Lose your language to find it.. Mikhail Shishkin

There's a whole bunch of Russian writers at the Book Fair, something that warms my soul..

Of course what's hype, what's not... even the Saturday Guardian seemed to warm most to the sensational side of things: mentioning only one of the authors brought over - who happens to be a larger-than-life figure willing to splash right into hot water by making all sorts of statements about Jews and Russians. Bykov is certainly a gifted orator, I haven't read his writing yet.

Anyway - the authors are reading in London (Waterstones, Picadilly at 6:30 every day this week incl. Saturday), and on Thurs and Fri around our island (Leeds, Liverpool, Sheffield, Cambridge, Bristol, Glasgow, Edinburgh, St Andrews).

I did hear Mikhail Shishkin talk about his writing last night. And read a short translated extract. He seems like the real thing. He talked about how he lost his language when he moved to Switzerland with his Swiss wife - in order to find it again. He said that every writer must decide if he's chasing today's language - and nothing changes as fast as that, becomes stale as quickly - or if he's going to find his own language.

He said lots more interesting stuff too, but best to point you towards his books. Which is tricky. Nothing in English yet, (surprise, surprise), except a short excerpt or two (see Rossica 19, the beautifully produced magazine from the organization behind the reading tour).

But a novel is coming out next year in Germany (Venushaar), and some travel writing is available in German. If you read French, look for 'Chichkine' on the publisher Fayard's list, that's him.