Time Shelter
Interview conducted by Philippe Mottaz, journalist and founder of The Geneva Observer
Winner of the 2023 International Booker Prize, Georgi Gospodinov, one of Bulgaria’s most lauded authors has also won the Jan Michalski Prize for Literature (2016 ) and the AngelusCentral European Literature Award ( 2019 ) with Physics of Sorrow, among many other distinctions. Time Shelter (Liveright, 2020 / Le pays du passé, Gallimard, 2021) is the third novel of this author born in 1968. A mysterious therapist establishes a “clinic for the past” in Zurich that treats patients with Alzheimer’s by recreating the past in which they felt most secure. Each floor reproduces a past decade in minute detail, allowing patients to transport themselves back in time to unlock what is left of their fading memories. Through sharply satirical labyrinth-like vignettes, reminiscent of Italo Calvino, Jorge Luis Borges and Franz Kafka, the narrator recounts in breathtaking prose just how he became entrenched in a plot to stop time itself. From communism to the Brexit referendum and conflict in Europe, Time Shelter, a funny yet frightening novel, explores the weaponisation of nostalgia. A truly unforgettable classic from one of Europe’s most fascinating novelists.