Eminé Sadk, the writer of 'Empty Bulgaria': "Totalitarian regimes manage to dissolve identity and turn you, for example, into a good communist."

A region, Ludogorie —or Deliormán, its original name in Turkish—so isolated that, until the 20th century, it didn't even appear on maps. An area of ​​Bulgaria where different ethnic groups (Turks, Roma gypsies, Jews, Bulgarians) have coexisted for hundreds of years. Once under the Ottoman Empire, later under the Soviet yoke, and today, an "abandoned territory" of wild forests and sheep farms that, like our emptied Spain , forces many to leave.

This is the setting, in part, of the novel Caravan for Crows (Automática Editorial), by Bulgarian writer Eminé Sadk (Dúlovo, 1996). Last May, she was in Madrid to present the Spanish translation of her first novel, written at the age of 23 during the pandemic.

The protagonist is Nikolay Todorov , a forty-something geography teacher who has just won a European award for revamping the educational environment of the high school in the small Bulgarian town where he works. He comes from the countryside.

The story begins with the start of Todorov's big day. He is single, unbelieving, and skeptical, but also tender and kind in his heart (which Sadk manages to convey). The mayor and the school principal have organized a party to celebrate the news of his award, and Todorov, after crossing the market and encountering numerous characters (the Shoemaker, the Sheriff, the lady) along the way, manages to reach a banquet where he is to give a speech praising the local traditions (a task he has no desire to do at all). His distress is such that when he opens his mouth, all he can manage is to vomit.

A character, sometimes comical and sometimes tragic, who made the author wonder if she would fit in when she was offered her first translation, which was into Spanish. "I was really worried about how it would be accepted by foreign readers, because the living contexts are different, but then I thought, don't we live in the same Europe? I know that in Spain there are also differences between urban areas and agricultural areas, that you also have isolated and empty places..." she recounts via a Zoom video call the day before traveling to Madrid.

She believes that "the book can work" in our country and details that Ludogorie, the area where her character and she herself were born, "was abandoned after the Black Death" and that times were no better during Ottoman rule. "It was there that Ottoman culture developed, and during both World Wars, the Balkan Wars, and the communist era, it was the destination for different ethnic groups from different parts of Bulgaria," she adds.

A setting for stories that, in Sadk's eyes, needed to be told: "This place has its own rules; it doesn't follow the clock of the contemporary world. It's home to many ways of seeing life and has also seen many people leave and never return. For me, returning to my parents' house during the pandemic was very important."

Sadk, a professional chef, says that the arrival of Covid forced him to close his restaurant and return to his home region . Like Todorov, after his unfortunate mishap at his award ceremony, he decided to move to Ludogorie. "Todorov reminds me of my friends born in the 1970s, who left and, in some cases, have returned. Interesting people I wanted the world to know about," he recalls.

Todorov, like the author, returns to the forgotten villages of Ludogorie, inviting us to explore this unknown European enclave where the cultural crossroads dominates. "I thought I had to explore what was happening there, what kind of literature has been written about this place, and I realized there wasn't much to read about this specific area, so I started writing..." And she adds, without saying so, that she feels proud: "I was at my parents' house, confused, thinking about showing the world the place where I lived, and look now, about to travel to Madrid to talk about a novel... I guess that's the power of literature, the power to connect."

Sadk was also interested in describing the lives of "those who have two cultures but live primarily in one." "They're people of borders, but the world has always been like that, or at least it has been for me. It's interesting how totalitarian regimes can somehow dissolve identity and turn you, for example, into a good communist," she reflects on the various historical influences that still weigh heavily on her region.

Sadk also has a cat, and says that her next novel, which tells the story of a woman from the early 20th century who travels around different Bulgarian places, also features a cat as a character. And to anyone reading these lines who might decide to visit the remote region of Ludogorie this summer, the author warns: "Novels weren't very popular in Bulgaria; they didn't convey what the public was looking for, but now there's a new energy, new writers with new approaches. Bulgarian culture is experiencing a renaissance. And there are no big countries and small countries, but big cultures and oppressed cultures. My writer friends have a warlike attitude."

Eminé feels part of "something very powerful to see." "And no one is giving it to us; we're simply inventing a new world. It gives me goosebumps just talking about it. There's a huge cultural gap between my generation and the previous one, and it's beautiful to watch the creation. It doesn't matter how it ends. We'll just say we tried."