"It occurs to me that what pushes people to lie and falsify is precisely the pressure to tell the truth. This is something I understood implicitly when I insisted all there was to know about my great uncle Hrolf was contained in his glass eye. It was impossible to know with certainty what the solution to his character was. And forcing the discovery of facts, pushing too hard, would deaden the chance for illumination."
Thursday, January 28, 2010
The Brothers Kramm
A soldier takes aim on the Eastern Front, and somehow the bullet strikes home again and gain, for generations to come. The Brothers Kramm is a new story which you can find in the 'False Papers: Biography and Real Life' issue of Queen's Quarterly (Winter 2009). The Brothers Kramm, both soldiers, who served in the Third Reich, are Eva's brother's brothers-in-law (sorry, you'll need to do the math in your head). Here's a quote from near the end of my story:
Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Ottawa Book Award Winner
Eva picked up the Ottawa Book Award - fiction category - in October.
Jury Statement:
“A compelling and unique blend of fiction and memoir, Eva’s Threepenny Theatre explores the life of Steinmetz’s great-aunt Eva through her tumultuous childhood in Germany before the Second World War, to her involvement in Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera, to her life in post-war Berlin and her old age in Canada. In an extraordinary feat of form echoing content, the story is told in shards, like glass shattered during Kristellnacht. At times devastating and poignant, at times hilarious, this book is brilliant and profound.”
Jury Statement:
“A compelling and unique blend of fiction and memoir, Eva’s Threepenny Theatre explores the life of Steinmetz’s great-aunt Eva through her tumultuous childhood in Germany before the Second World War, to her involvement in Brecht’s The Threepenny Opera, to her life in post-war Berlin and her old age in Canada. In an extraordinary feat of form echoing content, the story is told in shards, like glass shattered during Kristellnacht. At times devastating and poignant, at times hilarious, this book is brilliant and profound.”
Friday, October 2, 2009
Finalist for the Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Award
Eva’s Threepenny Theatre is a finalist for the 2009 Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize. Established in 1997, the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize recognizes Canadian writers of exceptional talent for the year’s best novel or short story collection.
The other finalists are Nicole Brossard for Fences in Breathing, translated by Susanne de Lotbiniere-Harwood; Douglas Coupland for Generation A; Alice Munro for her short story collection Too Much Happiness; Annabel Lyon for The Golden Mean. For more information about the award, visit The Writers' Trust.
All of the 2009 finalists will read during the International Festival of Authors in Toronto on October 28, 2009. Tickets for the event can be purchased online through the IFOA website.The prize winner will be announced at the Writers' Trust Awards on November 24, 2009 at the Isabel Bader Theatre in Toronto.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
rob mclennan's 12 or 20 Questions
rob mclennan has posted 12 or 20 Questions: with Andrew Steinmetz on his blog. Below is an excerpt:
Q9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
A9 - Hold on to the boat.
Q13 - What was your most recent Hallowe'en costume?
A13 - Salman Rushdie.
Q16 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
A14 - Play attacking midfield for Arsenal FC alongside Arshavin and Fabregas.
Q18 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
A18 - When you write you don’t have to open your mouth.
Had enough? NO, then go here.
Q9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
A9 - Hold on to the boat.
Q13 - What was your most recent Hallowe'en costume?
A13 - Salman Rushdie.
Q16 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
A14 - Play attacking midfield for Arsenal FC alongside Arshavin and Fabregas.
Q18 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
A18 - When you write you don’t have to open your mouth.
Had enough? NO, then go here.
Thursday, June 11, 2009
Montreal Review of Books
Mary Soderstrom reviews Eva in Montreal Review of Books.
This is a lovely book, with its thick, rich paper, its French flaps, and its bold red and black graphics. The book's physical appearance cries out for the reader to stop and take careful account of what is written in the pages.
Full review here.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Life is what happens when you read, Fiction is what happens when you write
Alex Good of Good Reports.net calls Eva's Threepenny Theatre 'a highly original reflection on memoir'.
One of the hallmarks of what's come to be known as literary postmodernism is the shift of attention away from texts as something made and onto the conditions of their making, emphasizing process over product. In some ways it's akin to the playwright Bertolt Brecht's goal of alienation, deliberately making the audience aware that what they are watching is something constructed by taking them behind the scenes or in some other way outside of their comfort zone. The goal? "To represent the familiar as unfamiliar." The method? "Estrangement, disharmony, detachment."
Which is one way of introducing Eva's Threepenny Theatre, a "fiction about memoir" wherein Andrew Steinmetz reflects upon the life of his great-aunt Eva and (though he fails to get equal billing in the title) grandfather Hermann Hans. Exactly how much of the story is fiction and how much memoir is impossible to say. Steinmetz inserts himself as a character into the narrative - sitting at a table with Eva and recording her voice on a tape recorder, digging into his own memory vault to bring the family chronicle up to date - but even here he doesn't tip his hand. Indeed as the book progresses it becomes harder to figure out who is supposed to be talking, as though the narrative's proscenium arch - Steinmetz's or "Steinmetz's" own point of view - had quietly dissolved.
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