‘A book is like a battery that passes on energy'

Ukrainian author Andrey Kurkov on how he became a children’s writer while working as a prison guard in the Soviet Union

- Pooja Bhula

A few months ago, Ukrainian novelist Andrey Kurkov, who speaks six languages and is published in 65 countries, was on his maiden Mumbai trip to helm a writing workshop. Attendees described it as a riveting performance. With his hand gestures, face expressions and words forming visuals, he showed them how to tell stories and question conventions. When Soviet tradition enforced socialist reality and uncompromising monochrome characters, Kurkov wrote short stories in Russian with black humour and grey characters. Unsurprisingly, publishers weren’t flocking to him. But after the Soviet Union’s fall, his books, such as The Milkman in the Night and The President’s Last Love, gained popularity.

Kurkov returned from Mumbai “amazed by the size and noise of the city”. In view of the Covid-19 pandemic, he left Kiev for his village of Lazarivka, preferring the countryside’s quiet comfort to the panic in the Ukrainian capital. Excerpts from an interview with BLink.

We’re always told, ‘the more you read, the better you write’. But you hold a different view...