Kenan Orhan, "The Renovation"
It’s December 7. Kenan Orhan, author of I Am My Country, can’t get anyone from the City on the phone.
How would you describe your story?
KENAN ORHAN: The tale of a real bungled remodel, just a nightmare.
When did you write it, and how did the writing process compare to your other work?
KO: I wrote it in the spring of 2023. I usually take about a month to write a story, and this was no different, though there was more of my own life in this one than I usually like, not in any obvious way I don’t think, but I prefer the lives of strangers and broke that rule a little with this one.
What kind of research went into this story?
KO: Very pedantic things: how much does hospice care cost in Italy, how long does someone with Alzheimer’s usually live; but also some moving and unexpected elements like art made by the incarcerated, interviews with jailed women. More research than I was able to use and less than the subject deserves, which seems to be my standard.
What, to you, makes the short story a special form? What can it do that other kinds of writing can’t?
KO: I think because of its size it has a very high ratio of surface tension, which, in my imagining, means it can maintain a higher level of magic. There are things you can introduce and not bother about explaining away or rationalizing because the reader, being a reader of short stories and so the smartest kind of reader, doesn’t mind. Short stories are the form of experiments, I think Calvino said that and he ought to know. They don’t crumble under the weight of their surreality like I think can happen with a longer form. It’s difficult to keep the central, magical metaphor that is common in my stories sustained for three hundred pages without it crumbling around you. I think of stories as the form of lightness, quickness and fun, and novels as the form of interrogation, accumulation and development, and really the novella is the perfect form because it can do it all or none of it, but so rarely is it published that it’s always read on its own terms.
Where should people go to learn more about you and your work?
KO: My website, I suppose, though I don't tend it very well.
What’s the best gift you’ve ever been given?
KO: People are too generous to me; I’ve received far too many good gifts over the years to pick one here. The worst was a pair of threadbare novelty socks that must’ve been made for children’s feet, so the best should be the opposite.
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