Writer’s main ambition is that your books encourage more books – Oksana ZABUZHKO during Art Club “Faces”

Talking about the new book Conversation with Oksana ZABUZHKO, which is getting ready for publication in collaboration with the Polish journalist Isabella Chru?li?ska, Oksana noted that the project unlikely would come to be, if not for the success of The Museum of Abandoned Secrets in Poland. “This is the best example of how the book creates a book,” she emphasized.

“I treated this project with enthusiasm because it is a portrait book and I do not have to write memoirs,” joked renowned writer. Oksana expressed her hope that this book will stimulate Ukrainian journalists and publishers since such genre is not very developed in Ukraine, despite the fact that in Poland it is becoming more popular. “This is a separate category, where there is a very fine line between journalism and literature,” she stressed. 

“For the whole week we lived in an old castle, and from dawn to dusk we were talking with Isabella Chru?li?ska, who, in preparation for this work, read all my books in the original. According to her plan, she recorded our conversations on tape, and went home with more than forty old-fashioned heavy cassettes. Then for a long time Ms. Iza deciphered, making text out of the conversation, and then I edited, wrote additions and refined. And that took two and a half months, “back-breaking” work on the computer,” said the writer about joint work on the book. 

“The book will be released somewhere around 250 pages and I will not present it because it is in Polish and it's not my text. They are my thoughts and my words, but the presentation is still of the Polish journalist. Good news for the Ukrainian audience - the publisher has plans to translate the book into Ukrainian and publish it before the end of this year,” said Oksana.

Zabuzhko has noted that she is pleasantly surprised at the results of such cooperation and praised the talent of the co-author to ask the right questions. “I hope the reader will be interested,” writer added, noting that besides Poles, German publishers also expressed their interest in the book. 

FOR YOUR INFORMATION: The Art Club “Faces,” established by Arseniy Yatsenyuk Foundation “Open Ukraine” in partnership with the creative place “Chasopys” is a platform for communication and exchange of experience of Ukrainian and foreign writers, musicians, artists, designers, filmmakers, photographers and other cultural representatives.