A luminous bow hovers in the darkness as if suspended in the sky while the arena-like stage is filled with smoke. A figure emerges: Katniss Everdeen, the girl from District 12 in Suzanne Collins' post-apocalyptic universe, played by Jennifer Lawrence in the film franchise. With her appearance, the 74th Hunger Games begin and no special effect is spared. Closely following the plot of Collins' first book in the young adult series, and the Lionsgate film of 2012,
The Academy cited the 71-year-old's compelling and visionary oeuvre that, in the midst of apocalyptic terror, reaffirms the power of art. Krasznahorkai is known for his dystopian, melancholic novels, which have won numerous prizes, including the 2019 National Book award for translated literature and the 2015 Man Booker International prize. Several of his works, including his novels Satantango and The Melancholy of Resistance, have been adapted into feature films.
One day more than 50 years ago, Carolivia Herron was stepping onto the curb at Piney Branch Road and Underwood Street, Northwest, when she was struck by a vision: a striking woman on the sidewalk, silhouetted by the sky, her hand raised in a gesture of repudiation. "It was like, 'Oh, wow, who is she? I've got to know her story,' " Herron says. The woman was imaginary, but powerful enough to start Herron's wheels spinning. When she got home, she began to write.
I still have that copy; I've carried it through half a dozen states and a dozen moves and uncountable phases of my life. Twenty-seven years later, its pages are vanilla-sweet, from the decaying lignin; the imprint was long ago absorbed into another. But "I Who Have Never Known Men," which was first published thirty years ago, in French, has found new life.
