Twist of fate

“Originally it was going to be a philosophical thriller about a famous author who has biophobia, as I like to call it, a fear of his own biography,” says Terrin, 44. “He starts thinking, what if something happens to me, how will my four-year-old daughter remember me, as she’s too young to have any conscious memories and a biographer can never fully convey who a person is.”

Emiel then seeks people from his past to find out their impressions of him in trying to control how people will remember him when he is gone. “He then starts thinking about how he can influence this.”

The personal fictionalised

In 2008, Terrin’s own daughter Renée suffered a cerebral infarction, which is a kind of stroke. Terrin stayed at her bedside doing what he does best: writing.

“Our daughter was in a coma,” he says, “and I was sitting beside her at the hospital when I started taking notes on what was happening around us. It was a way to deal with the situation through something familiar. But I was also conscious that what I was writing then would someday be read by her.” The result is a touchingly true portrait of what he and his family went through.

However, Post Mortem is much more than Terrin’s personal struggle. The first part of the novel is a declaration of the author’s passionate love for literature. “Emiel is totally consumed by his idea for the novel,” Terrin adds. “People often ask me how I go about writing a novel, and here I could finally show them.”

Filled with references to the book business, Post Mortem illustrates the conception of an idea. “Emiel just has an idea and lets it marinate without ever writing anything down,” continues Terrin. “He just gets these passages that strike him out of the blue, so the book is already alive in his mind. But just as he gives in to the fiction, he is hit by reality when his daughter becomes ill.”

Complex cross-overs

The author Terrin is thus writing a book about an author who’s writing a book about an author. Sound complicated? Bear with me for just a while longer.

In the third and final part of the novel, we learn the effect of the novel Emiel has written, seen through the eyes of his biographer, a clever addition as a biography is the only part of an author’s oeuvre he doesn’t control.

The result of this highly refined literary construction filled with autobiographical details is an indictment by Terrin of the contemporary fascination with the intimate details of other people’s lives. Reality these days seems to sell more books than fiction.

“My previous books were never autobiographical,” Terrin says. “I like to think of myself as a pure fiction writer. I don’t want my work to be analysed according to my personal life when I’m gone. I want my work to speak for itself. And yet, it’s the autobiographical aspect that draws people in. That’s ironic because it’s exactly what I’m trying to denounce.”

An expression of love

People should, says Terrin, “focus more on the actual story, which is far more intimate as it has taken up so much of an author’s life. But still, people want to know ‘the story behind the story’. I realised that if I wanted to talk about this subject, I had to give up some personal information, such as what happened to my daughter, to add some force to the novel. It gives the novel an extra layer.

Post Mortem is part autobiography and part literature, an intricate web where the fiction embraces the facts. It is a daring, often challenging and very humane novel, a novel that makes you think about the interaction between life and literature. It is already due to be translated into 15 languages, including English.

But most of all, Post Mortem is an expression of love, not just for literature, but also for his daughter, which is why Terrin winning such an award for this novel makes it an even more extraordinary experience.

“The AKO is one of the biggest literary prizes in the Low Countries, so it’s quite an honour,” he confirms, “but I also perceive it as a confirmation of my daughter’s struggle and courage, making it even more special. When she gets older, she’ll be able to read how much I loved her and literature, in my own words. If you add all these things up, then winning this prize becomes a very emotional and important moment.”

www.akoliteratuurprijs.nl

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