Karayan / Archer Immoral Tales

London - Alexandria: a coming of age erotic odyssey
1. Auflage 2018
ISBN: 978-9963-7-0676-1
Verlag: Armida Publications
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 150 Seiten

NATIONAL PRIZE FOR LITERATURE - Cyprus
In the age of David Hockney, Derek Jarman, Kenneth Anger and Andy Warhol, when bisexuality was at first radical and then trendy, a young man is faced with the ambiguity of sexual roles and oscillates between In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower and Special Friendships.
A frank and moving coming of age autobiographical novel about self discovery, love, art, sexual and artistic identity. A journey leading from the swinging London of the late '60s to contemporary Alexandria.
Weaving personal experience with modern social and historical events, internationally acclaimed Cypriot artist Andreas Karayan brings forth IMMORAL TALES, a book inhabited by colorful characters that captures the essence of life.
IMMORAL TALES is one part of a semi-autobiographical trilogy, but it is autonomous; it follows a young man's search for his artistic and sexual identity during his formative years.
Art and passion converge in Andreas Karayan's cosmopolitan gaze. His trilogy explores key historical, political and social events which have shaped contemporary Europe, as the backdrop for both the life of his protagonist and his own. More specifically, 'Immoral Tales: London - Alexandria,' Karayan explores the world-changing events of late 60's and early 70's in London, and how they influenced his decision to abandon medicine for the arts. The second part of the book explores the pre-revolutionary contemporary Alexandria.
The first of the genre in this part of the world, the book fosters a better understanding of art and sexuality, while emphasizing LGBT and other human rights issues. It is considered a landmark in Cyprus, since it is the first to explore themes which were previously considered taboo.
Grounds for the Literary Award
The book is a candid look at the life of the author, in the form of an autobiographical novel. Through a patchwork of images, Andreas Karayan succeeds with real verve and sensibility in describing the conflicting attractions of his body and soul. The book is a profound self-examination, which blends organically place and time, conveying their atmosphere elegantly with a disarming sincerity. It is in essence a bold attempt to seek identity without the author resorting to self-censorship. On the contrary, he unveils himself and his conflicts finding in the process of writing wholeness, in the interaction of art and life. The writer swathes the facts of his life in a poetic myth and successfully sketches characters who, with their individuality, are in the end transformed into dramatis personae. The whole is presented in an airy manner, with a sense of humor and self-mockery, but also with rich cultural references which bear witness to a good education.
About the author
Andreas Karayan was born in Nicosia, Cyprus, in 1943. He is a well-known Cypriot artist and a pioneer of LGBT rights in Cyprus through his paintings, writings and actions. He studied medicine at the University of Athens and graduated in 1967. He moved to London where he was seduced by the atmosphere of the late '60s and abandoned medicine in favor of art, studying at the Central and Camberwell Schools of Art. He then took an engraving course in Germany and lived in Berlin for a considerable time. He represented Cyprus at the Venice Biennale in 2001, and at the Cairo Biennale in 2006. He also illustrated poems of K. P. Cavafy, which were published in Berlin. From 1978 to 2004, he involved himself with journalism, theatre and cinema criticism. After an invitation from the Library of Alexandria in 2007, he lived in the city and produced a series of works on Alexandrian themes, which were exhibited at the Library. He is the author of three novels in Greek ('A true tale', 'Immoral Tales', and 'Dark Tales'). Nowadays, he lives and works in Nicosia, Alexandria, and Athens.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Karayan, Andreas

Archer, Peter

Leseproben

The appetite may sicken, and so die. – William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night If music be the food of love, let us listen as much as our appetites will allow. The golden hay is hanging on the wall, leaving the summer breeze to caress our naked bodies. Honey and walnuts is your scent; and I kiss the soles of your feet so the ground is kind to them. I lick your toes that touch the earth, the core of everything, and feel your flesh entering my body like a mower sieving through a fresh meadow. Helmut left for Germany on a rainy Sunday afternoon in August 1972. His scholarship had come to an end. He called round to wish us goodbye, bringing with him a record of Così Fan Tutte as a present. He had written on the inner sleeve how all the experiences we went through together had given him so much love and courage, it would enable him to deal with life, after returning to Ulm and his parents. I remembered the last six months during which we had shared everything; the day I had taken my book and my toothbrush and moved in with him, and then my return to Eleonora... I was standing by the window watching him leave in his yellow rainproof, until the window misted up with rain and my eyes with tears.
Epilogue
She (Alice) soon made out that she was in the pool of tears which she had wept... “I wish I hadn’t cried so much. I shall be punished for it now, I suppose, by being drowned in my own tears.” – Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
After Helmut’s departure, I gave up going to college, despite many phone calls from Dick Lee. My body weakened; I could not even manage an erection. I sat in the garden gazing at the passing clouds. Sometimes I went for a walk down to the river, or slumped at home, just staring at the ceiling for hours. Eleonora and I lay in bed like two strangers. The passion that had once bound our bodies together was now shattered into shards of ice. Sometimes she would look at me in a sad way – “what a pity you have lost your laughter.” Inside me there was a pool of tears, but I could not let them out, otherwise my whole being would have been flooded, and like Alice I would have had nothing to cling on to.
In the theatre everything is possible, even to die from love. – Peter Greenaway
The light dims gradually. Piano music and chords; the second part of Tchaikovsky’s piano concerto.
CURTAIN 1 “May the wind be gentle, may the waves be calm,” the sisters Fiordiligi and Dorabella sing as they wave goodbye to their lovers going to war. From Mozart’s opera, Così Fan Tutte (Thus Do They All). ENTR’ACTE
A dream and the story of Ruth, 1977 I was standing at a major crossroads, like Hercules, as he had stood between Virtue and Vice. For him, the choice was easy. It happened without much struggle. He was already destined to become a hero, but for me it was more difficult. On the one hand, there was a handsome girl with a desirable teenage body and a shadowy triangle between her thighs, promising the sensual pleasures that only Pandemos, the earthly Aphrodite, could offer; and on the other, a godly naked boy shining in the sun, attractive with well-shaped lips and cherry-like nipples inviting me to taste, standing with a proud erection. It reminded me of a dream I once had: I was lying with my legs pulled up, Hermes sitting on one knee and Aphrodite on the other. These two beings started to melt into one, forming a magnificent hermaphrodite, from whose penis flowed silvery foam, enveloping me. Then I woke up. I searched for years for this wonderful creature until I found it in the Louvre – a sculpted hermaphrodite, lying in a seductive way with provocative buttocks and the head crowned by a garland. Ruth was the girl who used to eat the petals of flowers. We walked together through gardens and whenever she found a beautiful blossom, she would pick it up gently, bring it to her mouth and eat it – just like giving a kiss. She used to love my lips caressing her lips between her pearly white thighs; they had a sweet aroma and taste – a pink lotus where I could forget myself, like Ulysses’ men on the island of the Lotus Eaters. We were exploring each other’s body. She looked at my penis as at an exotic orchid, its head a bloom. Her lips would gently suck the sweet honey hidden in its heart. Before meeting her, I got to know her fiancé in the students’ residence, where I was staying with Helmut. It was an instant attraction for both of us. His skin had a whiteness which illuminated the darkened room; my hands caressed his body, enjoying the softness of his flesh, then found the thick, dark hair surrounding his young manhood. We let ourselves go in a sweet languor, listening to music. “I will introduce you to my fiancée,” he used to say, as if wishing to exorcise his weakness for me. My dear reader, as my life unfolds in tales, not dissimilar to those of Scheherazade, allow me to say here, as she did to her husband and master, King Shahrayar, in an attempt to save her head for one more night, “I will tell you what happened next at another time.” BOOK TWO - TWENTY YEARS AFTER
The concept of time is relevant to the depth of our memory – a delicate imprint of a beautiful body on white linen on a summer afternoon.
A STORY FROM GERMANY
Rainy days with Armin, 1986
Requiem for a young man You said, “The pine trees are dying, the acid rain is coming from the other side – East Germany. If they do not take the necessary measures, in about twenty years’ time there will not be a healthy tree standing.” In persistent rain, we were walking together in Langenbach, sharing your umbrella – you wanted to show me this hill which belonged to your family. ‘The other side’ symbolised to me a mysterious and terrifying place. Barbed wire and stern-looking guards were everywhere; even the trees looked desolate. I went through it once with Helmut, when travelling from Stuttgart to Berlin in his car. Your house was once an old farm. The huge bed under the heavy beams, in which I would lose myself, reminded me of the queen who wanted to establish that the girl her son intended to marry, truly was a princess. Under fifty quilts, she placed a single pea, and because the girl could not sleep a wink, she proved herself a true princess. Hotel Stadt Rosenheim in Munich: endless silence, mist and rain; the two of us in the small attic room lying close to each other, naked. I could discern through the slanting window a piece of grey sky. Your secrets were hidden in the bedside cabinet: a black piece of underwear perfectly made to measure – you had studied dressmaking and tailoring – squeezing your penis tight in a pouch, as if you wanted to torture and punish it for your need of sex. “I am a war child,” you kept saying, looking at the empty eye-sockets of your father, who had left two blue eyes in a trench – even you he couldn’t see, when you were born. All photographs of him in officer’s uniform were put away. They hid everyone; your uncles, your cousins – all disappeared like shells washed away by the waves. The guilt, though, Kriegskind, was part of your inheritance. Pleasure through pain and humiliation – this is the way you compensate for long-past sins. I was trying to caress your nicely-sculpted, erect penis. You did not even want to touch it; you always invented various ways to bring about your pleasure without touching it. You brought breakfast in on a tray. While I was asleep, you went to the baker’s next door to buy Brötchen and cherry conserve. Whenever you called to see your mother, you took photos of the tree near your house in Langenbach. She had, unquestionably, accepted that you were gay – “There’s no need for your father to know,” she said. He usually sat in his favourite chair, with on his knee the dog who ran like mad to welcome you as soon as he heard you coming. When you were in Berlin later on, you covered the walls with all these photographs and amassed a collection of albums. With a small camera you attempted to capture every moment of passing time. “I will never reach fifty,” you said when I met you. The day before yesterday – the 3rd of March – you were forty-nine years old, and you were dying in the hospital of skin cancer, your red hair gone because of chemotherapy. I was taken aback the first time I saw your red pubic hair; I did not find it at all attractive! You sprayed it black, which made it even worse. But we had such a good laugh, just as when one morning you disappeared from my bed in Niki’s house in Limassol and, through the window facing the sea, I caught sight of you riding the waves. It was mid-December. I joined you and then Nikos saw us, “You must have gone mad,” he said. “You will freeze to death.” At first I was frozen, but afterwards a warmth spread throughout my body, the same as when we made love. You were so tall, one ninety-three,...