Maybe you have to read the very young Olivia Sudjic to understand what nature is made today the anxiety that ramps through the veins of a millennial. What lies behind their apparent indolence, the face-screen of these young people is now silent or by your voice. What they are afraid of or what hurts if they seem to know nothing because they attend to nothing. What dark labyrinths of his subconscious travels a post since they upload it to the network and press share until they receive a thousand likes. Anxiety Z of the latest literature.
Olivia Sudjic, a Londoner of Yugoslav origin (when this origin existed on the map), the daughter of two journalists strongly opposed and fearful of her early vocation as a writer (her mother was the first editor of the Traveler UK and her father directs The Design Museum-London ), at age 30, he has written a short essay on the exposed life of so many who live pending his particular audience. It was going to be his second novel, after a first one ( A life that is not mine ) in which his protagonist impersonates the personality of a woman who strips in social networks, but an attack of the subject or anxiety as an epidemic crossed him : Exposed (Alpha Decay editorial).
Is the lack of identity or roots the main reason for this growing anxiety that you describe as an epidemic? It may be one of the most important reasons, yes, but to it, in the case of young generations, a danger is added that has A lot to do with technology. I speak of the omnipresence of the news that intimidates about populism and climate change, compared to those we feel helpless as citizens. It is true that every historical era suffered its conflicts, but a war is finally over, it has a political solution, while the evils generated by modern capitalism seem not to have it. My generation grew up with an email address when the Internet seemed like the great hope that would unite the world by bringing freedom, and Francis Fukuyama talked about the end of history: the world would no longer suffer turbulence. But these came precisely with the Internet, which was never going to allow us to disconnect. She received a scholarship as a writer, a residence in Brussels during which she would write her second novel. Had he requested it to provoke the anxiety attack that led to this trial or happened by chance? (He smiles, as if the question was certainly innocent). I did not request anything, it was a surprise, and I accepted it without being able to predict that six months later, when it was too late to cancel it, my life was going to change dramatically. And there you were: the blank screen and an anxiety crisis in budding Did it have something to do with an emotional breakdown, as I think I read between the lines? The causes were multiple but yes, the end of a sentimental relationship did not leave me in the ideal state to disconnect from the real and dive alone in the long process of writing a novel not exactly cheerful. It was a situation very prone to depression, which resulted in an anxiety attack and in this essay. Isn't it paradoxical that if the exposure of your intimacy causes anxiety you persist in the confessional genre? Yes, of course it is: Neocapitalist life is full of paradoxes, like hating the internet and not being able to disconnect it. But it is that same paradox that creates the material of my writing, as a continuous recycling that allows me to deepen the problems. Is writing a basically therapeutic process for you? It is my way of thinking about reality and expressing my ideas. It is devoting my time to inquire about negative feelings to shed light on them, but not necessarily to feel better, which is what is sought in a therapy. It is not a catharsis, but an awareness of reality and myself. How do you come to the positive conclusion of considering anxiety "a dual and essential force not only for creativity but also for life"? The first is very old, but anxiety as a motor of life? My concept of anxiety is closely linked to sensitivity and attention: how people talk, how they respond, how it sounds. If I wanted to get rid of it I could live in a bubble, but its cost would be to feel less emotion. I am not saying that I need depression or neurosis as the cursed artist; Moreover, I think that happiness can also generate good literature, but in my case it would be to pretend to be what I am not, to falsify my identity. Anxiety is productive as long as it infects you with the need to communicate reality; In my case, writing. He doesn't mention any of the addictions that anxiety usually entails; You know, drugs, alcohol, play or, without going any further, anxiolytics to be able to function. You have never suffered them, you are not even addicted to networks like almost all of your generation? Not the type you mention, beyond a brief stage hooked on analgesics. But especially in my 20s I suffered a strong addition to toxic relationships, to some degree abusive or what is now called GasLighting: an emotional relationship that tries to convince you that your experience is not real, that leaves you unarmed because you end up distrusting of your own feelings, of yourself and especially of your sanity. It is not a physical or obvious addition, it is not antisocial nor is it considered that your mental state is addictive, and precisely because of that it is much more dangerous. It sounds like psychological abuse. Why does it say that women are more marginal and the role of men is that of the initiate? Because the world has been built by men, it is a masculine club, while women are accustomed to observing it from the margin. Let us take the small example of a car: who is the seat belt for, then the man; the woman either adjusts it or nothing will protect her from an impact, because it is designed by and for the man. Women have much more to do with homosexuals, people of color, and so on. Although not all men or all women are equal, but their characterization, within which I consider myself privileged. Yes, I am aware of the fate of having lived surrounded by people more interested in art and creation than in money; and having had some parents with whom I share cultural interests, although at the beginning they tried to dissuade me from the uncertainty that comes from living in literature. He has not answered me on the issue of networks, is he or has he been hooked and hence the theme of his first novel? I do not know the mental state of the addition as Amy Liptrot tells so beautifully in his memoir The Outrun , although I know well the anxiety of living pending an audience. But in recent years I have unsubscribed from all social networks (which costs the procedure) and I am only on Instagram; I'm too much, I'm afraid. Isn't your proclamation about the need to "stop using the internet that we created and build the one we really want" very naive? Well, I have lowered my hopes, but I believed it firmly until three years ago years. What I still maintain is that the political and social system can be changed. To start, we need young people to regulate the internet and its connections. And this was clearly seen with the ridicule that the American and Russian governments made in the face of the Facebook scandal in the last elections: they did not understand anything that was happening. How are we going to regulate people who ignore the virtual reality in which we move! Olivia, tell me to finish, what experience of fear shaped her literary voice? Not bad to be the last ... The first had to See with my family: I am an only child and, having a foreign name, in a school context where what you want to be is identical to others, made me feel a little different. Not that I felt like a refugee, but my name evoked a place, Yugoslavia, where the news of a terrible war came from. My childhood was emotionally unstable, and I think there was born my need to communicate and be understood. But the voice of a writer is something that changes over time, and the experience of Exposed was very liberating and has opened new paths, fortunately. What has happened to the interrupted novel? I am correcting it, which is a process that does not like nothing It will be published within a year.According to the criteria of The Trust Project
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