Azorno

by Inger Christensen

Set in modern Europe, the novel is about five women and two men. One of the men is a writer, the other is the main character of this novel. All of the women are pregnant by the main character. The questions then arise: who is the narrator? Has someone been killed? Is someone crazy? And, whose book is this anyway? The story ends with a struggle between two merged characters.

Genres: Fiction, Danish, Poetry, Scandinavian Literature, Classics, Literature, Novels

112 pages, paperback

First published January 1, 1967

About the author

Inger Christensen was born in Vejle, Denmark, in 1935. Initially she studied medicine, but then trained as a teacher and worked at the College of Art in Holbæk from 1963–64. Although she has also written a novel, stories, essays, radio plays, a drama and an opera libretto, Christensen is primarily known for her linguistically skilled and powerful poetry.

Christensen first became known to a wider audience with the volumes "Lys" (1962; Light) and "Græs" (1963; Grass), which are much influenced by the modernistic imagery of the 60s, and in which she is concerned with the location of the lyric "I" in relation to natural and culturally created reality. The flat, regular landscape of Denmark, its plants and animals, the beach, the sea, the snow-filled winters have determined the topography of many of her poems. Christensen has also been known internationally since the appearance of the long poem "Det" (1969; "it" 2006), a form of creative report on the merger of language and the world, which centres around the single word "it" and covers more than two hundred pages. The book clearly reveals the influence on Christensen's poetic work of such a range of authors as Lars Gustafsson, Noam Chomsky, Viggo Brøndal, R.D. Laing and Søren Kierkegaard. The analogy between the development of poetic language and the growth of life is, as in "Det", also the basic motif of the volume of poetry "Alfabet" (1981; Alphabet). In addition to the alphabet itself – which gives the book its title and provides a logical arrangement for its fourteen sections –, the structure is generated by the so-called Fibonacci series, in which every number consists of the sum of the preceding two. The composition reflects the theme exactly: while "Det" points to the story of creation and its "In the beginning was the Word", here the alphabet is a pointer to the "A and O" of the apocalypse.

The story of her life and work offers access to a poetry that is difficult and enigmatic, but simultaneously simple and elementary. Inger Christensen is one of the most reflecting, form-conscious poets of the present day, and her history of ideas also provides information on the paradox of lyric art; making legible through poetic means what must necessary remain illegible, and in this way wrestling a specific order from the universal labyrinth. Here the transitions between the poet and the essayist Christensen are fluid: just as lyrical figures and motifs give her essays a density of their own, figures of thought and configurations of ideas return as an organic component of the poems.

Reviews

[Aslı Can]

Dilini kimse bilmediği için derdini anlatamayan, olduğu yerde dönüp duran bir ejderha gibi. Ateşi, kendi kuyruğunu yakan bir ejderha.
Pullu, parlak ve asla anlaşılamayacak...

[Sinem A. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Danimarkalı kadın şairden deneysel bir novella... Kitabı ilk elime aldığımda çok darmadağın çok karmakarışık bir kitap olarak görüp nasıl bitecek diye kendi kendime sormuştum ama ikinci yarısında yanıldığımı anladım.

Bu kısa roman aslında kadın ve erkek ilişkileri üzerine evlilik üzerine bir güzelleme olarak okunabilirse de metnin değişik bir matematiğinin olması ilk başta okuma zorluğuna neden oluyor.
İlk 50 sayfadan sonra bu şiirsel matematiğe alışıyor ve 85. sayfadan sonra hikayenin ne olduğunu yazarın ne anlatmak istediğini çok açık bir şekilde anlıyoruz. Yazar bu 85. sayfadan sonraki bölümü yazmasaydı sanırım konuyu netleştirmek epey zor olacak metin bir şiir gibi kalacaktı hafızamda.

Beş değişik kadın, beş değişik gül türü, bitkiler, renkler, tekrar eden sözcükler, olaylar, nesneler, adresler...
Masal masal içinde; romanın yazarı aslında romanın kahramanı; romanın kahramanı da aslında romanın yazarı.. bir sürü olay aslında tek bir olay, bir sürü kişi aslında tek bir ikili..

Deneysel matematiksel şiirsel anlatımları sevenlere tavsiye edebilirim, değişik bir deneyim olacaktır.

[Radioread · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bekleyiş (sözcüğünün) özünü, altın bahçenin yontusu kılığında görmek güzeldi. O bahçenin gülleriyle ulaşılan desenler ise ağrının özüne benzer. Yaşanabilen ama yazılamayan uçucu yoğunluklara böyle selam verilebilir. Buna şiir deniyor; başka birileri, uzunyazı dünyasında deneysel der. Altın gül, bir yumruğun açılışı gibi sessizlik (sözcüğünü) önerir ve dönmeye başlar. İçine ikinci bir ruh sığmış gebe kadınlar gibi şeffaf baktığını görebilirsiniz. Ben gördüm. Kadife yaprakların iç yüzeylerinde saklı yaşamalar kat kat örtüşürken, birbirlerinin yerine geçiyorlardı. Ya da hepsi birdi. Güzeldi.

Aşk dışında her şeyin erimiş plastik kıvamı almaya başladığı buluşma noktasında kitap tarafından okundum ve Azorno’yla birlikte tek başıma aynı adrese doğru yola çıktım.

[Hakan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Danimarkalı yazar Inger Christensen’in 1967 tarihli bu kısa romanı hakkındaki duygularım karışık; aşk-nefret ilişkisi anlamında. Okurken bıraksam mı diye düşündürdü, bulanıklığından ve tekrarlarından ötürü. Farklı bir metin. Müphem, iç içe geçmiş, var olup olmadıkları bile belli olmayan karakterler. Eliptik ama güçlü bir anlatım, üslup. Yaratma edimi de kitabın ana derdi sanırım. Farklı ve de kaliteli bir şey okumak isteyenlere önerilir. Keyif alacağınızın garantisi ise verilmez:) Bu arada böylesine zorlu bir metni özgün dilinden mükemmel bir biçimde çeviren Murat Alpar’a da şapka çıkaralım.

[Joseph Schreiber · Rating 4 out of 5]

Writing about the nature of poetry, Inger Christensen says: "But poems aren’t made out of experiences, or out of thoughts, ideas, or musings about anything. Poems are made out of words." After my first encounter with her fiction, I wonder how much the same approach applies. Azorno is a novella composed of words, images, and phrases that repeat and are reformed, echoing through the apparent voices of either multiple narrators, or characters within a novel being written by one of the characters. But who? Like a deeply nested puzzle, the natural impulse is to try and keep track, sort out the voices and characters to try to determine who is who. To figure out if someone is dead, if someone else is crazy. The narrative voices themselves seem to be aware that they are potentially part of a greater narrative by virtue of their connection to one man. To complicate matters five of the characters are women and they are all pregnant by the same man. Or are they? Are they even distinct or fictional creations? As the narrative proceeds and the mystery deepens it is best to let go of the impulse to track "reality" and just go with the flow. Not unlike reading Can Xue.
My full review can be found here: https://roughghosts.com/2025/03/30/th...

[Sebnem · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kuzey her anlamda değişik bir coğrafya. Edebiyatı da öyle. Azorno, uzun zamandır okuduğum en iyi kitap. Farklılığıyla sizi çarpıyor. Benzeri bir hissi daha önce Norveçli Per Petterson'u okurken de hissetmiştim. Şimdi Danimarkalı Christensen'i okurken de aynı şeyi hissediyorum. Geri dönülmeyi kesinlikle gerektiren bir yer Kuzey.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hold da op! Jeg ved slet ikke, hvad jeg skal mene om denne roman i en roman (i en roman i en roman i en roman i en roman), og jeg er slet ikke i stand til at referere handlingen (og "romanreferater lyder som sladder om andre menneskers privatliv," som det siges på en af de første sider), så lad mig i stedet blot citere fra bagsideteksten:

Azorno handler om fem kvinder, som alle har et forhold til den samme mand, forfatteren Sampel. Alle fem venter barn med ham. Alle fem er ved at skrive en roman, som skal handle om fem kvinder og en mand ved navn Sampel. Sampel skriver også på en roman. De fem kvinder mødes, og i breve beskriver de møderne for hinanden

Azorno består altså dels af en række breve og dels af romanfragmenter. Det, der blandt andet (og især) gør romanen forvirrende at læse er, at alle karaktererne er første persons fortællere i deres respektive romaner, men hvem der skriver, nævnes kun i en bisætning, hvis det da overhovedet nævnes, og det er derfor en roman, som kræver en opmærksom og tålmodig læser. Imidlertid synes Christensen at være mere optaget af, hvordan der fortælles, end hvem der fortæller, og det er netop måden, den fortælles på, der gør den så uforglemmelig.

For på trods af teksternes indbyrdes forskelligheder, er de forbundet via en række detaljer: en buket brogede tulipaner, en salat, en sandstensskulptur. Sætninger og afsnit optræder ligeledes i først den ene tekst, så den anden og antager en besværgende såvel som musikalsk karakter. En følelse af deja-vu vil unægteligt ramme læseren. Azorno er udspekuleret komponeret, drillende skrevet af Inger Christensen, der bevidst leger kispus med læseren og rykker ved vores forventninger til romangenren. Der er ingen tvivl om, at det er en roman for de få, men det skal ikke afholde mig fra at anbefale den. Det er også en bog, som tigger om at blive læst mere end én gang, og derfor glæder jeg mig allerede til at genlæse den og forhåbentligt blive klogere på, hvad der foregår mellem linjerne - og på linjerne, frem for alt.

[jeremy · Rating 4 out of 5]

danish poet and novelist inger christensen was widely considered a strong contender for the nobel prize before her death at 73 in january of 2009. azorno was written in the late 1960's, but has only now, some four decades later, found its way into english translation. perhaps best described as a metafictional work, azorno is a labyrinthine novel where the line between author, narrator, and character blurs quite easily. the reader is never quite certain whether the reality as presented on the page is part of the novel penned by one of the characters or by the author herself. recollections of events are portrayed from slightly varied perspectives, leaving the reader to ponder whether the characters are mistaken in their memories, the narrator confused, or whether christensen herself is the one obfuscating. the use of repetitive language and observation is powerfully wielded, allowing a sense of foreboding to languish throughout the book. reality and the perception of reality coalesce in a way that leaves the reader enchanted, wanting as much as the characters (or is it the narrator? or christensen?) to understand who is whom. the effects of this slim work are dizzying, but its charm lies in the fact that the reader, character, narrator, and even the author, are all at the same disadvantage to understand what is real and what is fiction. azorno is a unique, carefully crafted novella that is as challenging as it is delightful.

[Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kan ikke rigtig beskrives, for på den ene side er der ingen handling, på den anden side er der sådan, 7 handlingsforløb på samme tid. Men man kan i hvert siges at 'Azorno' minder en del om Inger Christensens lyrik og hendes systemdigtning. Selvom hun gentager de samme sætninger igen og igen og alle personerne på en måde er én, men så alligevel ikke, bliver bogen på ingen måde kedelig, men det tror jeg nu også er en smagssag.

[Ploni Almoni · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mennesket er 1) skabt af formen 2) skaber af formen

Sådan lyder grundtesen, der åbner Inger Christensens postmoderne mesterværk Azorno, og det er motivet om iscenesætteren overfor iscenesættelsen, der mere end noge andet dominerer hendes hvirvlende roman. En roman, hvor 5 kvinder, alle forelskede og alle gjort gravide af samme mand forfatteren (Sampel), kæmper om at optræde som den sande jeg-fortællerstemme ....

På papiret lyder det måske lige til den fortænkte side, som en tekst der er mere formeksperiment end roman, og det er Azorno måske også, altså fortælleren bryder den 4. væg allerede i første sætning: "jeg har ladet mig fortælle, at jeg er den kvinde Azorno møder allerede på side 8." ....

Men Inger Christensens helt uforlignelige sprog hæver formeksperimentet fra postmoderne leg med fortællerstemme og 60'er typisk tekst-om-tekst tekst til en egentlig sammensmeltning af ord og fænomen.

Det skyldes ikke mindst, at teksten både er smuk, som de bleggrønne tulipaner i tivoli og de brogede tulipaner i vaserne, men også sært rituel, som når elementer af kvindernes liv konstant gentager sig, spejler sig og hvirvles ind i hinanden, til et punkt hvor man som læser bliver i tvivl om ikke man sidder og læser den samme side igen..Og netop, der hvor det skønne og det rituelle i menneskelivet væves tæt sammen med tekstens eksperimenterende jeg-kæde-form, træder Inger Christensens særegne menneskesyn frem, hvori mennesket udgør en del af verden, der både ser, bliver set, og ønsker at se og blive set ❤️

Via Napoli...

[Vilde Melchior Rødder · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Det var disse ord der pludrede og mumlede på et sprog jeg ikke kendte og ikke forstod, det var denne døsen i sproget, der gang på gang fik mig til at tro, at der bag min ryg, et eller andet sted i haven, befandt sig et menneske, som netop nu gjorde netop dette notat for at bruge det i arbejdet med en roman om mig, mens jeg gjorde det for at bruge det i arbejdet med min roman om Sampel.
Man kunne få den tanke, at sproget således uanfægtet fortsatte sit eget liv, selv i de mest bearbejdede udtryk, og selv om der ustandselig blev gjort forsøg på at forhindre det i overgreb mod friheden til at opleve."
- s.143-144

[Jale · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bizim güzel Inge'miz tadında bir kitap olduğunu düşündüğüm için aldığım, okurken şiirsel bulduğum, akıcı ama zor, ne anlattığından tam emin olamadığım, temiz bir zihinle yeniden okunması gerektiğini düşündüğüm, parça parça hoşuma giden, ama bütün olarak anlam veremediğim bir romanla karşı karşıya kaldım. İki erkek, beş kadın mı, yoksa tek kadın mı olduğundan dahi emin olamadım.

[Ben · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a very interesting read, and I think it would reward a careful re-reading. While I found it confusing, I feel like one can read the short book as the fragmented reality of a writer who has trouble keeping his life and his plot-lines separate in his mind.

[Sibel Önal · Rating 4 out of 5]

Azorno, inanılmaz bir kitap! Küçücük bir kitap ama kurgusuyla sizi oradan oraya savuruyor. Kitabın matematiğini anlamak için çok çaba harcadım ilk başta ama aslında akışa bırakmak gerekiyormuş. Eğlenceli, akışkan ama zorlayıcı bir kitap. Böyle metinleri seviyorsanız bu kitabı çok seveceksiniz.

[Viktor · Rating 5 out of 5]

noget af det aller bedste jeg har læst i år!

[Olivia · Rating 4 out of 5]

The five women of Azorno are all caught in each other’s gazes. Running through the book they all, one after another, take control over the form of the text, crushing the previous woman’s narrative to dust, rebuilding it into something of their own. They all have a connection to the author Sampel and his character Azorno, who shows up variously in Copenhagen, in Rome, in the Swiss alps. It’s an insolvable link, writes one of the women of Sampel/Azorno, infiltrations of and by them both all the way to the bottom, and the book does experiment a lot with the concept of the author, their role in what is true, and the relationship between the writer and the written about. In many ways, this is a novel about the act of writing itself, the rhythm and movement inherent to it. We follow the way the whole is constructed from a myriad of impressions, how these impressions all contort and twist, turn up in new contexts, and assimilate into the new order of things.

And so in this way, Christensen hands the reader the pieces of a puzzle, one at a time, pieces that all seem like they could fit together in an endless number of combinations, with no indication of where to put any one piece. Reading Azorno is being engulfed in a tangled mass of roses, sunrooms, letters and fountains, all continuously being reborn, repeated and multiplied. The pieces we amass are put together and taken apart only to end up in new constellations, and we wonder if any of the emerging pictures is the true and intended finished puzzle, or if they all are.

Azorno is very much a poet’s novel, because Christensen was first and foremost a poet (one of the most important ones in modern Europe). The text comes soaked in bitter, green sap, confronting us with a merciless vegetation and the peculiar sense of fertility lurking in it. New branches shoot out of the mother plant, yellow pollen saturates the air, Azorno is an overgrown labyrinth made to walk through alone, but making your way through it you can sense the presence of the women navigating it before you. Christensen’s characters borrow each other’s names and bodies, building their narratives through other’s voices to crack open their own muteness and defeat the restrictions of language.

There is a calm to this labyrinth, like a quiet stillness where everything is seen through a tinted kaleidoscope. Azorno manages to express an atmosphere of solitude, and in my mind it should be read when alone, preferably in a garden. I’ll continue making my way through Christensen’s works.

[Humla · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bokens beskrivning här på goodreads är skamligt dålig! Häng med på en resa skulle jag vilja säga, du kommer vara frustrerad, men när man som minst fattar vem det är som berättar och vad det är som egentligen har hänt, kan man förlora sig i det hypnotiserande språket som förföljer mig konstant i min vardag sedan jag läste färdigt.

[Ben · Rating 5 out of 5]

A love story as if told (and retold and retold...) through a broken mirror or kaleidoscope, or perhaps a kaleidoscope with a cracked lens. The effect is breathtaking.

Within a second my blood, thoughts, nerves, and senses were swept back ten years and I felt like a diver who finds himself at the bottom of the ocean one minute and on solid ground the next, unable to hear whether the others are saying he's alive or dead because he's encapsulated in a silence as vast as if he'd brought the ocean up with him and it surrounded me now like a huge bell, and Azorno came whirling into it, without drowning, grabbed me in his rush and swung me around, laughing. Then we walked on into the gardens with our arms around each other.
The big trees' shadows slid peacefully over and past us while Azorno spoke about the imagery of certain artists, about water and water lilies, parasols and white clouds and fabrics, a wealth of the kind of luminous, tangible things that are supposed to evoke the intangible, and which now had suddenly assembled in one specific place in the world, resting around us like a bell, Azorno said, a silence.

[Sara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Leí este libro por primera vez hace algo más de tres años y me fascinó a la par que me desconcertó tanto como ha vuelto a hacerlo esta vez. Entonces lo leí después de leer Malina de Bachmann y encontré alguna que otra resonancia en la temática con el libro de Ingeborg. Hoy vuelvo a encontrar esas resonancia y sin embargo me sigue desconcertando de una forma que Malina ya no lo hace.

Sigo sin saber qué pensar. Pienso que tiene muchas capas y que es difícil desentrañar todas ellas. O que quizá es muy fácil y simplemente es intuitivo y que en el fondo sé lo que ocurre aunque no lo pueda explicar.

[Shawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Weird. You have no idea what's really going on until the end of the book. Who is writing the book? Which characters are real and which are characters in the book?

[Hakan İlker · Rating 3 out of 5]

Canımı çıkaran kitap...

[Apostolis Tourtouris · Rating 2 out of 5]

A book about writing a book.

I powered through this mess out of sheer respect for the author and hope that it may make sense eventually, as the summary in the back cover implied. I didn't give it 1 star out of sheer respect of the author. Let me tell you about it, without spoiling anything inportant.

A book about five charachters or maybe six who claim to be six although they are one even though it doesn't really matter, because the reader and perhaps the writer as well is not aware who is writing and therefore the six characters who are actually one or maybe two have absolutely no distinct feature in their writing and there is no way to find out who's narrating each chapter although it doesn't matter cause the writer is actually just one, behind the mask of five, six or god knows how many names.

If all this bunch of bollocks above confused you, don't read this book. If you aren't interested in reading 114 pages of slightly altered but actually copy-pasted descriptions of a room, a salad, a café, don't read this book. If you aren't looking for a book just to say you're reading a book you'll throw away after the holidays, don't read this book. This is... this is just terrible man! Go play a video game or something.

[Eva · Rating 4 out of 5]

Experimentell roman (från 1967), mer som prosalyrik, ständiga omtagningar, som musik, modernistisk språkdans, utan samhällskontext, även omman kan anan en kvinnlig önskan om frigörelse.

[reegan]

i really have no idea what i just read, but it was kind of fun

[Jonas · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing, as good as her poetry, which is really just unfair. How can one person have this much talent.

[Mehmet · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bu kitabı konusu veya yazarı için değil, sadece kapağını ve ismini beğendiğim için aldım. Neyle karşılaşacağımı da hiç bilmiyordum (Nahide Dikel'e teşekkürler).

Tuhaf bir kitap. Borges'i ve benzeri yazarları bilmesem belki daha çok severdim. Çekici bir yanı var ama okurken çok dağıldım. Güzel yanı deneysel bir roman olması, kötü yanı romanda kötü bir deney yapılması. Yine de çevirmeni kutlarım, (Henrik Nordbrandt ve Peter Paulsen çevirilerini çok sevmiştim) kuzeyin serinliğini ve mesafesini taşıyan, temiz bir Türkçe ile çevirmiş. Kitabın sonundaki Kierkegaard alıntısı ise mükemmel! Edebiyatın böyle güzel bir yanı var, el ele veren, okuyana da uzanan bir köprü.

[Martin Ledstrup · Rating 4 out of 5]

The prose of Inger Christensen tends to be lesser accessible than her poetry. Counter-intuitively, somehow, prose is where Inger experiments. This goes not least for Azorno. Her grasp of the in-between space of language and world is profound, also in this book, but I find it lesser complete, lesser solid than her poetry (at least from 'It' onwards). Or perhaps it's the other way around: the form is too constructed, so it doesn't quite flutter like her poetry.

[Katrine B. · Rating 2 out of 5]

A very confusing and... special book. In the start it's very hard to keep up with but as you read on you kind of grow into the book. You feel what the women feel. You start to think like the women think.
I'm sure it has a deep and meaningful purpose but I didn't catch it and I'm not sure I will if I read it again.

[Zach · Rating 5 out of 5]

Holy shit. This book is amazing. And hard to describe. It is constructed almost symphonically, with motifs repeated within a series of variations. A few basic narrative elements are told and retold, but morph into contradictory stories. Yeah, I'm failing pretty bad at describing this. Just go read it, and then describe it to me so I can do a better job the next time.

[Johan Thilander · Rating 5 out of 5]

Azorno hade så lätt kunnat vara klyschig och pseudointellektuell i händerna på en sämre författare, men Christensen är så jäkla formsäker. Jag kommer inte ens försöka beskriva denna kalejdoskopiska "hönan eller ägget"-roman, men jag tyckte så väldigt, väldigt bra om den. Kommer att läsa om den flera gånger, en text som aldrig tar slut.