 | | Wydawnictwo Czarne
Wołowiec 2003
© Czarne
125x195
96 pages
paperback
ISBN 83-87391-75-1
rights available |
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Mirosław NahaczEighty Four
Excerpt
All parents – whether in Paris, London, Barcelona, or any other European city or province – wonder what their adolescent children do away from home. And they all have reasons to be extremely worried.
Miros?aw Nahacz’s tale confirms those fears in a most perfidious way. In it he tells the story of a group of school leavers (born in 1984) from a small provincial town, somewhere far from the big city centres, who have organised a lads’ weekend out: first they set off in pursuit of soft drugs (magic mushrooms and grass), then have alcohol for afters, then go on a long car journey, then a short walk, until finally they reach a deserted house, where they shut themselves in, only to find they can’t get out. They had wanted to hide from the world, but they’ve done it a bit too effectively. Will someone find them, if even they aren’t entirely sure how to escape from their own youthful freedom?
This short summary shows that Nahacz’s Eighty Four can be read as a story or a parable: there are lots of hard facts, some interesting reflections on life, strong language, utterly credible psychological portraits of young people, and at the same time a sort of general message about young people’s obsession with drugs. Why do young people take drugs? Out of a yearning for something more than just everyday life, and at the same time out of fear that this “more” will never happen. Young people dream of a world with deep meaning, while also sensing that once they leave school the only meaning of life will be normality. If they manage to move on from their youthful yearnings, wild adventures and drug-induced trances to lead sensible lives, they’ve won. If they believe in the myth of a great big world that’s always out of reach, they’ve lost. They become addicted to their own memories, hostages to the simple idea that taking flight is the only way to find real life, and that the provinces alone are to blame for their sterile existence.
Thanks to this general message, Nahacz’s portrayal fits many places and many provinces, not just in Poland.
Przemysław Czapliński
Mirosław Nahacz, born in 1984, lives in G?adyszów, in the Lower Beskid Mountains. He is working on his degree in culture studies. Eighty Four
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