The Believer Book of Writers Talking to Writers in Dutch!

I’ve had my eye on this intriguing beauty by McSweeney’s for quite some time so I was mildly ecstatic when I found a copy for €5 at the Boekenfestijn. Ok, it was a translation but for €5 I lowered my standards. Big mistake! At home I discovered that the cover was slowly detaching itself from the rest of the book and that the ignorant bastards at Lebowski publishing actually decided to cut 12 of the original 23 interviews because some authors just weren’t popular enough in Belgium and the Netherlands which is simply outrageous.

The entire concept behind this book is getting to know your favorite authors better and discovering new ones, a concept which was brutally violated by the puritanical censorship of Lebowski who believe that award-winning writers like John Banville, Orhan Pamuk, Marjan Satrapi, Richard Powers and Tom Stoppard just to name a few, aren’t good enough.

The 11 conversations that did make the cut, are inspiring, funny, thought-provoking and somewhat dull (sorry Lydia Davis). Authors like Paul Auster, Ian McEwan, Haruki Murakami, David Sedaris and many more share personal information about what drives them, their writing habits and also talk about their latest novels. Now, the interviews were originally published in The Believer between 2005 and 2007 making some information very dated to say the least. The best example is the David Foster Wallace piece. This talented author committed suicide two years ago but is one of the lucky few who survived the Dutch downsizing. His talk with Dave Eggers is simply heart-breaking considering he was still full of hope at the time.

I personally believe that translating this book was a completely useless, not to mention infuriating, endeavor. By waiting so long, the information is out of date and creates a heard all that before feeling yet certain personal questions remain interesting but it’s not enough to make this book actually work. The original (uncensored) version which was published several years ago will without a doubt have been a treat to read back in the day. Sadly, interviews are quickly dated making them lose some of their relevance, no matter how good they are. All I can say for now is, beware of the Dutch version which is appalling, simply appalling!