“This is the story of the in-between, the half-half, the quarter-quarter-quarter-quarter, the everything and the nothing.” It is the story of rooting, “of becoming, of metamorphosis, of death and rebirth, loss and gain”. It is the story of a world tree that grows on the border between the Indian and Eurasian plates. And at the same time the story of a boy who grows up between languages and cultures that seem very distant. “I, child of midnight and twilight, between yesterday, night and morning.”
Krisha Kops strikes a high note in his debut novel “The Eternal Noise” (Arche). The I that introduces itself somewhat pathetically on the first few pages is, however, also a special one: It is – a beautifully poetic idea – a tree that speaks as a narrative instance. The talking banyan fig is blown by winds that carry stories from India and Germany; Stories that tell of people who can definitely be imagined as the ancestors, the family of Krisha Kops.
The image of the tree had been with him for a long time, said Kops when he first presented his book to the Tukan group in the Seidlvilla during Holy Week; he understood it as an “absolute metaphor” in the sense of the philosopher Hans Blumenberg. With the banyan tree, which is very important in Indian literature and mythology, the theme of home can be described “not only horizontally but also vertically”. What is supposed to mean: Home here is not only meant in the geographical sense, i.e. horizontally, but also in a spiritual, upward striving respect.
This book is, unmistakably, fed by a colossal father conflict
What should also be clear: It is also a special author who is speaking here. Krisha Kops was born in Munich in 1986 to a German mother and an Indian father. As a philosopher and journalist with a doctorate, she deals in particular with intercultural and justice issues; the “inter”, the “between” is of central importance for him. The diversity of his commitment becomes clear on his websiteit ranges from lectures and texts to the management of the neighborhood association wirhelfen.eu. And now there is a debut novel, in which Kops processes the story of his own family, whose faces also flashed on wall projections of old black-and-white photos during the first reading.
The fact that he mythologically charged the biographical material gave him distance, says Kops, a “nice protective layer”. With the Indian part of the ancestors, about whom he knows less, he allowed himself greater freedom when telling stories. Ironically, however, the most bizarre character, that of the father Ramu, is the closest to reality. Such a life, rich in the absurdities depicted in the novel, he “could not have invented”. Imagine: an Indian student who arrives in Munich in the 1980s and falls in love with the city and the women. Even the cold of winter doesn’t bother him; he never wears an overcoat and will be “the first Indian of whom the mountain winds tell, wearing a three-piece suit, slithering down the Alps on skis, faster than a falling wind, his tie flapping about his ears”.
The father buys a nightclub in Schwabing
The highly talented Ramu initially studied physics, taught tennis on the side and sold wooden caskets imported from Kashmir. Proving to be a born businessman, he resorts to importing Madras shirts and becomes rich. Soon he only wears three-piece Brioni suits, drinks champagne and lives with a view of the English Garden; In order to finally be able to hear the revered music of Johann Sebastian Bach as loud as he wants, he also buys a nightclub in Schwabing and drives up in front of it in his white Rolls-Royce. Unfortunately, he’s also a gambler addicted to roulette. He gambles everything away, in life and in love, and in the end he tries his hand at a frozen pizza company in India. And so his son, called Abbayi in the novel, grows up in Munich largely without a father. This book is, unmistakably, fed by a colossal father conflict.
But even if this father alone would provide material for an exuberant novel – Krisha Kops wants to tell a lot more in his debut, maybe a little too much at once. To show how many influences converge and intertwine in a person through the various ancestors, his novel goes back to the great-grandparents. This leads to so many figures on the Indian as well as the German side – often with sombre backgrounds – that the accompanying family tree is indispensable. But through the mythological connection, through the image of the tree and the murmuring winds, Krisha Kops manages to hold the various threads and themes together and culminate in a magical final scene. With a message that shouldn’t go with the wind: you can find your place even in the in-between.
Krisha Kops: The Eternal Noise. Further reading: Tuesday, May 17, 8 p.m., series “Frühlingsmix”, Literaturhaus, literaturhaus-muenchen.de