INTERVIEW FOR THE EUROPEAN SHORT STORY NETWORK

What is it about the short story form that appeals to you as a writer? What does it permit you to do that you can’t do in a novel, or in poetry?

The short story form allows me to make my point; to get from A to B in a very direct trajectory. It gives me the opportunity to explore characters and develop plot just enough to say what I intend to say. Although there’s symbolism in my short stories (some of them are in fact symbols as a whole), they’re quite straightforward – unlike poems, which are sometimes harder to understand and decipher. Furthermore, while it’s possible to successfully integrate lyricism into short prose (and by doing that, make a short story with interesting lyrical images), the final product can be quite different and a lot richer than poetry. And it seems to me that some lines and paragraphs in a short story can make much more of an impression on readers than those in a novel (naturally, this is a generalisation). Finally – and I say this both as a writer and a reader – the short story has a bright future because it consumes less time then a novel.