Turkish novelist Elif Shafak has joined Margaret Atwood and David Mitchell in committing a manuscript of her writing to the Future Library project – a 100 year artwork that will see her work unpublished until 2114.
Conceived by Scottish artist Katie Paterson, the Future Library is, in Paterson’s words, “a living, breathing, organic artwork, unfolding over 100 years”. Starting in 2014, each year Paterson, working closely with her partner and library curator Anne Beate Hovind, has approached a writer to contribute a manuscript to the project.
To support the project, a thousand trees have been planted just outside Norway in a forest, to ultimately provide the paper on which the manuscripts will be printed in a century’s time.
Speaking about the ethos behind the project, Anne Beate, in an interview with Nothing in the Rulebook, said:
“Just a couple of generations back, people were ‘cathedral thinking’ all the time. You know, you build something or plant a forest, you don’t do it for your sake – you do it for future generations.
We kind of have this fast food thinking and now we have to prepare something for the next generation. I think more people realise the world is a little lost and we need to get back on track.”
Shafak, the author of novels including The Bastard of Istanbul, The Forty Rules of Love and most recently Three Daughters of Eve, will now follow Margaret Atwood, David Mitchell and Sjón as one of the 100 contributors to the project.
Speaking about Shafak joining the project, Peterson described the choice as pertinent, explaing: “Her work dissolves boundaries: cultural, geographic, political, ideological, religious and spiritual, and embraces a plurality of voices. Her storytelling is magical and profound, creating connectivity between people and places: a signal of hope at a particularly divided moment in time.”
Shafak herself has clearly discovered her own spiritual affinity with the project, saying:
“I had heard about the project, I had read about it; and I thought it was quite unique. The energy around it spoke to me. And I honestly thought it was a labour of love; I thought there was a lot of love involved in this project. The fact that you can leave a manuscript for the future, without knowing who will open up that box and read that manuscript – you know, for me it was like putting a letter in a bottle and putting that bottle in a river, and just, trusting that the river and the flow will take the letter to the right person, someday.”
The handover ceremony, where Shafak will deliver her manuscript in a ceremony in the Norwegian forest, will take place on 2 June. Yet if you are keen to find out more about Shafak’s involvement with the project, you can watch the following detailed interview with the Turkish author below.
https://player.vimeo.com/api/player.js
nothing in the rulebook 