An interview with Erato loannou

“Reading fiction allows us new perspectives of the world. Everything we read, inevitably may alter the way we view the world to a lesser or a greater degree. Everything we read is bound to affect our perspective of the world and consequently it is bound to change us. Most of the times we’re not consciously aware of these mysterious doings of the stories lurking in the pathways of our minds long after we’ve read them,” says Erato, Author of Cats Have it All, a collection of short stories.

Tell me about yourself.

I am Erato Ioannou, a writer from Cyprus; a small island tucked in the easternmost corner of the Mediterranean Sea.

Why do you write? 

Why write, indeed! This, I guess is one of the questions that most writers dread. There is no ‘right way’ to respond to it. There’s an intrinsic urge to write—a need characterized by such urgency and it is essential to respond to it. Writing is a means of deciphering the psyche—a process through which a writer plunges into the innermost, darkest, forbidden zones of human existence. Writing is an exploration; a strife to understand ourselves, our immediate and not so immediate surroundings. 

 What kinds of stories do you write? 

My stories are triggered by ‘what if…” Usually, they start with a small detail—be it a weird bit of conversation or an image, which runs the risk to stay unnoticeable in the midst of our everyday preoccupations. That’s all it takes to spark a story, along with “what if”. What if I put this character in this odd situation? How would she react? I believe that stories are within all of us. They are just waiting to be told. What makes a writer is that need to discover the story; that keen eye for detail which will bring the story to life. My characters’ point of departure is the story’s devastating setting—physical or emotional. A devastating setting to which they react in unexpected ways, making the story twist and turn in a rhythmical manner as though it has a mind of its own.

 What do you enjoy the most about writing? 

The end of the process. I enjoy the final product. The work of art that has come out of me and it is let to roam free in the world. It’s a moment of transcendence, really, when your story manages to touch other humans in so many unexpected ways and at so many levels. Writing itself, is a painstaking procedure. It tears you apart. You depart from a real world, from everyday life, from all the mundane occupations, to plunge into a fictional reality—which does not spare you. When I write, my characters’ experiences, their thoughts, their dark secrets, their pain, their anger, their loath has to go through me. There’s no other way to do this, really, if you want to write. Inevitably, the murky water of your characters’ essence will have to go right through you, and you pick all there is to pick up. It’s exhausting, to enter the psyche of another human being—as characters should be treated as true human beings by a writer, or else they will not be genuine. In the end, though, the whole process results to redemption, to healing, to a deeper understanding of humanity; and this is valuable. 

Your story Deserted, what is it about?

The town of Famagusta or Varosia was deserted by its inhabitants in the summer of 1974 when Cyprus was invaded by Turkish military troops. Varosia remains a ghost town as we speak. Deserted https://www.addastories.org/deserted/ is the story of eighty-year-old Anna who decides to stay behind. It’s a story about Place as part of the self. When Place, your home, is violently taken away from you, the self is also torn and this is as painful as when the flesh is torn, dripping with blood and memories lost.

 Why did you choose to write about war?

It’s not a matter of choice. We carry Place within us no matter what. And by Place, I mean the country we were born in, the country we were raised in, the ones that we’ve visited, or we’ve lived in for short or longer periods of time. Place shapes who we are. It molds our personalities and our identities. Some people may not be familiar with the tragic history of Cyprus—my homeland. The results of the Turkish military invasion on the island in 1974 have inflicted deep wounds. Inherited trauma has been haunting us. It has left its mark on the literary work we produce. Even when one makes a conscious decision not to write about the war there is no escape. Its violence has not subsided. It is still present in our memories even in the memories of those born after the war. It is present in its physical form—in the line separating the island into two parts. It has marked the souls of the refugees, the lives of those who lost their loved ones, their homes, their everything.

 Tell me about any other stories that you have written about war or based in countries affected by humanitarian crises?

My writing is influenced by trauma caused by war. Even when my stories do not directly deal with it, war is still there, lurking under the surface. After all, the aftermath of the Turkish military invasion of Cyprus is still there. My country is still divided. Thousands of soldiers occupy the north part of the island. War affects my characters in all the ways that it has affected all Cypriots. Of course, this is a challenge for writers writing from small places. How do we make the specific universal? Why should a wider international audience care about the characters of a small distant place? I was honored and humbled and happy to see that my stories could speak to a wider audience, beyond geographical boundaries. My short story “Something Tiny” it’s such a story tells the story of a Cypriot Yiayia who has found a weird way to rationalize with her husband's disappearance during the war.

 Is there a role for narrative fiction/storytelling to motivate readers to take action to address the causes and consequences of humanitarian crises? 

Stories have been a means of bringing about change since the beginning of time. But beware! Setting out to write a story with an agenda, embarking on a storytelling journey thinking “this is how I’m going to change the world” then you end up with a didactic text serving propaganda. The reader will not react positively to it. It won’t be literature. It will be something else. Through storytelling, the writer explores. She asks questions. She allows her reader to ask them too. The reader will reach her own conclusions based on her own personal experience. When a writer manages to make the specific universal, then yes, things start to change—from within.

Can you describe any incidents from your own experience where reading a fiction story or novel has led you to change the way you behave or caused you to act upon a particular crisis?

Reading fiction allows us new perspectives of the world. Everything we read, inevitably may alter the way we view the world to a lesser or a greater degree. Everything we read is bound to affect our perspective of the world and consequently it is bound to change us. Most of the times we’re not consciously aware of these mysterious doings of the stories lurking in the pathways of our minds long after we’ve read them.

 What is the one thing that you’d like the readers of your stories to take away? 

I want them to take away the stories themselves. I want my readers to make my stories their own.

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