A Shout from Copenhagen: The Meeting with Evil

“Now more than ever, the world needs to be told about the extent to which men, women and children are being subjected to torture. Thomas Larsen’s book about Inge Genefke’s Meeting with Evil and her 30-year fight against it bears that witness”
-Tim Robbins, Star of The Secret Life of Words

“Fifty years ago, the Nobel Laureate Albert Camus said, ‘For every man tortured, ten terrorists are born.’ Inge Genefke and the organizations she founded are working to help the victims and stop the torture. What better way to wage the war on terrorism?”
-Julie Christie, Actress. Played Inge Genefke in The Secret Life of Words

“As Thomas Larsen says in his introduction to The Meeting with Evil, torture victims are the loneliest people in the world. Their tormentors inflict upon them excruciatingly painful abuse which they are helpless to defend themselves against and which can permanently damage or completely destroy their bodies and spirit. As the only Holocaust survivor ever elected to the United States Congress, and one who has personally experienced a concentration camp during the Second World War, I feel compelled to ask, Who will speak out for these unfortunate human beings in their loneliness and suffering? It is a comfort and reassurance to know that there is at least one human being who has dedicated the major force of her adult life to doing so. That extraordinary woman is the subject of Mr. Larsen’s book – Dr Inge Genefke, a Danish physician, an outstanding humanitarian, and a distinguished medical doctor who uses her training and compassion to bring healing to those who have endured the pain of torture.”
-Tom Lantos, United States Congressman (in his foreword to The Meeting with Evil)


I just dotted the last ‘i’ on the translation of a book which was at one and the same time terribly distressing and enormously heartening to work with. Translating it into English made the horrific things described in it seem to be unfolding in slow motion and the courageous fight against these things, also related in the book, awesomely heroic.

In English, the book – which is currently in search of a publisher – will be titled, The Meeting with Evil, and subtitled Inge Genefke’s Fight against Torture. The book was written in Danish by the distinguished political journalist, Thomas Larsen and published in Copenhagen in 2005. Its subject is a Danish physician by the name of Inge Genefke.

The book includes a foreword by Tom Lantos, United States Congressman (http://www.lantos.house.gov/) , himself the survivor of a camp during the Second World War, as well as endorsements by Isabel Coixet who directed a heartbreaking and hopeful film dealing, in large part, with the work of Inge Genefke, and Tim Robbins and Sarah Pally who starred in that film, The Secret Life of Words (2006), as well as Julie Christie, who portrayed Inge Genefke in the film.

Inge Genefke has devoted the past half of her 68 years fighting against torture and struggling to ensure that the world is aware of the terrifying extent to which torture is being employed throughout the world as well as to see to it that care is provided for those whose lives have been broken by these crimes against humanity and to fight against the continuing existence of this inhumanity.

Her efforts and those of her colleagues have resulted in a situation where undeniable evidence now exists to disprove the lies of those political and military regimes who seek to deny the fact that torture of the most heinous sort not only exists but is being widely employed. Employed – as Inge Genefke states – not to obtain information really, but to eradicate the personalities of courageous individuals taking a stand in society. “Torture,” she says, “does not produce reliable information. Under torture, a person will say anything to make the torture stop, will confess to crimes he knows nothing about, will sign blank pages to make the pain stop.”

Inge Genefke’s efforts and those of her colleagues have resulted in the establishment of two centers for rehabilitation and research against torture in Copenhagen which formed the model for scores of other centers throughout the world, providing treatment for hundreds of thousands of victims and gathering research for the treatment of the victims as well as evidence which can be used to prove that torture is in use and produced in court against those responsible.

The pages of Thomas Larsen’s book are filled with equal parts of horror and hope and contain a portrait of the woman who has had the courage and tenacity to fight for all these years against this ugliness. Inge Genefke provides the hope. It is encouraging to know that there exists a force in the world willing to confront this evil -- she and her husband, Dr. Bent Sørensen, and all her colleagues at Copenhagen’s Rehabilitation Center for Torture Victims (http://www.rct.dk/) and the International Council for the Rehabilitation of Torture Victims (http://www.irct.org/) and those throughout the world who have been trained and aided by them in their own fight against torture and struggle to help its victims.

Inge Genefke has received many awards and distinctions from many countries throughout the world for her efforts and has been repeatedly nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Her struggle is not political, but humanistic, apolitical. Her aim is to stop the torturers and help the tortured.

Thanks to the United Nations Convention against Torture – which is also analyzed in Thomas Larsen’s book – torture, for all signatory countries, is a crime without a statute of limitations and one which can be tried anywhere, not only in the country where it has been committed. And the effects of this have already been seen. Torturers like Augusto Pinochet are no longer safe to travel freely in the world, enjoying the profits they have reaped from their activities. There is no more immunity for such people. Torturers, from the top on down through the hierarchy, are no longer safe in their misdeeds. A soldier or military policeman or “special adviser” is no longer free to claim that he was only following orders. The UN Convention makes it clear that such orders are unlawful and that it is unlawful to obey them.

The distinguished, 70-year-old literary magazine, New Letters (http://www.newletters.org/),
published by the University of Missouri Kansas City and edited by Robert Stewart, beginning with its Autumn 2007 issue, will publish a series of articles with excerpts from Thomas Larsen’s book about Inge Genefke. For a preview of what will appear in the book, readers are invited to read those issues of New Letters. At the same time, a forthcoming on-line publication, Exploring Globalization, co-edited by Walter Cummins (who also edits The Literary Review, currently celebrating its 50th anniversary, http://www.theliteraryreview.org/) will include in its inaugural number an interview with Inge Genefke and Bent Sørensen. That interview is now accessible at http://www.gig.org/eg/

Readers with questions about this important topic, publishers who are interested in acquiring the English translation of this book and periodicals interested in articles or interviews are invited to contact me via this blog or my website (www.thomasekennedy.com).

Greetings from this ancient kingdom! Thomas E. Kennedy
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See also http://www.copenhagenquartet.com/ for information on four independent novels about the souls and seasons of Copenhagen, each written in a different style and set in a different season and which can be read independently of one another or together in any order desired: Kerrigan's Copenhagen, A Love Story (2002), which is a novel disguised as a guide to the bars of Copenhagen, each chapter unfolding in a different serving house; Bluett's Blue Hours (2003), a noir tale about the deep dark of Copenhagen winter and the seamier sides of life in this beautiful capital; Greene's Summer (2004), about a Chilean torture survivor who comes to Copenhagen to be treated in a torture rehabilitation center and meets a Danish woman who has herself survived a violent marriage; and Danish Fall (2005), a satire about 12 people connected to a Danish firm which is being downsized. Also available, free of charge while they last, is a 29-minute DVD documentary about these books: “The Making of Thomas E. Kennedy’s Copenhagen Quartet.” Preview film-clips of the DVD can be accessed on http://www.copenhagenquartet.com/

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A Shout from Copenhagen: Bookshops of Copenhagen

Tuesday, November 6th, 2007

A SHOUT FROM COPENHAGEN: The Bookshops of Copenhagen


One of many things I love about Copenhagen is its wealth of small bookshops. Most book-lovers in the United States mourn the continuing disappearance of the cozy neighborhood bookshop with an owner you knew by name and who knew your tastes in reading and was quick to tell you, “Say we’ve just got something in I think you might like…” The voracious goliaths have taken over the scene with their plethora of discouraging sloppy tables overflowing with remaindered hardbacks, making life difficult for independent publishers and writers. I don’t know how many reports I’ve received from people who tried to buy one of my books in one of those giant emporiums only to be told that I was out of print – which in Borders or B&N lingo means that my book was not distributed by their distributor so I might as well be dead and why don’t you join me in kicking the corpse? Maybe that sounds bitter. I’m not bitter; I live in Copenhagen.

Here there are plenty of small to medium-sized independent bookshops. Those that sell new books and the so-called antiquarians. Even the few shops that could not be classified as small – I’m thinking of Arnold Busck on Købermagergade, near the Round Tower, which has a café and readings on its 2nd floor, and Politikens Boghal on the Town Hall Square, both of which stock a fine supply of English language books. There is the wonderful Paludan’s Book Café on the cobblestoned Fiolstræde, just across from the ancient university Library – a big, roomy shop with tall windows which features a greate series of Thursday readings, excellent draft beer and red wine and a sandwich of Italian cheese and prosciuto ham to die for; and let us not forget that in the basement antiquarian sector of the shop there is an eerie exhibition of modern sculpture nestled in its shadowy recesses, haunting forms. And a stone’s throw from there, on Nørregade, just to the right of Our Lady Cathedral, is Atheneum International Book Dealer, whose English section is run by the elegant Sidsel Brun who is passionate about stocking books that matter; here you’ll find the esoteric English books you cannot find elsewhere.

Then there is Chester’s Book Café at Strandgade 26 in the charming city neighborhood known as Christianshavn (which is also home to the so-called Free State, “Christiania,” an abandoned military encampment taken over by squatters nearly 40 years ago though which, sadly, is currently under assault by the current less than liberal government; a visit to Christiania is rather like a visit to the wild west in the middle of a civilized city). Chester’s Book Café is in a semi-basement, just down the street and across the avenue from the Danish Writers Union and features Wednesday evening readings by some of the best of contemporary Danish and international writers. Tranquebar Book Café (on Borgergade – just across the street from the Torture Rehabilitation Center – which will be subject of a later entry in this blog series) is a sprawling place named for the only colony Denmark ever had in India and modelled after the travel bookshop in the film “Notting Hill,” though this one is considerably more elegant and roomy. Its stock includes not only travel books but the literature of the countries you are considering travelling to as well as products from those countries – textiles, objets d’art, knickknacks, beer and wine! You can sit in one of its many chairs sipping a glass of red wine and reading for hours, undisturbed.

All these shops are personally welcoming with friendly and helpful personnel you might also bump into when roaming the old serving houses of this ancient capital. I regularly run into book-sellers in bars like The Fiver (Femmeren) on Classensgade or at Rosengaards Bodega just off the Coal Square or at the Café Under the Clock on Silver Square. Although not strictly a bookshop, I would also like to mention The Jazz Cellar on Skindergade because, although it specializes in jazz CDs and DVDs (I recently purchased a copy of the great restored DVD version of “Jazz on a Summer’s Day,” a film I had seen in 1960 and which made me understand I could love both jazz and rock and roll – it featured numbers by Chuck Berry as well as Anita O’Day…) But the Jazz Cellar – so named because it started out in a cellar on Grey Friar’s Square, although it is now in larger mezzanine quarters on Skindergade – also stocks books about jazz and was even so kind as to extend its concept to stocking my four novels about Copenhagen because of their taste for jazz as well; they sponsored an event once during which I read selections of each of the four books while my lady, Alice, womanned the DVD player, providing just the right background music mentioned in the novels at just the right time – Coltrane, Davis, Getz, Adderley, Lady Day…

I have saved for the last the bookshop in which I spend many a happy hour, alternately perusing the stock and chatting and sipping red wine with its owner – himself a writer and publisher – Lars Rasmussen about whom many have remarked his close resemblance to Feodor Dostoyevsky (see “Dostoevsky on Skinnner Street on www.WebDelSol.com, click enter, then in the upper right quadrant, click “The Literary Explorer” and scroll down to the desired title.) His shop, a broad expanse of plate window in a semi-basement, is called The Booktrader (www.booktrader.dk).



See also www.copenhagenquartet.com for information on four independent novels about the souls and seasons of Copenhagen, each written in a different style and set in a different season and which can be read independently of one another or together in any order desired: Kerrigan's Copenhagen, A Love Story, which is a novel disguised as a guide to the bars of Copenhagen, each chapter unfolding in a different serving house; Bluett's Blue Hours, a noir tale about the deep dark of Copenhagen winter and the seamier sides of life in this beautiful capital; Greene's Summer, about a Chilean torture survivor who comes to Copenhagen to be treated in a torture rehabilitation center and meets a Danish woman who has herself survived a violent marriage; and Danish Fall, a satire about 12 people connected to a Danish firm which is being downsized.
Greetings from this ancient kingdom!
Thomas E. Kennedy (www.thomasekennedy.com)

Irish writer wins Man Booker prize

Irish author Anne Enright won the Man Booker prize for her novel The Gathering. I haven't yet read this, but according to Booker judge Howard Davies, the novel is “powerful, uncomfortable and, at times, angry." Enright was a longshot for the prize, and it's certainly encouraging to see a long-shot win a major award.

Kundera on Translation

I finally read Milan Kundera's fascinating essay on the novel--The Curtain--and he makes the following comment on translation:

"... ever since Europe added rhyme to rhythm in its poetry, the full beauty of a verse can no longer be transplanted from one language into another; by contrast, faithful translation of a prose work, while difficult, is possible; in the world of novels there are no state borders."

Nobel Prize in Literature

Doris Lessing has been awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature for 2007.

German Book Prize

The shortlist for the German Book Prize has been announced and the list includes Julia Franck who has a story appearing in the upcoming issue of Absinthe (to be published in October).

You can read about the other finalists and read excerpts from their novels at the excellent web site signandsight.com.

UPDATE: Franck was named the winner of the German Book Prize. You can read more about it here.

I Pity the Fool

My friend, filmmaker Brent Coughenour, is headed out west with his current film project titled I Pity the Fool. And no, it's not a documentary about Mr. T. The film, shot in Super 8, captures beautiful scenes of decay in Detroit and weaves through it a narrative of sorts, involving the discovery of some mysterious letters and photos in an abandoned trailer park, and a possible murder. If you live on the west coast I encourage you to take the opportunity to see it but if you're looking for a typical Hollywood film this is not it. Watch closely and you might even spot this writer.

The film will be screened tonight, Tuesday, August 7, at 8pm at the Northwest Film Forum (1515 12th Ave.), along with Jack Cronin's Invisible City as part of Vanishing Ruins: Visions of Detroit.

Future screenings include:

Friday, August 10th, at 8pm at the Ink People Center for the Arts, 411 12th Street in Eureka, CA.

Friday, August 17th, at 8pm at Artists' Television Access (ATA), 992 Valencia Street, San Francisco, CA 94110, (415) 824-3890.

Sunday, August 19th, at 8pm at Echo Park Film Center, 1226 N. Alvarado St., LA, CA (213) 484-8846. echoparkfilmcenter@hotmail.com.

Monday, August 20th, at 6pm at Unurban Coffee House, 3301 Pico Blvd., Santa Monica, CA.

Also check out two interesting interviews with Brent at the SIFFBlog and at Hot Splice.

Ingmar Bergman 1918-2007

Awoke to the CBC providing the sad news of Ingmar Bergman's death at age 89. I was introduced to Bergman's films as a grad student at Michigan and was immediately drawn to his work, no doubt in large part by the way his films depicted his struggle with faith and his emotionally powerful portrayals of relationships between men and women and families. In his films close-ups of the human face were often used to convey the subtlest of emotions, and were photographed beautifully by his long-time collaborator Sven Nykvist in films such as Persona, Cries and Whispers, and Fanny and Alexander. I was fortunate to see Bergman's final film, Saraband, at its North American premiere in Montreal at the Festival des Films du Monde in 2004. It was clear the master filmmakers' skill had not diminished with age.

In addition to his work as a film director, Ingmar Bergman had an even longer career as a theatre director but his work in theatre did not appear to receive the recognition it deserved. A number of his theatrical productions were staged at the Brooklyn Academy of Art and I had the opportunity to attend four: Peer Gynt, The Ghost Sonata, Ghosts, and Mary Stuart (and after the performance I met Bergman's friend and frequent collaborator, Erland Josephson). With a minimalist approach to stage and set design the viewer became an active participant in visualizing the drama onstage.

Ingmar Bergman made over fifty films and published several novels. Those who know me well will not be surprised that I've seen just about every film and read almost everything by and about Bergman that has appeared in English (I even once had a sweet cat named Ingmar).

At 89, I'm sure Bergman was tired, but I had selfishly hoped for a few more films.

As the Eastern Christians say, may your memory be eternal, Ingmar Bergman.

Absinthe partners with Dzanc Books

Absinthe is pleased to partner with Dzanc Books to publish translated fiction from Europe. Below is the press release issued by Dzanc:


DZANC BOOKS TO PUBLISH TRANSLATED FICTION FROM EUROPE

To Whom It May Concern:

Dzanc Books is joining forces with the editors of Absinthe: New European Writing (www.absinthenew.com) to bring great works of European fiction to North America for the first time.

Dzanc is committed to finding the absolute best literary fiction to publish. We believe acquiring and publishing works from around the world is important on two fronts – a) there is some incredible work being done in Europe that has not been made available to those who only read English, and b) reading fiction from different world view points is essential to having a better understanding of the world we live in, and our own place in it.

Dwayne Hayes and Jessica Bomarito, editors of Absinthe, have been publishing wonderful translated material in their journal for close to five years now, and have built up a fantastic array of talented translators they communicate with regularly and Dzanc will, in partnership, help Absinthe further their own mission by getting this work into book form and distributed to stores nationwide. Our intent is to find an excellent work of fiction for publication in 2008, and then continue this joint arrangement annually. Other authors and translators may also contact us directly as well by sending manuscript submissions through our website at www.dzancbooks.org and writing us with attached materials at info@dzancbooks.org.

Please feel free to share this information and if you know people who are interested in contemporary European literature, or writers and/or translators of European fiction looking for a North American publisher, we would be thrilled to hear from them. We look forward to reading the submissions and hope to share more news of our efforts soon.

Best wishes,

Dan Wickett
Executive Editor and Publisher

Steve Gillis
Founder and Publisher


Dzanc Books is a 501(c)3 non-profit literary publisher based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. If you would like to learn more about books and programs, or make a donation, please visit our website at www.dzancbooks.org.

Wedding Bells

A long silence since the last post because the Absinthe editors were married at the end of May. We expect to post more frequently in the coming months as we look forward to the publication of Absinthe #8 in the fall.