Inci: Thank you, Attila, for accepting to do this interview for both Protean Depravity and the upcoming Otherland Newsletter. First off and again, congratulations for your deserved nomination for the Bram Stoker Awards for a superior achievement in a short story collection with your book The Black Maybe. It is your first book that has been translated into English and reaches the international horror audience through Valancourt Books, even though, as far as I understand, you already have made a name for yourself in your native Hungary. Is all your work horror related and do you see yourself as a horror author primarily or does the genre play a rather limited role in your wider work?
Attila: Thank you so much for your kind words. The Stoker nomination came as a shock to me that I think I’m still processing, because it always seemed to be an impossible achievement from my vantage point. The three books I’ve released so far in my mother tongue have been rather successful locally, they provided a fresh perspective on the idea of literary horror and genre in general.
Horror has always been close to my heart and I see it as a genre capable of discussing several aspects of life, be that personal or societal in utmost clarity and honesty. I’ve always found horror to be refreshingly direct. What I’ve written so far is considered horror or cosmic weird. That being said I don’t necessarily see myself as a horror writer, because when I set out to write a story I don’t set out to write a horror story. They just turn out that way, because in every story I write I’m searching for the limits of how far the story could go, and how deep I could drive my characters into their own reality. I’m also a screenwriter for a living. In my film and television work horror used to play a rather limited role, as the genre is not readily accepted in my country, though I’ve been often injecting my screenplays with elements of the weird, horror, and fantastic. We have just shot a film that could be considered horror. We’re in the editing stage of the production.
I: Let’s get to the subtitle, “Liminal Tales”. I keep on hearing the term “liminal” more and more especially in horror and especially in combination with spaces, places. I think the best description I can think of from the top of my head is that they are places of transition, of passage. Can you explain in what sense and how liminal applies to your stories?
A: I think most of my stories, especially the ones represented in The Black Maybe are stories of change, be that change physical, metaphysical or psychological. These stories attempt to capture the narrow divide between the before and the after, they chronicle the time and space of characters or the world itself twisting from one recognisable entity into another. That in-between-ness is most exciting for me as a writer. People, places, societies change, but in the process of changing comes a moment when the subject of the change loses its form; it becomes unrecognisable, having abandoned one form and still in search for the next one. I attempt to capture that moment in most of my stories to differing degrees, as I see that liminality as a state of painful freedom.
I: You write in a very concise style which suits the short form well. The reader will often bump into single sentences which are easy to miss if read cursorily, but on second glance bear an incredible depth. Besides being a quality very useful for the shorter form, this may be even something a musician does, or someone who writes lyrics? Considering your story “Fogtown” builds up to basically become a tribute to Hungarian underground music, plus legendary US author Steve Rasnic Tem stresses many times over in the introduction to your collection that there is so much Heavy Metal in your work, I was wondering if you would care to tell us a little about your connection to music and its influence on your writing?
A: I love music, always have. Music, as far as I’m concerned is the definition of our humanity and it is the very idea of art. It exists and non-exists at the same time, its essence is impossible to capture in any other form but itself. Music is music, and even a single, solitary sound can move mountains within your soul. When I was younger I used to play drums in a band. We played some sort of psychedelic-progressive metal. Playing music with people who were my closest friends was a formative experience. We spent entire summers living together, playing and recording music, performing live shows, smoking pot, doing stupid things young people are prone to. The years spent in that band made me the man I am now, and the idea of playing music and the idea of writing are very similar to me. I abandoned playing music, as I don’t think I was very talented at it, but at one time it meant the world to me. The story Fogtown is a tribute to those years. I do love metal, of course, but I listen to a wide range of music; drone, ambient, classical, pop, techno. It doesn’t matter as long as it moves something within me. Many of my stories come to me at live shows, or while listening to a record. A mood, a chord or a line of lyric would just get stuck in my mind, directing me towards a particular way of telling a story.
I: Some of your stories have an almost dual part structure, in which the story will build up quite slowly, often dwelling on some social commentary like the place of women in society in “Multiplied by Zero” or a casual, in-depth analysis of the Post-Soviet depression in Hungarian rural life in “The Amber Complex”, and then take a turn delving into eldritch horrors, ending in truly unforeseeable places. I personally think these are your strongest stories marking a very original Veresian style in which, beside building a suspense through setting, you somewhat more or less covertly write about the place you come from, “forcing” us to learn something about it. I find this awesome. Are there any challenges to this style, to packing so much into mere half- short stories?
A: Every story I write is a type of personal challenge. I’m rarely ever inspired by literature. If I have an idea that suits another writer’s style or tone I usually abandon it. I’m inspired by life, be that my personal experience or societal experiences, though that sounds pompous and in a way incorrect. I write a certain story if I feel it allows me to discuss an issue that’s so elusive that it’s impossible to be captured through a simple statement. In a way, impossible to be captured through words. I need to capture it through a story, and a story, for me at least, is always more than what’s written. Therefore writing is a very deliberate act, and when I start writing I do so because of an urge of curiosity of how the story would look when it’s written. There is always the possibility of failure involved - is it possible at all to write that given story? The answer lies only in the act of writing.
When I started writing some years ago genre literature, specifically horror was almost non-existent in Hungary, and most writers and readers saw genre as a way to specifically not talk about Hungary, or the real-life experience of living in Hungary, or being Hungarian. Most stories were set abroad, with American characters, trying to mimic mostly American writers. In many ways writers were trying to deny their Hungarian-ness, no doubt because they felt that Hungary was not a place that allowed entrance for the fantastic. The hardship, but also the lure of my writing came from the question of whether one could or should write about the realities of Hungary in a way that felt personal, genuine and true to the lived experience, while also using the idea of the fantastic to pinpoint certain issues or observations that cannot be discussed otherwise. So the most important thing for me was to write about Hungary in a way that would feel true and recognisable to Hungarian readers - they would accept the setting of the fiction as their own reality. It is harder than it sounds, because I think all over Europe, but certainly in Hungary readers are antagonistic to local settings. They find it hard to believe that unusual, fantastic, horrific things could happen here. Everything is just too mundane. So in writing most of my stories the first step is to capture that mundanity. Only after that am I allowed to twist that mundanity around and introduce the fantastic, not as a separate entity or as a form of escape fantasy, but as the pinnacle of that mundanity. I’m not interested in adapting genre tropes to my local setting, I’m searching for ideas and concepts that feel new to me and are connected to the realities of my experience.
Let’s take my story The Amber Complex as an example. The setting of the story is my hometown, and the source of the narrative is my fear of what I could have become had I not succeeded in establishing my own life and career. The wine-cellar setting was inspired by my summers working in a small village excavating wine cellars and meeting sommeliers as they were chasing wines for different purposes. My idea was to talk about alcoholism, not in the sense of addiction, but in the sense of chasing the high booze or drugs could give you - a high that’s pointing towards the ecstasy of losing your own self in a short bliss where you feel some sort of murky, but genuine connection with the larger universe. A high where you can imagine yourself to be more than you actually are. As a writer I wanted to go as far as I thought possible in the extremes of the story - start with the most downtrodden, mundane reality and chase the story towards metaphysical heights, and make sure that the entire experience felt integral to the reader.
I was always conscious of the language or style of my stories, because most local genre writers try to mimic other, mostly American writers. That wouldn’t work with my approach, so I had to construct a style that didn’t read like genre, was precise and un-obstructive enough to give readers the idea of their own reality, and yet allowed for subtleties. In constructing the style I’m always conscious of the Hungarian reader, especially when I open a story up for the fantastic elements. They mustn’t lose the story, or feel that the core reality of the setting broke down. So, especially with The Amber Complex I had to be gradual about my approach, take my time in introducing layers upon layers of the impossible or the fantastic, and in the end make sure that even the highs of the story spoke of the mundane experience by way of contrast. Hungarian readers were often shocked at how well the story captured their experience of rural Hungary, and without it the story wouldn’t work. Establishing that reality takes time, that’s why I rarely write really short short stories. Most of my stories are above 20 pages and under 60. That’s my comfort zone.
I: The horror genre, especially from and in the United States has been roaring this past decade with different, especially marginalized groups justly claiming horror back, showing us their sides of horror. Nevertheless, this trend hasn’t yet jumped over to horror from other continents (maybe with the exception of Central and South America) and it is still hard finding representation from other places. In this sense, it is remarkable and important that you, as a non-US author and with your first English book on top of that, are now nominated for probably the most important award for horror circles. I think it is important for us here in Europe too, because there is a big community who speaks and reads in English as a lingua franca without which we wouldn’t be aware of each other’s work. Unfortunately, the native English world hasn’t yet seen and acknowledged its responsibility as such a lingua franca. How does that make you feel and do you think it is a disadvantage for you to be away from the so-called hub of horror literature?
A: I think, or hope that it’s a conversation. I believe horror to be the most relevant genre today, and though I love the stuff pouring out of the US, I’m immensely grateful that English translations make other views available to us as well. I find Central and South American authors to be especially exciting, I can’t have enough of Marianna Enriquez, Samanta Schweblin and the likes of them. Their approach to horror, weird and the fantastic feel very relevant and inspiring to me. That being said, mostly due to Valancourt’s work a world of European horror opened up to me as well, and I find it maddening that writers living some hundreds kilometres from each other cannot read each others’ stuff. It’s a blessing that now we’re allowed to read Luigi Mussolino’s and Anders Fager’s collections as they each speak about their individual experiences of not just being an Italian and a Swede respectively, but of being Europeans as well. Europe is a weird place, as so many types of experiences exist in such a small continent, and it would be a shame if we were denied those experiences as readers due to language barriers. I think Valancourt, and certainly some other publishers too, see the responsibility that comes with their access to publishing in the current lingua franca, and I can only hope that their good work is appreciated and would continue.
I never lamented being born a Hungarian, thus denied access to the natural hub that comes with being born an English speaker. I only became a writer after I’ve mastered English enough so I could read books that were relevant to me, and to write in English. A second language allows you to understand and control your own language with more accuracy, and without that accuracy I wouldn’t be able to write the stuff I write. Also, my stories are about my own experiences, my own society, my own people. It feels unreal, impossible and humbling that people now read and appreciate my writing abroad, but those stories wouldn’t exist without my experiences as a Hungarian. I would be a different person had I been born in the US, and so my stories would be different. I try not to ponder on what-if scenarios, as what’s happening with The Black Maybe is already beyond my wildest imaginings. You can’t change who you are, you can only try to make the best of your circumstances.
I: Do you feel compelled to work on a novel some day or do you feel comfortably at home writing short stories?
A: I do have a novel. When I first presented my writing to my Hungarian publisher, they made it clear to me that even though they loved what they read, there was no place in the market for short story collections. They were expecting a novel from me, and I delivered one. It’s called Darker Outside (Odakint sötétebb) and it’s a weird, horrific coming-of-age story set in rural Hungary. The novel was a rather unexpected instant success, so my publisher wanted something quick to capitalise on that success, allowing me to release my story collection Midnight Schools (Éjféli iskolák) the next year. Most of the stories in The Black Maybe, 7 out the 10, are from that collection. Midnight Schools was also successful, breaking down the idea that one couldn’t release collections to success, and possibly allowed for other genre writers to release collections too. Despite the success of my novel I’m still attached to shorter stories, though I’ve been experimenting with an intermediate form. My latest book, The Restoration of Reality (A valóság helyreállítása) reads as a short story collection, but the more you read the more you understand that the stories are deeply connected and there is a larger overarching narrative hidden beyond them. By the time you finish it you might realise that you’ve just read a novel. The Restoration of Reality is a book that speaks most clearly of my current sensibilities and intentions. Even though I wrote it as a series of a short stories, I was aware that I was writing a book where these little pieces formed a larger entity. I knew I was writing a novel; only what I wanted to discuss was impossible to do so in a single, coherent novel-length narrative. The form is very much the essence of the book. I intend to expand on that idea in my next book, more explicitly a novel, but also written as a series of seemingly individual short stories.
I: The influence of Lovecraft in most of your stories is kind of evident with you sending us on vacation to touristic destinations we can experience eldritch abominations or throwing us into pain cults for evil gods. Are there other, maybe Hungarian, influences to your writing?
I do love Lovecraft and he was an inspiration, especially in my youth. That being said I wrote most of my Lovecraftian stories for a local magazine, The Black Aether, published by Józsi Tomasics, a man of immense dedication. He set his mind on publishing a pulp magazine in the style of Weird Tales, dedicated to Lovecraftian cosmic and weird stories, open to writers both amateur and professional. He created a space for Hungarian writers to write explicitly in the Lovecraftian niche, a thing unheard of before. My Mythos-inspired stories were written for him, as he was the first editor to actually publish my work, and I’m a loyal person. Whenever he calls me in need of a story I provide one. Without him I don’t think I would have persuaded Lovecraftian themes or style, and in all the stories I wrote for the magazine I set out to look for ways to expand or subvert what one could do with a Mythos tale. Some of my best and most personal stuff, such as Walks Among You and Multiplied by Zero came out of this collaboration. I thought Walks Among You was the furthest I could take Lovecraft away from its roots by removing the fantastic from the Mythos, but last year Józsi made a call that The Black Aether was coming to an end. He wanted a final story, so I wrote one called The Summer I Chose to Die - the story to close my Lovecraft-style cycle by subverting everything about Lovecraft and making it a political statement about contemporary Hungary. Alas, it turns out that the magazine not only didn’t die but is about to expand, and yet again there is a call for me to write another Lovecraft-themed tale. So I guess my Lovecraft stuff goes on as long as Józsi and his magazine lasts.
As for Hungarian influences - I don’t think that I have been inspired by Hungarian literature. When I say this I don’t mean that I don’t read or love Hungarian literature; I do - immensely. But as a writer I knew I was going against everything contemporary writers were doing; not by way of denial, but by way of carving out my own style and niche. Hungarian is a wonderfully expressive language and we do have several fantastic authors. I read their books and appreciate them, but I don’t consider them inspirations. They are only guiding me away from established themes and styles towards my own unexplored territories. There are some contemporary genre or mid-stream writers, such as Anita Moskát or Balázs Farkas, whose work I follow fanatically. We’re also friends, inspiring each other to write more and write better. If I had to name one writer with whose work I feel a creative connection it would be Gábor Csaba Trenka. His early books were standing at a weird crossroad of literal writing and the fantastic, strong on mood and emotional honesty. I don’t think you’d notice any sort of connection between his books and mine, but he did show me that there was a third way between genre and mainstream literature even in Hungary.
I: Is there anything else you’d like to say about your book?
When I read a book and it genuinely speaks to me I often feel a sort of creative envy; I wish I could write from that perspective, or in that style, or that rawly and honestly. I feel that even if I hadn’t written The Black Maybe, upon reading it I would feel that envy. So if anyone feels that they wanted to read weird and horror exploring the human experience, written from a Central-Eastern European perspective and they are ready to be disturbed, please consider reading my book.
I thank you wholeheartedly, Attila, for giving this wonderful interview. As with everything you write, your answers are a pleasure to read too. I’ll be rooting for you here to win at the Bram Stoker Awards in three weeks on June 17th, and can’t wait for more of your work to be translated into English so we can read more from you.
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