#Scurf 179: Conversation with Eleonora

The Italian writer, journalist talks to me about reading her experience in newsrooms, studying economics and writing flash fiction

Jun 07, 2024

This is something new I’m giving a try, so bear with me. I’ve crafted a new series of substacks where I will speak with some peers about their art — writing, photographing, philosophising, painting, etc. As I evolve in my own writing routines, I’ve felt enriched and educated by these conversations. This is a practice, I believe, I’m setting up mostly to get to know more from and about other writers, artists, photographers through their lives and stories.

You can read the first conversation in this series with Debjit here, and the second with Ila here. You can follow the conversation series here.

For the third edition of Conversation, I chatted with writer Eleonora Balsano. She is an Italian-born, polyglot journalist and writer based in Brussels, E.U. Her short fiction in English has appeared in Portland Review, Fictive Dream, Reflex Fiction, Janus Literary, JMWW Journal, and elsewhere. In 2023, Eleonora was longlisted for the Wigleaf Top 50 and in 2021 she was shortlisted for the Bridport Prize. She is a reader for Longleaf Review and WestWord. Eleonora is currently working on a dystopian novel. You can read some of her work here:

https://www.eleonorabalsano.net/

Podcast: Chosen Tongue (Spotify, Apple)

Hi Eleonora! Could you share some background about yourself and how you came to writing?

I was born and raised in Rome, in a very Italian family. My parents didn’t speak any foreign language but enrolled me in an English class before I started primary school, and that sparked a lifelong fascination with a language and a culture that were so different from mine. I started writing as a child, short stories and magazines I would sell to my classmates. My mum was a great reader. We didn’t have many children’s books at home beside a few classics, but she would tell me about Gogol’s The Nose or The Overcoat at bedtime. I credit her with giving me a taste for the surreal early on.

When I graduated from high school, my teachers recommended I study literature in uni, and out of rebellion maybe, I decided to study economics instead, to show everyone and myself that I could be good at other things than writing (I wasn’t). I also wanted to understand how the world worked, how money was made, how government policies could correct imbalances. I suffered through my uni years, grappling with subjects I didn’t have a natural interest or talent for (oh, my Math exams! Sheer torture) but at the same time I reckon that opened my mind to different things.

After uni, I became a journalist, covering mainly finance and banks, and occasionally foreign affairs. I loved journalism, and I loved the newsroom. I guess there will always be a part of me yearning for that feeling of watching history unfold before your eyes.

I was born to a Hindi speaking family, completed my education and vocational training in English, fell in love with a Bengali man and now find myself conversing in English, Hindi and Bengali routinely. Inferring from your podcast, I believe you also function between 2-3 languages. Could you speak about this sort of multilingualism?

I was educated in Italian, learnt English as a child and French later, when I met my husband, a French-speaking Belgian. We actually communicated in Spanish at the beginning of our relationship, as my French wasn’t very strong and he didn’t want to use English (he said our mother tongues were both Latin and we shouldn’t put a Germanic language between us. He can be a stickler like that!) At home we speak mainly French and Italian with the kids, but English is always part of the picture. Brussels is a very international city, so everyone just switches between languages all the time.

Can you share how you got the idea of starting a podcast? And how did you arrive at this title ‘Chosen Tongue’? How do you select the speakers for the podcast?

Chosen Tongue as a title came to me early on. We live at a time of massive migrations and an increasing number of people all over the world will have the option to choose the language they write in instead of relying uniquely on their mother tongue. My guests are multilingual writers and poets who write in a second language, and whose work is influenced by their multiculturalism. I wrote about this at length in this essay.

In your writing, you’ve experimented with various forms: fiction, flash fiction, the essay. Which of these would you say is the most challenging for you?

I wouldn’t say a form is more challenging than the other. It really depends on how I feel and the story I want to tell. Some stories need space, and they become short stories or novels. Some others come fully formed as flash, snippets of life. I’ve been itching to try poetry for some time now but I self-censor a lot. There are thoughts I know I could only express in that form and at some point I’ll take the plunge.

What do you think about publishing more experimental forms of writing like flash fiction? What appeals to you about this format?

I discovered flash during the pandemic, when I was desperate to write but didn’t have enough time or focus for longer projects. I immediately fell in love with it, and I think there isn’t a better way to learn the craft. Flash reminded me of my years working for press agencies as a journalist. We had very little time to come up with taut, accurate reports, often having to dictate them on the phone. I learnt to condense information, leaving out everything unnecessary. In the same way, I like to say flash writers are the bricklayers of fiction. When you must draw a complete story arc in a limited space, you can’t waste a single word. That’s a unique exercise for a writer.

When you’re writing something, do you like to get lost and to not be aware? Or do you write to ground yourself in the work?

In short fiction, I usually write the story in one sitting, without thinking too much. Then I let it sit for a long time before editing.

With novels, I like to outline in detail before I even start to write. I’m afraid of wasting time without knowing where I’m going. That’s maybe because I still have children at home and not much time to write.

Can you talk a little bit about your in-progress novel?

I have two, actually 😊 One, the dystopia, is a very big project based on my experience of moving to the U.S. shortly before the pandemic and finding myself stranded in a country where I was an immigrant with limited rights. It was a scary time.

In the past few months, I had an idea I’ve been taking notes on. A very different project, self-contained. I like to say it’s a coming-of-age story, even if the protagonist is a woman in her early 40s. I think women often come of age a second time once they’re past childbearing and full of energy and just enough wisdom to find their voice.

I love the journey and writing life of Jhumpa Lahiri who went from writing in English, to learning and then writing completely in Italian. What are your thoughts on her work? And which writers — novelists, playwrights, critics, journalists, poets — working today do you admire most?

Jhumpa Lahiri’s journey is absolutely fascinating to me, and certainly one of the reasons I started the podcast (Chosen Tongue). In 2021, one of her stories from her Roman collection (out in the US last Autumn), was published in the New Yorker. I remember reading it, without looking at the by line, and thinking, this must be an Italian author. The details about Rome, the flow of the story, the atmosphere, were so familiar to me. I was so surprised when I saw it was Jhumpha Lahiri, translating back into English a story she had first written in Italian. Her prose in Italian retains the English taste for straightforward sentences (subject, verb, complement) and feels crystalline, in a way that Italian prose often isn’t. At the same time, she notices details an Italian might overlook, and the result is very refreshing.

Among the contemporary authors I’ve been loving and reading lately, I could cite Jenny Erpenbeck, Sheila Heti, Hisham Matar among the novelists. Kim Addonizio is a poet I adore and never tire of reading.

Could you describe for me the room where you usually write, your writing routine, any associated rituals.

I moved house last summer and went from a wooden shed in my backyard (sometimes cold, but quiet and cosy) to a proper room, well heated but very noisy, as it’s by my front door. That’s given me some headaches lately. I always sit down with coffee after the school run and journal for as long as I need before tackling any story. I am at my desk most days from 9:30am until 3pm, when I have to get my kids. Some days are good, and I get a lot done, and some others I’m constantly interrupted, and nothing gets written.

Could you share a bit about the literary scene in Belgium? Who are the writers working now, what are their chief preoccupations? Any authors you’d recommend?

Belgium is a bit of a Frankenstein state in the literary sense. There are two main languages, Flemish and French, and each literary community has its own life. As I am not proficient in Flemish and I don’t write in French, I tend to orbit around the English-speaking community in Brussels. Two Belgian authors I enjoy are Stefan Hertmans (War and Turpentine, 2013) and among the French speakers, Amélie Nothomb.

A few round up, quick questions here as we close 📚💭

What books are on your nightstand? So many! The Idiot by Dostoevsky is the one on top of the pile although I have been reading it very slowly.

What’s the last great book you read? Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck, this year’s International Booker winner.

Your favourite short story writer? Among short story writers, my favourite is probably Claire Keegan. Her story Anctartica is the best I have ever read. (I can’t screenshot it though, as I don’t have the book with me)

What are you currently reading? The Last Attachment by Iris Origo, about Lord Byron’s relationship with Teresa Guiccioli. It’s based on their correspondence and as Byron wrote to Teresa in Italian, it is extremely interesting to me to see how he sometimes used words in surprising but effective ways.

What’s your go-to classic? Anna Karenina is the one I regularly go back to.

And your favorite book no one else has heard of? I’m sure people have heard of it but it’s not the kind of book you find in airports: Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill, a true work of genius.

What moves you most in a work of literature? Honesty. Vulnerability. When I feel the author is laying themselves bare.

What do you plan to read next? I’ve fallen in love with Jenny Erpenbeck last year and I’m going to read all her books. Go, Went, Gone is next.

Scurf