Lithouse Podcast

Igoni Barrett is a Nigerian writer of novels and short stories, especially well known for his award-winning novel 2015 Blackass. In 2014, he was named on the Hay Festival's Africa39 list of African writers under 40. Barrett is also part of the House of Literature's artistic council, advising in our project to promote African literature.This is Igoni Barrett's reading list:Abdulrazak Gurnah, Afterlives (Etterliv)Zoe Wicomb, You Can’t Get Lost in Cape Town (Ingen går seg vill i Cape Town)Toni Morrison, The Bluest Eye (De blåeste øyne)                                   JazzAlex Haley, Roots (Røtter)Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man (Usynlig mann)Yambo Ouloguem, Le devoir de violence (Bound To Violence)Mohamed Mbougar Sarr, La plus secrète mémoire des hommes (Menneskenes mest fordekte minne)   Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for

What do the Mings, The Rameses’, the Romanovs, the Assads and the Clintons have in common? They are all family dynasties who, for better or worse, have influenced the history of the world.Historian and writer Simon Sebag Montefiore is a formidable storyteller, and his detailed and engaging works about historical figures such as Catherine the Great, Stalin and the Romanovs have earned him readers across the globe. In his most recent book, The World – A Family History of Humanity, his focus is no less than the entire world history, told through some of the most central family dynasties.More than an ambitious and grand project, Montefiore’s latest colossal publication is also an exploration and re-thinking of how we tell history. “World history often has themes, not people; biography has people, not themes,” as he writes in the book’s introduction.By emphasizing the family, he is able to combine the two – the great historical events with the stories of the people in the midst of it all. He also gi

Lecture by Denise DeCaires NarainThis lecture introduces two of the most prolific Caribbean women writers, Jean Rhys and Jamaica Kincaid, comparing their distinctive styles and thematic focus. Both writers have spoken of the significance of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre in their writing lives and the lecture will explore how this plays out in their work, particularly in their respective engagements with anger and madness.For many feminist critics, Bertha Mason, Jane Eyre’s “mad woman in the attic, encapsulates the fury of women excluded (or expelled) by patriarchal structures. In this lecture, Denise DeCaires Narain argues that the unique forms that Rhys and Kincaid deploy give shape to that fury in productive and stylish ways.Denise DeCaires Narain has worked at the University of Sussex for a number of years, where her research has focused especially on Caribbean writers and postcolonial literature. In this lecture, she offers a unique introduction to two of the most prominent writers

Leila Aboulela is a Sudanese writer, currently living in Scotland. She is the author of six award winning novels, including The Translator (1999), Bird Summons (2019) and River Spirit (2023), as well as a number of plays and short story collections. Aboulela was the first ever winner of the Caine Prize for Fiction, and an elected fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.This is Leila Aboulela’s reading list:Maaza Mengiste, The Shadow KingTayeb Salih, Season of Migration to the North                             The Wedding of ZeinNaguib Mahfouz, The Cairo Trilogy (Palace Walk, Palace of Desire, Sugar Street)                              The Thief and the dogs Ahdaf Soueif, In the Eye of the SunFatin Abbas, Ghost Season

Elizabeth Strout is one of the most distinct voices in contemporary American literature, and beloved by readers and critics alike. Her international breakthrough came with the novel Olive Kitteridge, which earned her the 2009 Pulitzer Prize, and which was later adapted into the award winning mini series of the same name. Since then, she has written four books in her Lucy Barton series; My Name Is Lucy Barton, Anything Is Possible, Oh, William! and Lucy by the Sea.Her Lucy novels tell stories about exposedness, poverty, grief and childhood trauma, but also about the value of hope, art and love. Lucy grows up in a poor and dysfunctional family in the Illinois countryside and becomes a writer against all odds. Through her village upbringing and different periods in Lucy’s life, the novels depicts her slow awakening as a writer, someone who tells stories, who gives the world meaning through language.In Strout’s novels and short stories, the great drama unfolds within unassuming everyday l

Elizabeth Strout is one of the most distinct voices in contemporary American literature, and beloved by readers and critics alike. She started writing at an early age, but it would take her many years to finally get published. Back then, her mantra was “just keep going”.This year, Strout’s debut novel, Amy and Isabelle, is finally available in Norwegian (translated by Hilde Rød-Larsen). Her international breakthrough came with the novel Olive Kitteridge, which earned her the 2009 Pulitzer Prize, and which was later adapted into the award-winning mini series of the same name. Since then, she has written four books in her Lucy Barton series; My Name Is Lucy Barton, Anything Is Possible, Lucy by the Sea and Oh, William! – which have earned Strout a reputation of an unafraid and deeply thoughtful writer.«You can’t write fiction and be careful,» Strout has said. Growing up in a small, rural town with a strict family – similarly to her beloved character Lucy Barton – books we

Writer and therapist Glenn Bech sparked a larger debate about class issues in Denmark with his autobiographical novel The Fathership (forthcoming in Hazel Evans’ translation) and his manifesto Jeg anerkænder ikke længere jeres autoritet (“I no longer recognize your authority”).The novel The Fathership depicts a brutal childhood characterized by violence, betrayals and toxic masculinity, but that also has a tenderness and love for the families and working class community portrayed. The novel was praised by the literary establishment, and the following year, Bech published Jeg anerkænder ikke længere jeres autoritet (“I no longer recognize your authority”), a furious manifesto about class struggle, the proletariat and the elite. In a self-scrutinizing, loud and emphatic prose, Bech rails against class contempt and the economic blind spots within the cultural middle class, showing the reader what it is like to be exposed, gay and poor.Masculinity, homophobia and

History is written by the victorious. But do we not also need to hear the story from the other side, from ordinary people caught in the middle of historical upheavals, forced to pick a side, or just try to survive? To those relegated to the footnotes in the history books, or not mentioned at all.This can be said to be the starting point for the novels of Sudanese-Scottish Leila Aboulela and Ethiopian-American Maaza Mengiste, both writing about historical events in their home countries.The backdrop in Aboulela’s new novel River Spirit is the dramatic time in the Sudan’s history in the late 19th century. In the span of just a few years, the country underwent several occupations, as well as a bloody revolution led by a man claiming to be al-Mahdi (the Islamic Messiah). Through a multitude of voices from different sides of the conflicts, and with the young orphaned girl Akuany as a turning point, Aboulela leads us through a central historical time in the Sudan.A young, poor woman is also

The year is 1949, and the state of Israel is in its infancy. In the Negev desert, bordering Egypt, Israeli armed forces have set up camp with the mission to “cleanse it of any remaining Arabs” after the war the preceding year. They happen upon a Beduin family, a teenage girl among them, whom the soldiers rape, kill and bury in the desert.In present-day Ramallah, a young woman discovers these events through a small newspaper story. It catches her attention because the events took place exactly 25 years before the day she was born. The woman becomes compelled to find out what actually happened in that desert, and embarks upon a highly dangerous journey to come to the bottom of the story.Adania Shibli is a critically acclaimed Palestinian writer, and holds a PhD in media and cultural studies. She has published three novels in Arabic, and Minor Detail is the first to be translated into Norwegian. While slim in size, the novel contains far more than the modest number of pages would suggest. Shibli e

Freedom of expression is never absolute, but subject to laws and social conventions. Threats to freedom of thought and speech can come directly from authoritarian states or religious institutions. But they can also be self-inflicted, in the form of self-censorship. Both forms of censorship exist in democracies as well as dictatorship, and often overlap.Throughout history, authors in particular have been made the object of the limitations set by powerful institutions, be it by explicit decree or through the trepidations felt at writing challenging or shocking literature.Few know this landscape better than historian, author and critic Ian Buruma. He has written a host of books on East Asian (especially Chinese and Japanese) culture and history, the West and Islam, and European history, including this year’s The Collaborators. Buruma is also highly respected columnist and critic for The New Yorker and The New York Review of Books, the latter of which he also served as editor-in-chief.This evening, Buruma will gi

The year is 1995, and 16 year old Shy is sneaking out of the rural boarding school for “difficult” boys, named “Last Chance”. A long history of petty crime, expulsions and frustrated family members has brought him here, but now it is all soon over. With a spliff in his pocket and his Walkman loaded with his drum ‘n’ bass favourites, he’s ready. His rucksack is filled with rocks, and his head is swimming with memories of all his failures and times he fucked it up.Shy is a compositionally ambitious and lyrical character study with troubled youth as its subject. Through frequent flashbacks and interjections, Shy provides us with glimpses of a difficult childhood leading to a young man at the verge of self-annihilation. Shy is a tender story of depression and not being able to fit in, told with great compassion and nuance. At the same time, the novel is a fervent ode to the outsiders of the 90s and to the culture and music that embraced them, those who no one else wanted.Max Porter i

Do you understand why I’ve decided to tell you about our family? If our stories survive, we will not die, even when our bodies are no longer here on this earth.The Vietnam war was a watershed event in the Cold War as well as in the West’s understanding of itself. But what does the story look like from a Vietnamese perspective?In Vietnam, the war is still a traumatic experience. This is what writer Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai explores in her novel The Mountains Sing, in which we alternately follow the girl Huong and her grandmother Diệu Lan.While the rest of the family has been scattered across the country, Huong and Diệu Lan tries to make it through the days with the help of stories. Huong disappears into books like Pinocchio and Treasure Island, or listens to her grandmother sharing her life story, where Nguyễn takes us through the history of Vietnam in the last hundred years, from a colony under Japan and the brutal reforms of the communist regime in the 1950s and through the horrific years of the Vietnam war. Is r

In some other world, in some other life, Pinto might’ve prayed in the morning, prayed his šaharit, prayed to be relieved of his abhorrent passion. But the only prayer that came to his mind now was to the Lord to let him keep Osman for the rest of time, for his voice to be the last thing he would hear before slipping into la gran eskuridad. Rafael Pinto is a young Jewish apothecary in Sarajevo, Bosnia, with big dreams and a penchant for opium. One summer day in 1914 he witnesses the assassination of archduke Franz Ferdinand, and suddenly Pinto is thrust into life as a soldier in the Great War. There he meets Osman, a handsome Muslim soldier who charms Pinto with his bravery and talent for storytelling, and between them blossoms a boundless love which shall follow them through the war and to the ends of the Earth.Aleksandar Hemon’s The World and All That It Holds is a grandiose historical novel that combines historical fact with a rich and fabulous prose. With events set in a multicultural Europe in great socia

A masseuse who rises in the ranks to become Himmler’s confidant. A cross-dressing princess who spies for Japanese secret police in China. A Dutch Jew who personally hands over his friends to the Nazis and the gas chambers.The Collaborators is the story of three most unusual lives, all of whom served the other side during World War II. But it is also the story of their legacies and the ways in which the writing of history can become the falsification of history: The Dutchman and the spy were both remembered as martyrs, while the masseuse was awarded the Red Cross Medal barely three years after the end of the war.Why were these people exempted from post-war reckoning and social stigma? How are they remembered today, and what do they tell us about how history is written and remembered?Ian Buruma is a Dutch historian, author and professor of human rights and journalism. In over four decades he has written popular and respected books on culture and history, with special emphasis on Europe, Japan and China. With bo

In the novel Glory, we find ourselves in the fictional country Jidada, which is peopled with all kinds of animals; bleating sheep, a confident pig preacher, vicious dogs making up the country’s security forces, and at the very top: the Old Horse, who has ruled the country with an iron hoof ever since independence. He is «the longest-serving leader in a continent of long-serving leaders, and indeed in the whole wide world».Author NoViolet Bulawayo has drawn inspiration both from George Orwell’s classic Animal Farm and the African tradition of animal fables in her allegorical story of Zimbabwe president Robert Mugabe’s fall.In a bubbling and playful language, where satirical quips, twitter updates and razor sharp observations all follow each other, Bulawayo tells the story of the coup against Mugabe as it plays out among the animals on the Seat of Power as well as among the public. Through the goat Destiny, returned after years in exile, we get an outsider’s view on the events, and in a vivid mother-daughter po

Joyce Carol Oates is one of the world’s greatest living writers, and is frequently cited as a candidate for the Nobel Prize in literature. It is truly a momentous occasion that Oates will visit the House of Literature, and in doing so will be visiting Norway for the very first time.Through more than one hundred books spanning most genres, the American legend writes tenderly and with precision about our societies’ great questions.«The opposite of language is silence and silence for human beings is death», Oates said after receiving the prestigious National Book Award for her 1969 novel Them. The novel is considered one of her major works, and will now be available in Norwegian translation for the first time. In Them, we follow a forking class family living under harsh conditions in Detroit, from the 1930s and until the bloody race riots in 1967.Oates has also written fiction based on real events or people, such as her best-selling novel Blonde, based on Marilyn Monroe’s life and death, whic

In 2021, Abdulrazak Gurnah was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature, the first African-born writer to receive the award in close to 20 years. The Swedish Academy awarded Gurnah the prize «for his uncompromising and compassionate penetration of the effects of colonialism and the fate of the refugee in the gulf between cultures and continents».Across the world, more and more readers are discovering Gurnah’s body of work. His novels Paradise, Afterlives and Desertion explore the history of East Africa and Zanzibar, while other works, such as Admiring Silence and By the Sea, portray a migrant’s encounter with British society. What they all have in common are the memorable characters created by Gurnah, characters that are not heroes, but rather unique in their quiet everydayness, and who often feel alienated from the world around them.Through these characters, Gurnah gives us masterful depictions of a region and its history, of the colonial era, of exile and migration

Do artists have a social responsibility? Should art be «pure» and not related to ethical or political issues? What, exactly, is the role of art? These are questions that the American author Joyce Carol Oates has dealt with through a long writing life, both as an author and as a professor in creative writing at University of Princeton and UC Berkeley.Oates is a legend, and the author of more than 100 books. Known for memorable titles such as Blond, Them, Black Water, The Gravedigger’s Daughter, We Were the Mulvaneys and Babysitter. She has been a consistent favorite for the Nobel Prize of literature the last 25 years, and has been a mentor to writers such as Jonathan Safran Foer and Mohsin Hamid. In this lecture, Oates talks about the role of art and that of inspiration and the wellspring of creativity, examined through the work of contemporary writers and poets. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Masande Ntshanga is a writer and poet, an editor of New Contrast Magazine and a teacher of creative writing. For his debut novel The Reactive, he was awarded the Betty Trask Award, while his second novel, Triangulum, was nominated for the Nommo Prize for Best Speculative Fiction Novel written by an African. His latest book is the 2020 chapbook Native Life in the Third Millennium.This is Masande's reading list:Imraan Coovadia, Tales of the Metric System                          A Spy in TimeK. Sello Duiker, The Quiet Violence of DreamsNjabulo Ndebele, Fools and Other StoriesIn this podcastseries the House of Literature in Oslo, Norway invites writers and thinkers to talk about their work, what they read and present their readinglist from the African continent and diaspora. Host in this episode Åshild Lappegård LahnEditing and production by the House of LiteratureMusic by Ibou C

Maaza Mengiste is a writer, photographer and teacher of creative fiction at Wesleyan University. Her 2010 debut novel, Beneath the Lion's Gaze, depicts the bloody revolution in 1970s Ethiopia, and was named one of the 10 Best Contemporary African Books by the Guardian. Her second novel The Shadow King, portraying the Italo-Ethiopian war of the 1930s, was shortlisted for the prestigious Booker prize in 2020.This is Maaza Mengiste’s reading list:Ama Ata Aidoo, Our Sister KilljoyMaya Binyam, HangmanMihret Sibhat, The History of a Difficult ChildTsitsi Dangarembga, Nervous ConditionsIn this podcastseries the House of Literature in Oslo, Norway invites writers and thinkers to talk about their work, what they read and present their readinglist from the African continent and diaspora. Host in this episode Åshild Lappegård LahnEditing and production by the House of LiteratureMusic by Ibou CissokhoThe House of Literature’s project to promote African literature is supported by NORAD. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com