Introducing ERAST FANpoRiN
AKUNIN
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MURDER ON THE
BORIS AKUNIN
Secrets&spies
He has sold ten million books in Russia, bridged the divide between popular and highbrow fiction and is read around the world. But, BORIS AKUNIN tells James Smart, public speaking makes him nervous.
sking your subject where they are and
why is a common enough way of
starting a phone interview. It sets the scene and lets them exercise their vocal cords. l-‘or Boris Akunin. ensconced in a London hotel. it is the first chance to Use his favoured conversational device: the list. ‘Well actually.’ he explains in considered. deadpan linglish. 'there were three reasons for that. One of them is that a title of mine is coming out in ten days. The second reason is that I will be attending the lidinburgh literary festival. which will be in two weeks‘ time. There is yet one more reason why I came early. I am working on a book and I am now in the most delicate period of writing when I need to be away from everyone and in a quiet place like London. l moved here into this apartment and l have a building site just ten feet from my window. which starts working at bain.' lle sighs. ‘1 think the ending is going to become more violent.‘
Any i‘epet'ctissions will be felt around the world. The Georgia-born author's secret agent novels. based around the intrepid liandorin family. have sold ten million copies in Russia. where they are currently being filmed. and have been translated into over 2() languages. In
the (K. the fourth in the series. The /)(‘(lI/I of
.'l('/If//('.\. has just been published. Like its predecessors. it follows lirast l‘andorin. a man with a sharp mind. a life-saving corset and an
12 THE LIST FESTIVAL MAGAZINE ' '
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increasingly nifty line in martial arts. His investigations have taken him to respectable London. the steppes of central Asia. the Moscow underworld and onto the world‘s biggest steamship.
‘The lirast liandorin series is a sort of
encyclopaedia of different genres of crime liction.‘ explains Akunin. 'liach of the novels represents a new subgenre: the first one was a romantic adventure. the second was a spy thriller. the third one was a characteristic-style closed room adventure. the fourth is a novel about a hired killer. The next one. which is called Special Missions. is again very much different. becatise it consists of two short novels under one cover. The first one is a
‘WRITING MASS FICTION WAS A SHAMEF UL THING FOR A PHILOLOGIST TO DO'
picaresque novel. very hilarious. the second one is really cruel and terrible. [I is a story about lack the Ripper. because one of the theories about lack the Ripper was that he was a Russian medical student who then came back to Russia. and that's why the killings stopped.‘
Akunin’s explanation offers a clue to the books‘ success: they are at once clever novels
TI'II' NLW ERAST FANDORIN MYSTERY
URKISH GAMBI
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written by a man with a wide knowledge of literature and literary convention. and enormously readable and rather fantastic jannts into a 19m century world of espionage and intrigue. l-‘andorin’s apparently endless loyalty to Rtissia has caused some commentators to suggest that the liandorin series serves to offer succour to a troubled country and indirect support to President Putin’s much—criticised security policy. Akunin. though. seems more enthused by ideas than ideology. ‘l was very much interested in the style of the epoch.‘ he says. ‘the way people talk. the way people dressed. how fascinated they were with the first toys of technical progress. And besides. I feel a certain nostalgia for a time when people believed that paradise on earth was within easy reach and all the existential problems could be solved with your intellect.’
ln a British context. Akunin's novels sit in a respectable tradition that includes Arthur (‘onan Doyle. John Buchan. (ieorge .\/1acl)onald l‘raser and lan Fleming. In Russia in the mid-90s. things were a little different. The Soviet emphasis on reading as education had resulted in a huge gap between popular fiction and literature. inspired to write a novel by his wife. who loved reading detective novels btit felt embarrassed to be seen reading lowbrow fiction on the underground. he created l’andorin. He did so under a pseudonym. partly because his real name of (irigory (‘hkhartishvili (it sounds. when properly pronounced. like a suppressed sneeze) was hard for Russian. let alone foreign. lips to pronounce. but also because of the perceived stigma. ‘At the time I was working at an established literary magazine] he explains. ‘and I didn‘t want my colleagues to know that l was writing this sort of literature because it was supposed to be a shameful thing fora philologist to do. to write mass fiction.~
At the time. Akunin rated his chances of success at ‘maybe 40‘} '. ‘No one in Rtissia wanted to read about the l‘)th century.‘ he