Irakli Charkviani’s autobiographical novel is, on one hand, ‘the story of a king’ – the real story of how a Georgian rock star was born the ‘king’ at the age of 43; on the other hand, it is the story of a terrorist from Kabul, Rumi’s final experiences in the passenger cabin of an aeroplane before he presses the button that will blow it up. In modern world literature, A Calm Swim can be compared to Haruki Murakami’s Kafka on the Beach in which the odd chapters give us the story of one character, and the even chapters – that of another character, but where the fates of these two persons is intertwined and, eventually, merged. The lives of the ‘king’ and of Rumi evolve in parallel, their fates seem to shackle them together, and they represent one human being’s two natures. One element is constructive, the other destructive. We know that one of these persons is Irakli Charkviani, who chose the pseudonym of the ‘king’ in his last years, while the other is an incarnation of the mediaeval Sufi philosopher and legendary poet Rumi. The action takes place in two separate spaces – material and metaphysical dimensions. Although the novel’s historical and biographical part occupies the material space, evil forces, plotting against the universe, are present in the other dimension. One of those plotting is Lenin, who represents the forces of destruction in the novel: he lures the future terrorist to his mausoleum and talks to him about the necessity of reducing the world’s population. A reader of the novel will be most enthralled by the author’s extremely frank monologue about himself and the complex epoch in which his life ran its course. The generation born in the 1960s to 1980s period is called Generation X. It was a generation for which personal freedom and human rights were the most important values and which decided to change the injustices of the world. A Calm Swim is a novel written on the principle of flow of consciousness: reality periodically rises to the surface like a torpedo. The Aeroplane Boys is about the events of 1983, when seven young Georgians hijacked an Aeroflot passenger aircraft. The hijackers had intended to flee the Soviet Union. Some of them were the offspring of well-known families. The Soviet government sentenced the surviving hijackers to death. This tragic story, to which more than one literary work has been devoted recently, has probably left the deepest mark on Irakli Charkviani’s life and consciousness. ‘The closer one gets to oneself, the closer I get to death,’ is perhaps the fate and the tragedy of Generation X, something that can be sensed in every line of the book. Irakli Charkviani’s chief metaphors – A Calm Swim and The Paper Ship – imply escape from that enchanted circle, Soviet and post-Soviet space.

‘Irakli Charkviani’s novel A Calm Swim is a generous, unashamed and, I’d say, a fearless exposition by a writer who has shown his ability for the fantastic.’   

L. Berdzenishvili, writer / Radio books programme

EXTRACT
Translated into English by Maya Kiasashvili  

This text (the word nauseously banal, created by the writers suffering from an inferiority complex, made of rubber as thin as a condom) definitely doesn’t fit the elated mood I, King Irakli, meant to guide me while writing a short book which wouldn’t in the least look like an ordinary one, because it isn’t my aim to entertain you, while books, as a rule, are written if not to cheer several Marys or Janes, to at least spoil their mood. However sternly some intellectuals try to convince us that they don’t care at all for Mary and Jane, I’m absolutely sure that even James Joyce wanted to impress Irish Marys, which he managed, but a little later.
In short, the great writers eventually succeed in this, while their majority die without impressing a single Mary or Jane by the heroic deeds of their machos, laboriously born out of their minds. In other words, the writers are not that lucky, especially those writing prose professionally, exercising their muscles more vigorously than poets do. According to the latest research, women don’t like muscled men, muscled prose writers in particular.
Anyway, I’m not going to entertain you and if you still toy with the idea, please put my opus aside, immediately, as, unlike a strong-muscled prose writer, I won’t be offended if you give up on me at this stage. Quite the contrary, I’ll be ecstatic to know that I’ve revealed the truth to fewer people. It’s always better when very few know the truth! It’s like a disgusting pimple on your nose, springing up exactly at the time you’re about to go to a party. My book is more of a pimple rather than a posh party. So, those who love lies and fun are humbly asked to leave me alone, at home, facing a mirror.
The second reason I’ve undertaken this hard task is a bunch of absurd rumours that swarm my exhausted, severely-wounded eagle-like essence like ravenous vultures. Thirdly, I’ve reverted to writing the truth as this November, Lord made me look briefly through the door with only silence beyond it. Shakespeare would have said: The rest is silence. Strange as it might sound, for the reasons completely unknown to me, I’ve become part of that silence, true, for a minute or two, but still. It might have been this brief, unexpected encounter with the other world that made me decide to tell the truth.
I’m also pretty sure the moment I die, plenty of idiots will pop up claiming they knew me better than others, that only they and a couple of creatures like them were able to perceive the true essence of King Irakli. They’ll come up with a lot of nonsense, which many Marys and Janes might even buy – something that is going to deeply upset me in the other world. Unlike many others, it’s only logical that my life should continue in discussions and speculations after my death. Precisely for this reason, I believe it’s my duty not to strain the public and to safeguard it from the incorrect information about myself... (See PDF) 


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