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აველუმი
“აველუმი” ცხრა აპრილის მოვლენების ამსხაველი ტილოა – ეროვნული ცნობიერების კიდევ ერთი გამოღვიძების, კიდევ ერთი მოუთმენლობისა და კიდევ ერთი კრიზისის სურათი.
518 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1995
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345 people want to read
About the author
Otar Chiladze
29 books179 followersOtar Chiladze (ოთარ ჭილაძე) was a Georgian writer who played a prominent role in the resurrection of the Georgian prose in the post-Stalin era. His novels characteristically fuse Sumerian and Hellenic mythology with the predicaments of a modern Georgian intellectual.
Chiladze was born in Sighnaghi, a town in Kakheti, the easternmost province of then-Soviet Georgia. He graduated from the Tbilisi State University with a degree in journalism in 1956. His works, primary poetry, first appeared in the 1950s. At the same time, Chiladze engaged in literary journalism, working for leading magazines in Tbilisi. He gained popularity with his series of lengthy, atmospheric novels, such as A Man Was Going Down the Road (1972–3), "Everyone That Findeth Me" (1976), "Avelum" (1995), and others. He was a chief editor of the literary magazine Mnatobi since 1997. Chiladze also published several collections of poems and plays. He was awarded Shota Rustaveli Prize in 1983 and State Prize of Georgia in 1993.[1]
Chiladze died after a long illness in October 2009 and was buried at the Mtatsminda Pantheon in Tbilisi, where some of the most prominent writers, artists, scholars, and national heroes of Georgia are buried..[2] His elder brother Tamaz Chiladze is also a writer.
Chiladze was born in Sighnaghi, a town in Kakheti, the easternmost province of then-Soviet Georgia. He graduated from the Tbilisi State University with a degree in journalism in 1956. His works, primary poetry, first appeared in the 1950s. At the same time, Chiladze engaged in literary journalism, working for leading magazines in Tbilisi. He gained popularity with his series of lengthy, atmospheric novels, such as A Man Was Going Down the Road (1972–3), "Everyone That Findeth Me" (1976), "Avelum" (1995), and others. He was a chief editor of the literary magazine Mnatobi since 1997. Chiladze also published several collections of poems and plays. He was awarded Shota Rustaveli Prize in 1983 and State Prize of Georgia in 1993.[1]
Chiladze died after a long illness in October 2009 and was buried at the Mtatsminda Pantheon in Tbilisi, where some of the most prominent writers, artists, scholars, and national heroes of Georgia are buried..[2] His elder brother Tamaz Chiladze is also a writer.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
May 5, 2024
Детальніше – у 31 випуску подкасту "небагатослів".
Авелум намагається врятувати усіх. Саме тому в нього є дружина, коханка, молодша коханка. Дві дочки - одна в шлюбі, інша - поза ним. Це - його "імперія кохання". У книжці також є "імперія зла" - радянський союз. Але не варто очікувати, що перше чи друге тут сюжетотворчі. Тут важливі не стільки події, скільки внутрішні злами. Щоб їх підмітити, треба бути особливо уважним, оскільки Чиладзе не любить лінійної оповіді. Листи, телефонні розмови, газетні статті, телерепортажі, сни, роздуми про сюжети книжок, які пише головний герой, навіть трохи галюцинацій- усе це, втім, не розмиває реальності твору, не робить з нього магічний реалізм чи сюрреалізм. Просто Чиладзе захоплюється метафорами і Авелум як письменник - так само, і вони нашаровуються одна на одну. Наприклад, як той лабіринт Мінотавра - як мітичний сюжет, як сюжет для книжки Авелума, як кошмарний сон, як метафора для тюрми народів. І серед усіх цих шарів треба відкопувати, де надломився Авелум.
Авелум намагається врятувати усіх. Саме тому в нього є дружина, коханка, молодша коханка. Дві дочки - одна в шлюбі, інша - поза ним. Це - його "імперія кохання". У книжці також є "імперія зла" - радянський союз. Але не варто очікувати, що перше чи друге тут сюжетотворчі. Тут важливі не стільки події, скільки внутрішні злами. Щоб їх підмітити, треба бути особливо уважним, оскільки Чиладзе не любить лінійної оповіді. Листи, телефонні розмови, газетні статті, телерепортажі, сни, роздуми про сюжети книжок, які пише головний герой, навіть трохи галюцинацій- усе це, втім, не розмиває реальності твору, не робить з нього магічний реалізм чи сюрреалізм. Просто Чиладзе захоплюється метафорами і Авелум як письменник - так само, і вони нашаровуються одна на одну. Наприклад, як той лабіринт Мінотавра - як мітичний сюжет, як сюжет для книжки Авелума, як кошмарний сон, як метафора для тюрми народів. І серед усіх цих шарів треба відкопувати, де надломився Авелум.
July 28, 2021
This book is so much better than that other Georgia-during-Soviet-times book, The Eighth Life. More intelligently written, far more depth and relevance. At tue same time, it suffers from one significant flaw, which is all the rambling, philosophising and digression that the author seems to need and which ultimately distracts and detracts from the novel.
I did get a decent feeling for life in Georgia between 1956 and 1989, though.
I did get a decent feeling for life in Georgia between 1956 and 1989, though.
December 6, 2022
რთულია ტკივილის გარეშე გაატარო დღეები ამ
წიგნთან ერთად
მაგრამ მაინც შეუდარებელია
წიგნთან ერთად
მაგრამ მაინც შეუდარებელია
January 17, 2019
Tbilisi: Avelum by Otar Chiladze
Does freedom bring happiness?
After reading « Avelum », Otar Chiladze’ novel, you could have some doubts. The book is likely autobiographical to a large extent and describes the life, love entanglements and frustrations of Avelum, a Georgian poet and writer. Two important historical events for his country have bookended his adult life. In March 1956, people took to the streets to protest Khrushchev’s destalinization – the People’s Father was born in Georgia – but the military opened fire and left many victims on the ground. Avelum saw an injured boy calling for help, but he didn’t manage to rescue him. In April 1989, during the Perestroika, Rustaveli avenue was again filled with crowds clamoring for independence. Avelum’s daughter, Little Katie, full of hope and enthusiasm joined the movement, whereas Avelum observed the revolution from afar, as a disillusioned spectator.
Freedom, Avelum, got plenty of it in his love life, at least more than the average citizen in the former Soviet Union. Married to Melania, Katie’s mother, he falls in love with Françoise, a young French woman visiting Tbilisi’s museum. They will develop a long affair, giving birth to another daughter, but an affair complicated by distance and the administrative hurdles to travel within and outside the Soviet Union. Meetings in Moscow and Paris are long to organize, maintain them in perpetual waiting, offer the satisfaction of a few days together but end up too quickly leaving them with a bitter taste. Avelum, who never broke up with Melania, get involved in a third relationship with the young Sonia in Tbilisi. But at the start of the novel she announces that she will get married with another man, a more stable one.
Chiladze’s novel is brilliant, but I did put it down a little bit like if I was ending a night spent drinking too much and discussing with an intellectual rehashing missed opportunities in a smoke-filled bar. The story probably renders well the atmosphere during the dark soviet years, but it doesn’t fit well with the image of a city in full renaissance that I discovered visiting Tbilisi on a sunny Fall weekend.
I went up to Narikala citadel using the cable car in which an Iranian couple – she was not wearing a veil – was taking countless selfies. Once on top, I admired the sunset light falling on the old city built around a curve in the Kura river and crossed by a post-modern bridge. I came down by foot, walking down the alleys finding their way across the old wooden houses with their ornate balconies and stark colors. Some seemed on the verge of crumbling while others, splendidly renovated as hotel or restaurant, opened on courtyards where a climbing vine offered some shade.
I had a hard time thinking that freedom doesn’t bring happiness.
http://www.travelreadings.org/2019/01...
Does freedom bring happiness?
After reading « Avelum », Otar Chiladze’ novel, you could have some doubts. The book is likely autobiographical to a large extent and describes the life, love entanglements and frustrations of Avelum, a Georgian poet and writer. Two important historical events for his country have bookended his adult life. In March 1956, people took to the streets to protest Khrushchev’s destalinization – the People’s Father was born in Georgia – but the military opened fire and left many victims on the ground. Avelum saw an injured boy calling for help, but he didn’t manage to rescue him. In April 1989, during the Perestroika, Rustaveli avenue was again filled with crowds clamoring for independence. Avelum’s daughter, Little Katie, full of hope and enthusiasm joined the movement, whereas Avelum observed the revolution from afar, as a disillusioned spectator.
Freedom, Avelum, got plenty of it in his love life, at least more than the average citizen in the former Soviet Union. Married to Melania, Katie’s mother, he falls in love with Françoise, a young French woman visiting Tbilisi’s museum. They will develop a long affair, giving birth to another daughter, but an affair complicated by distance and the administrative hurdles to travel within and outside the Soviet Union. Meetings in Moscow and Paris are long to organize, maintain them in perpetual waiting, offer the satisfaction of a few days together but end up too quickly leaving them with a bitter taste. Avelum, who never broke up with Melania, get involved in a third relationship with the young Sonia in Tbilisi. But at the start of the novel she announces that she will get married with another man, a more stable one.
Chiladze’s novel is brilliant, but I did put it down a little bit like if I was ending a night spent drinking too much and discussing with an intellectual rehashing missed opportunities in a smoke-filled bar. The story probably renders well the atmosphere during the dark soviet years, but it doesn’t fit well with the image of a city in full renaissance that I discovered visiting Tbilisi on a sunny Fall weekend.
I went up to Narikala citadel using the cable car in which an Iranian couple – she was not wearing a veil – was taking countless selfies. Once on top, I admired the sunset light falling on the old city built around a curve in the Kura river and crossed by a post-modern bridge. I came down by foot, walking down the alleys finding their way across the old wooden houses with their ornate balconies and stark colors. Some seemed on the verge of crumbling while others, splendidly renovated as hotel or restaurant, opened on courtyards where a climbing vine offered some shade.
I had a hard time thinking that freedom doesn’t bring happiness.
http://www.travelreadings.org/2019/01...
didnt-finish
January 11, 2014I ‘rented’ the Kindle edition while I was doing a 30-day free trial of Amazon Prime, as a book from Georgia for the Read The World challenge; but the trial expired when I was half way through, and I couldn’t be bring myself to pay the £1.96 to buy a copy.
Which sounds pretty damning, but it wasn’t actually as bad as that suggests; the narrative itself, of a love affair between a Georgian poet and a French woman during the last years of the Iron Curtain, was pretty effective, and the evocation of life in the USSR was excellent. But in between there was an awful lot of discursive, philosophicky sort of stuff which I found very hard work. Not so much because of the ideas themselves, but because I kept losing track of what he was trying to say. I regularly found myself having to go back a page to find the start of a sentence and try to regain the thread.
It might be my fault for having developed bad reading habits — maybe I should be reading slower — or perhaps something got lost in translation, but I think I’ll find something else for Georgia.
Which sounds pretty damning, but it wasn’t actually as bad as that suggests; the narrative itself, of a love affair between a Georgian poet and a French woman during the last years of the Iron Curtain, was pretty effective, and the evocation of life in the USSR was excellent. But in between there was an awful lot of discursive, philosophicky sort of stuff which I found very hard work. Not so much because of the ideas themselves, but because I kept losing track of what he was trying to say. I regularly found myself having to go back a page to find the start of a sentence and try to regain the thread.
It might be my fault for having developed bad reading habits — maybe I should be reading slower — or perhaps something got lost in translation, but I think I’ll find something else for Georgia.
January 28, 2022
უცნაური წიგნია,სხვანაირად წარმოჩნდება ავტორი,არ გავს მის სხვა შედევრებს...იმდენად ახლოს ეცნობი მთავარი გმირის პირად ცხოვრებას რომ ძველი ნაცნობივით ახლობელია,არასწორ გადაწყვეტილებებშიც რატომღაც უთანაგრძნობ...
საბჭოეთი მისთვის სატუსაღოა,სადაც თავისუფლებას მხოლოდ სასიყვარულო ურთიერთობებში პოულობს.
1956 წლის 9 მარტიდან - 1989 წლის 9 აპრილამდე ერთი ადამიანის ტკივილით სავსე 33 წელი.
"ყველა ომის მიზეზი ერთნაირად სასაცილოა შედეგთან შედარებით"
საბჭოეთი მისთვის სატუსაღოა,სადაც თავისუფლებას მხოლოდ სასიყვარულო ურთიერთობებში პოულობს.
1956 წლის 9 მარტიდან - 1989 წლის 9 აპრილამდე ერთი ადამიანის ტკივილით სავსე 33 წელი.
"ყველა ომის მიზეზი ერთნაირად სასაცილოა შედეგთან შედარებით"
September 9, 2022
I read this during my first 2-week trip to Tbilisi. Chiladze’s novel is often described as “atmospheric” and I completely agree. His storytelling is poetry and painting, he brings you wholly into his world. As I wandered up and down Rustaveli Avenue, I felt a haunting from the events depicted in this novel. A MUST READ for anyone looking to visit Georgia or learn more about the Caucasus. This book has deep emotional truths, albeit with some out-of-date depictions.
July 9, 2018
4.5 stars.
August 30, 2020
89 წელს დავიბადე მეც, აველუმის ოჯახში.
May 4, 2025
Really liked this one. It was pretty dense, dynamic, and the characters as well as their world were fascinating. The atmosphere and the pace wove a captivating story until the very end.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews