Ivan Vladislavic

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Ivan Vladislavic is an unassuming man. Confronted by two female interviewers, he seemed shy, bashful and in an attempt to ease (his?) tension, cracked a few jokes about nothing in particular.

Born in Pretoria in 1957, he is a self-proclaimed ‘ware Suid-Afrikaner’, but talks easily about his Croatian, Irish and British ancestry. This veritable melting pot of identities sits uneasily with his sense of self. In the army, in which he served out his ‘recommended’ two-year sentence, he was ‘affectionately’ called ‘die Rus’ and his most recent collection of short stories, “Propaganda by Monuments” belies a struggle to truly voice a sense of self.

Trying to uncover Ivans’ self, behind the literary persona, was immensely difficult. A private person, he does not take kindly to even slightly intrusive questions. When we pushed a little too hard, his blue eyes, normally dancing with amusement and good humour, iced over and we caught a glimpse of the infamous Irish wrath.

He maintains a low profile, but is hazy when asked if it is by design or default. English writers, he maintains, are not afforded the audience support of Afrikaans writers. Although he studied Afrikaans as a major at the University of the Witwatersrand, he has never written in his studied language, indeed, he has always thought of himself as English. Again, the contradictions in his sense of self come to the fore as he talks about his difficulties in trying to get published as a young, South African English writer.

In his view, Afrikaans has a much livelier literary scene and a more avid readership. This audience support is lacking in South African English culture as readership tends to be more fickle. In a sense, these difficulties worked in his favour — he feels that short stories are the best means of attracting attention to a literary newcomer. Short stories can act as a learning curve and, if one encounters the bitter taste of failure, not much time has been lost on ones efforts.

His first collection of short stories attracted the attention of Ravan Press and although they never published his work, a few years later they offered him a job as an editor. The old adage — all editors are frustrated writers — simply cannot apply to him. He remains as an editor in the publishing world and continues to write and be published.

It is obvious that his time at Ravan was extremely useful in terms of the contacts he was able to build, especially as he takes the moral high-ground when it comes to publishing his own work. This, he feels, is extremely unethical and he thus approached David Phillip Publishers with a more mature book of short stories.

In a sense, Vladislavic talks as he writes. Staccato-like sentences punctuate the air and pauses teeter off sentences in a most unnerving fashion. On the one hand he talks easily of his love for literature, his passion as a youth for Lesley Charteris’ books and, “other bad literature”. On the other, he stutters through his family background — “happy” — his social background — “father was a mechanic” — and his political background — “Wits was political in the 70’s.” We get the impression that he is used to control.

This desire for structure in his life is indicated by his initial dalliance with architecture. He toyed with the idea of studying architecture instead of his BA, and luckily for the South African literary cogniscenti, he didn’t. But this fascination for architecture has not been a mere passing phase. He has co-edited a book on architecture entitled blank _____: Architecture, apartheid and after and feels that his love for words and their construction translates very easily into a love for buildings. 1999 was spent in Germany on a writing fellowship and this sojourn probably married his passion for language with his need to satiate his visual ideals with beautiful buildings.

This is where his monuments yawn with past memories. As a youth, he used to walk around a Pretoria over-populated with memories literally cast in stone, bronze or marble. His fascination with breathing life into these monumental structures is evident when he speaks of the historical past — “it amazes me how quickly people become bored with the making and unmaking of history.” Finally we have located his passion. His eyes cloud with a distant anger when he speaks of peoples’ disregard for memory and its most popular outlet — writing. “Almost half of South Africa is illiterate and we have indulged in cultural apathy and a sheer disregard for writing” — his exasperation is more than evident. Vadislavic hangs his head, in what looks like shame, but, we discover is sheer disbelief about a country that has a rich history of story telling and cultural exchange, but a present reality of a cultural void.

This presented an ideal opportunity to ask for his comments on the ignominious demise of the State Theatre. His response is surprising, given the fact that he witnessed the birth and (near) death of this western cultural idealism: “The Theatre reflected the over-ambitious, grandiose and totally inappropriate culture of the time in which it was constructed.”

To Valdislavic, it was a space that was misused. Space is an important feature in his life — he constantly talks in terms of space. When we ask if he has ever thought of leaving South Africa, he replies that in the back of his mind he has always thought that he will live elsewhere, yet he has lived with his partner Minky Schlesinger in a space in Kensington for over ten years. Perhaps this is a relic of his fragmented ancestry — and of growing up in a predominantly Afrikaans city, yet identifying more with the English language. In any event, writing has provided a useful space to escape to, and relieved him of the drudgery and ethical horror of conscription.

He is humble about his many accolades and about the fact that he has been translated into German and French. He often suggests that he has never really grown up and his shy demeanour does lend one to believe that he is an awkward teenager, still forging an identity and reworking memories fitting for a 21st century, English speaking writer in South Africa.

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