Florin Lazarescu
Biography
Florin Lazarescu (b. 1974). Prose writer and screenwriter. He graduated from Literature Faculty of the Al. I. Cuza University in Jasi. He published three novels What They Know About the Panda Bear (2003), Our Special Envoy (2005; translated into French, German, Spanish, Italian, Slovenian, Hungarian and Croatian), Numbness (2013; translated into Chinese) and the collection of short stories The Tube with a Hat (2009). He is the (co)author of the screenplays for The Tube with the Hat (2006, directed by Radu Jude, winner of Sundance Festival for the best international short film, 2007), A Shadow of a Cloud (directed by Radu Jude, premiered at Cannes in 2013), Aferim! (directed by Radu Jude, winner of a Silver Bear in Berlin, 2015). Contact :...
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Novel, Fiction Ltd. series, Polirom, 2013, 248 pages Book presentationCentred on the stories of two main characters, Evghenie, an aspiring writer, who cannot find his real aim in life, and Valeria, his landlady, Florin Lazarescu’s novel captures not only their two different kinds of “numbness”, eternal writer’s block, in Evghenie’s case, and the fear of looming Alzheimer’s, in Valeria’s, but also the “numbness” of an entire city and all its everyday dramas. For, the city in itself, with all the minor stories that go to make up the wider story, is the third character in the novel, its pulse described now with bitter humour, now with specifically Romanian dramatic means, in a way that becomes spectacular, thanks to the author’s talent at constructing minor episodes of great power. Raising the issue of perpetual failure, in the form of the characters’ inability to salvage their recent memories and use them as a means of prevention, Numbness is a tale of futility, of hopes that exist only out of a human need for hope, but without any real horizon, of small joys which ultimately emphasise the tragedies behind them. A profound book, written with verve and great attention to detail. |
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Short stories, "Ego. Prose" series, Polirom, 2009, 240 pages Book presentationTen short stories that could also be considered as chapters of a novel, The Tube with a Hat recreates the vivid atmosphere of a Romanian childhood under communism. Although this is not the main issue of the book, you could find here an answer of the question “is the happiness possible under a totalitarian state?”.
The protagonists of each story – told from the perspective of a child – seem to say “yes, it is”, or “maybe not, but it worths trying, at least”. That’s because for them life is a playground where it doesn’t matter if you win or lose, but if you fight to play by your own rules. Either a game of magical realism, or a tragicomedy, their existence is a continuous and spectacular art of improvisation to survive.
The short story that gives the title of the book was filmed by the director Radu Jude, in 2006, using a screenplay written by the author. The short film The Tube with a Hat has become the most awarded one in the history of Romanian cinema (more than 30 awards in festivals all over the world; between them, the one for the best short at Sundance Film Festival, USA, 2007). You could watch it (English subtitles) by clicking the following link: The Tube with a Hat
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Novel, "Ego Prose" series, Polirom, 2005, 240 pages Book presentationA satirical novel at first sight, but one in which the author, with verve and talent, paints a fresco of the post-1989 Romanian press and all its flaws: pursuit of cheap sensationalism, the invention and simulation of stories, etc. However, besides this subject in itself, the author slips in a number of other hot topics from the contemporary world, such as ideological conflict, terrorism and so on. The narrative is packed with suspense and spiced with a series of unprecedented situations, which provide abundant humour.
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