Speaking the Unspeakable

What does it mean to write about the present? Is it possible to describe the world you live in without lapsing into a mere description that lacks any kind of analysis?

Ali Smith, author of the Seasonal Quartet – one of the first literary works to ever tackle Brexit and its aftermath – may be one of the most insightful chroniclers of our time.

In her conversation with Gaia Manzini, Smith embarks on a long journey trying to uncover what power can literature and language still hold in a world where capitalism is rapacious, an all-devouring beast.

Gliff, Smith’s latest novel, casts the light on Great Britain in an unspecified future. This lack of definition may fascinate the reader while creating an effect of extraordinary detachment. A dystopian novel, one might think. And yet, in Smith’s view, there’s no such thing as historical novels nor dystopian ones. She is convinced that, when someone’s writing, something about their time and place will necessarily slip into their work. In Gliff, she says, nothing is invented: it might have happened, somewhere, at some point.

Smith, during this conversation, reveals herself as more than a writer: an activist, a thinker, someone deeply involved in political and sociological matters. Drawing from her experiences with Médecins sans frontières and Refugee Tales, Smith discusses what it means to be human, and what can a writer do in a world that systematically removes undesired subjects from the public discourse. She believes deeply in the ethical responsibility of her craft: writers have to lend a voice to those who have none. At the core of her discourse there’s a belief in the deeply human desire to be together, to be communal, a need to meet other people, share experiences and feel less alone. Smith asks a provocative question: Why are we humanising machines while dehumanising people? Why are we hiding behind screens, creating a separation between us and reality? What’s needed, states Smith, is dialogue, connection, relationships.

Gliff is also a book about the power of language to create new realities: a word like “gliff” can mean anything and its contrary, everything and nothing at the same time. By choosing it as a title, Smith was trying to exploit this unique power, this “gift to us”. In her words, language is a real “currency of meaning” that should make us conscious of how rich we are.

Smith proves to be fairly conscious of this richness, in particular when it comes to narration, and telling stories. Narration, she affirms, is something old, something human beings can’t live without. Nothing in our world is new, everything has already happened, and there are always stories to be told. These are inclusive stories – they don’t try to cut anyone out. “It’s politics that’s exclusive; story just goes here’s the story”.

Perhaps this is the writer’s role today: to give voice to the unspeakable, to carve out space for the stories and people erased from the present – and those still to come.