Entering its 15th year of existence, the quarterly cultural magazine ‘Mehr Licht’ recently inaugurated its prize for the best cultural essay written in the previous year in Albania.
The magazine is run by writer and translator Mira Meksi, whose large body of literary work and translations have made her a prominent cultural figure in Albania. Meksi's publications have been translated into Macedonian, Bulgarian, Serbian/Croatian/Bosnian/Montenegrin, French, English and Italian. She has herself translated many books from French and Spanish into Albanian by authors such as Dumas, Yourcenar, Duras, Baudelaire, Lamartine, Rimbaud as well as Marques, Borges, Neruda, Paz, Sabato, Allende and Fuentes.
A festive ceremony was organised to celebrate the occasion. Mira Meksi shared her thoughts on this event and on her work with Southeast Europe: People and Culture.
You are the founder and the editor-in chief of the literary magazine “Mehr Licht.” Why have you named it in German and what is the mission of this quarterly publication?
The magazine “Mehr Licht” was founded in 1996, so it is now entering in its 15th year. Its name “More Light” were the last words of the great Goethe and mean “more illumination, more knowledge, more reality.” This is what this magazine is meant to contribute towards. Its mission is to serve national literature and culture by promoting the best values of modern or traditional Albanian literature as well as international literature. Nowadays “Mehr Licht” has been turned into a real literary encyclopaedia with its numerous articles, which increase in number every year. It comes out once in every four months (3 issues per year; about 1200 pages) and is a member of the European network of literary magazines “Eurozine”.
Recently the “Mehr Licht 2010” prize was awarded during a ceremony among representatives of literature, art and culture. What does this literary prize represent and where did this prize go this year?
This prize is awarded to the best cultural essay published during the period 2009-2010. This prize will be annual. The 13 best essays of this competition were published in the 39th issue of “Mehr Licht” magazine. The winning essay was “Brerore’s Metamorphosis” by scholar and translator, Shpëtim Doda. This essay treats the writer’s status before and after dictatorship by viewing him/her from various angles from the literary and aesthetic to the social and political.
It is said that Albanian readers have abandoned the Albanian book, that they read little or that the publications of Albanian authors have been left on the displays. How true is that?
I don’t think that it is so. Albanian readers have always been exposed to the best foreign literature, thus acquiring fine reading tastes. And compared to the past, there are actually more choices to select among the books. But this does not mean that Albanians have abandoned original Albanian literature. Good Albanian literature has its own readers. The books of Ismail Kadare, Arian Leka, Zija Çela, Flutura Açka, Moikom Zeqja and others are in high demand.
Your two first novels, “Ioannina’s Frosina” and “Porfida-Ball in Versailles” contain women’s names. Also your third novel has a woman as its main protagonist. You declared in public that even your fourth novel, about to come out, is dedicated to another woman, Teuta – Illyria’s Queen. Is this a coincidence?
I know the woman’s world, her psychology, soul and dreams better. Moreover, I think the woman’s universe with its complexities is very inviting for a writer.
A feature of your works is that they are a source of broad information and unusual erudition.
The subjects I have treated in my works have varied from the historical to the world of kabbalah, insanity, dancing over the centuries in human society, bull fights and the endless universe of the icon. This way, my writing process has been accompanied by intensive research and the collection of information and this often has taken more energy than the writing process itself.
