Nobel Prize in Literature | Jon Fosser, "Autumn Dreams": See the light through the cracks

On October 5, 2023 at 13:00 local time (19:00 Beijing time), Stockholm, Sweden, the Swedish Academy awarded the 2023 Nobel Prize in Literature to Norwegian playwright Jon Fosse for his "innovative drama and prose to give voice to the unspeakable."

Norwegian playwright Jon Fosse

In recent years, Ibsen Prize winner and Norwegian playwright Jørn Fausser has been one of the popular candidates for the Nobel Prize in Literature, and no playwright has won the Nobel Prize in Literature after Harold Pinter.

Following Someone Coming, another collection of plays by Norwegian playwright Jørn Fauser Autumn Dreams: Selected Plays by Jon Fauser was published by Shanghai Translation Press. On April 23, 2016, the premiere ceremony of "Autumn Dreams: Selected Plays of Jon Fausser" was held at Jewelvary Art & Boutique, and Norwegian Prime Minister in Shanghai Ouyang Wen, Ibsen International Head Feng Yi, translator Zou Lulu and others attended and spoke.

Cover of Autumn Dreams: Selected Plays by Jon Fauther

The most famous playwright in the European and American theater scene

Born in 1959, Jørn Fausser is the most prestigious living playwright in contemporary European and American theater and has been recognized by the European and American theater community as the Norwegian playwright who has contributed the most to the world after Ibsen. In 1994, Fausser's theatrical productions premiered for the first time at the Bergen State Theatre. Over the next 20 years, his plays have been translated into more than 40 languages and performed more than 1,000 times worldwide.

Jørn Fuser was born in Haugesund, a small town south of Bergen, a cultural city on the west coast of Norway, in the Nordic country, where the fjords in front of him and the mountains behind him became the background of his life. He learned his own language, and the language nurtured by this landscape is present in every line of his writing. "Child" and "sea" became two recurring themes in his writing. Most of his characters are trapped in a "non-space," and they all seem to wear masks that represent anyone, conveying a sense of alienation and detachment.

"Fausser's work has its own unique temperament and rhythm, some of the content is repeated many times, the dialogue is like a slow train, you never know where to stop." Norwegian Prime Minister in Shanghai, Ouyang Wen, impromptu recited excerpts from Fasser's works and talked about his feelings about Fausser's works. He believes that these contents in Fausser's plays create a small space, "There is tension and anxiety in this space, but it is always changing, and different characters bring different changes into the space to make everyone feel more." Tranquility, nature, and human connection, Fauser created such a space for the work and the reader, and today this space is expanded in Shanghai. Translating and publishing Jon Fausser's work into Chinese is a special and important project. ”

The publication of Autumn Voices was promoted by Ibsen International Norway with the aim of recommending the works of Norwegian playwrights to China. Ibsen International introduced Jørn Fausser's work to China in 2010 and successfully staged it at the Shanghai Drama Arts Centre. "I first came into contact with Fausser 15 years ago and I was deeply shocked. I am honored to spread his work in China. "Fausser's work makes viewers and readers alike expend their energy to explore and search, looking for the problems inherent in these characters, involving his hopes and troubles." Fausser's work deals with the common problems facing human beings, including death, love, and suffering, so let's extend and discover the meaning. All of this forms a silhouette that allows humanity to share the problems that each person faces, regardless of language and cultural background. The human condition, the inner struggles and the beautiful fragility make us feel together. ”

Translated by Zou Lulu. Photo courtesy of Zhu Wenle

Writer of "minimalism"

Because he was also a Norwegian national treasure playwright, Jørn Fausser was often opposed to Ibsen, but Fausser believed that he was more influenced by Beckett, the representative of the absurdist. Fausser said in an interview that he is more of an "existential" or "minimalist" writer. His writing is all about the essence of life, the most basic emotions, the most essential situations.

Zou Lulu, the translator of "Autumn Dream", believes that all the dialogue in Fausser's plays is monologues, "often seen on the stage of Jon Fausser, where characters struggle to communicate with each other. "That's why his work feels lonely. But Zou Lulu does not think Fawther's work is negative: "Canadian singer and writer Leonard Cohen once said: 'Everything has cracks, but only then can light come in.'" On the surface, Fausser's plays, novels, and poems seem to describe the rifts in each of our lives, like the love and loss, frustration, and communication we experience in our lives... All the pain of life, and the dark moments that cannot be forgotten. But as a translator, I love Mr. Fausser's work because I see light through the rift, and I want you to see the light as I do, which represents compassion, hope, love, the hope of distant peace, and the desire in each of us to be reconciled with ourselves and with the world. ”

The published "Autumn Dream" includes four scripts: "Autumn Dream", "I Am the Wind", "Shadow" and "And We Will Never Be Separated". "Autumn Dream" is composed of many scenes spliced one by one, and throughout the performance, all five characters in the play appear on stage, and there is no separate plot describing individual stories. The two characters in "I Am the Wind" (or maybe just one split into two) float at sea in a broken boat with little food and water by their side. The story takes place when one of them intends to head out for the high seas. Suddenly, the islands in the distance were filled with thick fog and turbulent waters, taking them on a mysterious and unknown fantasy journey. The play splits reality with an unimaginable singularity. The reciprocal chanting between the two and the unusual sensitivity of complex relationships together constitute a highlight of the show. Although it seems that the fates of the two are closely linked, they are actually individuals who have lost their way in their own lonely world.

Some people find his drama depressing, and Fawser can't deny that. But he also refuses to interpret his work: "I sit down, I listen, I write everything I hear." Before I started writing, I had no idea about the whole story and the characters in it. It was a great experience. I delved into the unknown and brought back something that was once unknown. ”

A journey in dialogue with the Fauser soul

"I had already started writing the script of "Autumn Dream" before 2009, I completed the first draft in 2010, and in 2014 we cooperated with the Shanghai Art Center on the 'Fuse's Blossoms' series of performances. The final draft was for the publication of Volume II. Translator Zou Lulu told The Paper that "Autumn Dream" is her favorite Fauser screenplay work, and it is also the play she has spent the longest time translating, "Another one I also love is "I Am the Wind". We Will Never Be Separated was Fauther's first screenplay, though not the first he wrote. There is also "Shadow", which has also been performed a lot around the world. ”

Zou Lulu first came into contact with Fauser in 2004. At that time, although Fauser was well-known in the European and American theater circles, he was not yet well-known in the Chinese world. At that time, an old educator and artist from the theater industry went to Norway and brought back Fause's play "Someone is Coming" and gave it to Zou Lulu for translation. Zou Lulu recalled the first time he saw the script, "I felt that I was 'banged' by a large rock flying from outside the sky." She threw the script in a drawer and locked it, not daring to read it for three months, "I never thought that anyone would understand the deepest corner of my heart, the darkest, most painful, most real feeling of life." I never thought that there was a second person in this world who felt the same way as you, who came from the end of the world, was so far away from you, was still a man, or wrote in another language. After plucking up the courage to translate this work, Zou Lulu never stopped.

Since 2010, Zou Lulu has gone all out to make Fausser's works available on the Chinese stage, "first in the Shanghai Theater Academy, in cooperation with the Shanghai Drama Art Center in 2010, first arranged "Name", and then in 2014 we made 'The Blossom of Fuser'".

Zou Lulu believes that the biggest difficulty in translating Fause's works lies in the rhythm of his language. His language is so minimalist that at first glance everyone can write it, and some people question whether Fasser's work really has depth, "but someone once imitated his style and wrote it as a joke." Because beneath the surface of the seemingly minimalist language, in fact, the most difficult thing to present is the rhythm and musicality of his language, Fausher himself has dabbled in music and painting, and I think his true essence is a poet. He has also published many books of poetry and won awards, so his plays and novels are very poetic, rhythmic, and musical, which is the most challenging part of translation. For example, in the seemingly simplest language, how do you present the sense of music and rhythm. His entire theatrical world is unified, so there is also a connection between his plays and scripts (at least between the 9 scripts that you can see). Therefore, his rhythm and musicality are not only between the lines of a script, but later it seems that he feels that in fact, between the two scripts, there is also a rhythmic and musical continuation. This situation is not something that every writer can encounter in translation, and I think it is a growing challenge. ”

In the process of translating Fawser's works, Zou Lulu constantly talks to Fausser. In 2009, Zou Lulu met Fausher for the first time. At that time, Fauther's 50th birthday, the Bergen International Arts Festival held a special event "Fausher 50", which was celebrated throughout the country. At the event, Zou Lulu met the writer herself, who had been in Bergen for nearly two weeks and has been communicating with Fausher ever since.

It is a pity that Zou Lulu's translation was translated from English, but his acquaintance with Fausher made up for it to the greatest extent. Fausser himself is a professional literary translator and is fluent in many languages. He translated many plays and other literary works himself, as well as the Bible. Therefore, Zou Lulu can discuss a lot of professional translation problems with him, "I can ask him about very small things, to pick out the details, he calls me 'problem machine', I have almost annoyed him to death over the years." Because he is also a literary translator, our dialogue is very easy, and I believe that Chinese reader will be able to read a version that is very much in line with his original intention and spirit. ”

The forthcoming third Fawser novel, Morning and Night, was chosen by Fauther, "He said, 'Lelu, you want to translate this,' because it was one of his favorite novels." Of course, we hope that after volume three, there will be more things for Chinese readers and audiences to see in the future, and maybe we can make a collection of poems by Jon Fausser. ”

"Fauser is particularly interested in Chinese culture and religion." Zou Lulu told The Paper, "We still have a little dream: when everyone is free, I will translate the ancient Chinese poems into English, and then he will translate them into Norwegian." He is very interested in Chinese Buddhism, in fact, his works are a bit like Chinese painting. He has also been to China and has a great longing for Chinese culture. ”