Desertum (2nd edition) Târgu Mureș, Lector Publishers, 2023.

Category: novel
Pages: 208
Cover: paperback
ISBN: 978-606-8957-47-0

Ferenc Vincze (born 1979, Târgu Mureș, Romania) is a writer, translator, and literary historian. He is editor of the literary periodical Szépirodalmi Figyelő. He received the Géza Csáth Literary Award in 2023, presented by the FISZ (Hungarian: Fiatal Írók Szövetsége, Association of Young Writers). He authored the following books: A macska szeme. Prózai írások. [Cat Eye] Napkút–FISZ, 2007; Desertum. (1. kiadás) Regény. Orpheusz, 2014; A hegyi hódok tündöklése és bukása. Novellák, elbeszélések. [The Rise and Fall of the Mountain Beavers] Lector, 2020; Az utolsó történet. Elbeszélések. [The Last Story] Lector, 2022.

Desertum explores the dynamics of remembering and forgetting, for these two processes occur simultaneously: we remember, but we also forget and are aware of the omissions. In fact, there’s a suggestion that what is truly important is what remains unspoken. Ferenc Vincze’s novel is narrated by grandfathers of various nationalities (more than two). Each, in their own way, has experienced the same thing. After all, birth, love, death, success, and failure – like a desert (perhaps a desolate emptiness, or perhaps a barren expanse?), or perhaps a final, celebratory dessert – are the fundamental experiences that define our humanity. And here, in (almost) the present: Eastern Europe, in a multicultural region reminiscent of Transylvania, in a time that has yet to grapple with the weight of the grandfathers’ era. The book attempts precisely that, reopening the partially healed wounds time and again.