Georgian writer and translator.
Anna Kordzaia-Samadashvili is a lecturer at Ilia State University in Tbilisi. She writes for various literary magazines. In 2003, Anna received literary prize “Saba” for the best debut of the year. Her short stories are included in compilation of “Best 15 Short Stories of the Year” in years 2004, 2005 and 2006. In 2005, she published collection of short stories “Me, Margarita” (Bakur Sulakauri Publishing), which received “Parnasus Prize” for “Years’ Bestseller”. Anna Kordzaia-Samadashvili’s short stories are included in Contemporary Georgian Fiction (Dalkey Archive Press), “Short Stories of 21st Century” (Bakur Sulakauri Publishing) and “Woman – Face and Challenges” (Caucasian House Publishing). Anna’s short stories are also published in Georgian Women Writers’ Anthology, published by German publishing house FVA in 2013, which was presented in Leipzig Book Fair and “Leipzig Reads” program of 2013. Anna Kordzaia-Samadashvili also translated works of Cornelia Funke and Elfriede Jelinek from German into Georgian. She was awarded a prize by the Goethe Institute in Tbilisi for her translation of Elfriede Jelinek’s novel “Die Liebhaberinnen” (Women as Lovers).
In 2011, Anna Kordzaia-Samadashvili published her acclaimed novel “Children of Shushanik”. She received an award for best novel of the year in 2013 for her novel ‘Who Murdered Chaika?”.
A Long Letter To A Sister Far Away
P.S. I completely forgot: what shall I do about that girl of
yours? Can't you just tell her I was taught English by
Swedish Hindus and that I'll be no use to her? She's looking
for some kind of emotional angle – well, where on
earth do I come in? Tell her I sit in a cellar, don't see a
soul, have no contact with the outside world... and if she
wants something about Tbilisi for her project – I never did
work out what it is she's studying - give her some tale of
misfortune. Tell her it's nothing to do with me but it's a really
great story, and there you go, knock yourself out! And
don't make her think I'm giving her the brush off, either,
or being inattentive, or lazy. I don't think I've told you this
before, but Uncle Vakhushti had a cat. He told me his son
came along one day, slowly pulled something out of his
pocket and that when he looked down into his hand there
was a tiny, dirty, sticky-eyed, stiff-tailed kitten. 'Blimey!'
he said and Blimey became its name. I knew Blimey. He
grew massive and he was beautiful, like a tiger. He was
the scourge of the neighbourhood cats, and soon every
kitten in the neighbourhood looked like him. Blimey was
always getting into fights, his ears were always torn and
bloodied, but he wore his wounds proudly and they really
suited him, too. One day somebody smashed his head
open – it couldn't have been a cat, it must have been a
person that did it – and when I saw it I was really scared
and said 'Oh Blimey!' Talk about a close shave! And that's
an understatement! He was a great cat, and he died a
hero too – fighting over a woman. And Uncle Vakhushti
said to me: 'Blimey's not with us any more. He was a cat
who valued honour more than life itself'.
Well, that's about it. Much love - I'm off to bed, otherwise
tomorrow I'll be chucking that alarm clock across the room
and wishing the neighbours good morning at 2 o'clock
again, and that really won't do.
A.
translated from Georgian by Elizabeth Highway