Books
April 25, 2024

Hungry for life

The inhabitants of the remote island state of Vanuatu would not have dreamed that their homeland in the South Pacific writes literary history. And they owe that to bestselling author Amélie Nothomb. Formerly called the archipelago New Hebrides and was under Franco-English community rule. Amélie Nothomb stumbled on her by accident: In 2003, a resident of Vanuatu sent the author a catalog of oceanic art published by him. She did not know the man and wondered about his dedication: "For Amélie Nothomb, even though I know you do not care."

Nothomb leafed through the catalog and found him boring indeed. But her interest in Vanuatu was aroused, she continued to research and found out that there was never any hunger in the island nation, which is predominantly farming, fishing and tourism. "Vanuatu fascinated me, because there is plenty of abundance there, the people lack appetite, the pursuit, Vanuatu is the antipole to me, to my hunger," says the author. She has dedicated several pages to the archipelago in her new book.

Even the title, "Biography of Hunger", is strange, surprising. Almost presumptuous. Finally, Amélie Nothomb, born in 1967 in Kobe, Japan, daughter of a Belgian diplomat, grew up in prosperity. Hunger? Does she know what she's writing about? "I know many kinds of hunger: chocolate hunger, writing hunger, hunger for life, hunger is the best there is." Often the author shoots off such phrases that pop like champagne corks. The provoke, coquettish, exhausting, scary. Can you believe her? In this case, yes. "As a child, I was always hungry all the time, and my mother once said, 'That's a real disease!' I wondered if I'm normal at all, it took me several years to realize that there are people who are more hungry than others, that hunger has never stopped, I'm living very well with it. "

Amélie Nothomb has written more than 60 books

Amélie Nothomb sits very upright in her chair as she tells how she got the idea of making a book out of her eternally growling stomach. Her office, a tiny room in her Parisian publisher Albin Michel, is dark. Hundreds of letters to the editor are stacked behind the desk, which the author answers all by herself - handwritten. She wears a long black skirt and a black coat over it, which she does not take off all the time as if she were on the go. Dark long hair, the face color almost white. In front of us on the desk is her new book. On the cover the face of a woman, a beautiful face, the view urgent, a bit disturbing. Is she? "Of course," says Nothomb shortly. A quick smile, just a few seconds, nervous. On other photos she wears a big black hat, her lips are painted bright red. Her fans worship her like an icon.

The 41-year-old, who lives in Paris and Belgium, has already published 17 books, with just under 50 completed works in the drawer. With her debut, The Purity of the Murderer, in 1992 she promptly landed a bestseller. A novel about a cynical writer with a cancer and a clever journalist peppered with many dialogues - a typical feature of Nothomb's books. Some of her texts are strongly autobiographical, as well as the new book about her childhood and adolescence.

Hunger is, if you like, the main character in this life story. Hunger, which is not born out of necessity, has nothing to do with want, but with desire, greed, desire, willing. Hunger as a form of existence, as an attitude to life. It fits very well with emergency rhythm. When she talks about herself, she sets an astonishing pace, years racing ahead in fast motion. Sometimes one has the feeling of sitting in a movie, full of strong, intense pictures without blur. The extreme, the excessive is the common thread in her life, she can not help it.

A childhood like a road movie

Her new book is not a common autobiography, but works in places like a script, with fast cuts, many dialogues. Amélie Nothomb, the diplomat's daughter. Grew up in Japan, China, USA, Bangladesh, Burma, Belgium. Six countries, six lives. They all condensed to around 200 pages: heartbreaking, exaggerated, deathly sad, euphoric, relentless. The "over hunger", as she calls it, accompanied Amélie already during her childhood in Japan. "I ate tons of sweets - that's how it is today, and of course I also like Belgian chocolates." She does not care about healthy food, she says.

Another childhood sin is champagne. Her parents gave sophisticated receptions, at some point the guests left, leaving the half-filled champagne flutes.Perlende perfection, Amélie thought and drank, together with her four years older sister Juliette. And her parents? "I had total freedom, as long as I brought home excellent grades." That did the lightning-smart little monster. Top marks for chocolates and sparkling wine.

When Amélie was eight, the family moved from Maoist China to New York in 1975. A larger contrast program is hard to imagine, Amélie's life hunger got new food. Years passed as in intoxication, concerts, musicals, restaurant visits, Amélie amused himself. And at the same time knows that their luck has only a limited expiration date. The fate of diplomatic children. A childhood as a road movie. Maybe her hunger for life also has to do with her early experience, that nothing is permanent and the next farewell is always imminent - a life in mental transit. Amélie Nothomb says today that she has no roots. The extreme, the excessive, is the common thread in their lives

When she is eleven, the family moves to Bangladesh, and Amélie realizes what hunger really is, life-threatening and terrible: "These incredibly lean bodies (...) were like a punch in my stomach," she writes. Two years later she falls ill with anorexia: for the first time she wants to conquer hunger, to be a starvation artist - a protest against her own body, which had received breasts and curves that she does not like. She does not eat for two and a half years. And replaces their hunger for food with letters-hunger. A thick dictionary she studies from A to Z, entry by entry. Amélie Nothomb, the obsessed, who does not do things by halves, even when reading an encyclopedia.

It took years for her to regain her nutrition, says the author. "Today, when I am hungry, I like to eat with my friends, myself being the worst cook in the world." The author laughs, and this time it sounds happy. Did she talk to her parents about her illness? "Difficult," says Nothomb. Could it be that the diplomat's daughter grew up in a family of displacers? "At least, we tend to play down, deny, problems."

Amélie Nothomb always writes early in the morning - accompanied by strong tea

She herself stops in her books, takes refuge in the ever-new loop of her imagination. At the age of 17 she was driven by a hunger for writing, since then she has been producing one book after the other. Her "biography of hunger", like all her lyrics, was written in the early morning hours next to a jug of half a liter of strong Kenyan tea. Previously, she has not slept for more than three or four hours, more, the author says, can not do it. Wake hungry. That fits in with the anxious tension that almost always accompanies her, she says.

The "Biography of Hunger" is a very personal book. One might think that Nothomb wants to air the veil, its mysterious aura, for a while. Or? The author averts, "I do not care if I'm mysterious or not, at most I'm interested in understanding myself better." Has she ever thought about psychoanalysis? "I do not want to do that, it would be a lot of work, and I would not be able to get off the couch at all, and who knows if I would still have the drive to write."

Amélie Nothomb stands up. She urgently needs to go now, she says. Once again her short, nervous smile. And she's out the door. It's twelve noon. Mealtime.