Video of the nominees in face masks, supplementary to the ‘Novel of the Year’ event

NEF ‘13 Centuries of Bulgaria’ last week announced the nominees for the ninth National Literary Prize for Novel of the Year.

Text: Magdalena Gigova

Video: Tsvetan Ignatovski

Before the jury (which was kept secret) chose the winner of the prestigious prize on the historic date, 2 June 2020, we recorded videos of the six authors selected from over 30 contenders.

In order to observe the social distancing imposed by the epidemic, the writers appeared at the beautiful house of NEF ‘13 Centuries of Bulgaria’, at 1, Vasil Gerov Sq. in Lozenets quarter, not forgetting to wear the mandatory face masks.

Behind the camera, Tsvetan Ignatovski was pleasantly surprised that, although swayed by muses, all the writers had thought in advance of what to say within the two minutes assigned to them in the regulations.

Theodora Dimova (author of ‘The Stricken’), as a true professional—an editor in BNR’s Radiotheatre—had even rehearsed using a chronometer. She called her work ‘a novel-wound’.

Georgi Tenev preferred to read an excerpt from ‘Balkan Ritual’ instead of revealing details of the plot.

Demetra Duleva (‘The Wandering Albatross’), who is a diplomat at the Bulgarian Embassy in Paris, recorded her video in France and sent it via the internet.

Momchil Nikolov revealed from where the title of his novel, ‘Chekmo’, originated—the nickname of a close childhood friend of his.

Regarding ‘Chronicles of the Unknown’, the author Nikolai Terziyski revealed that he treats the conciliation of ‘blood’ as a growth of the personality.

As a doyen among the nominees, Vladimir Zarev wisely did not give away the plot of ‘The Monster’, but, in another conversation off-camera, he shared that his entire remarkable 45-year career had been spent solely with the Savremennik magazine.