STORIES WE LIVE BY
On the third day of the Summer School, our attention shifted towards narrative, perspective and the power of form. Stories do not simply describe the world — they also help us determine who becomes visible, whose experiences are recorded in history, and how we can imagine social change.
THE ART OF STORYTELLING
A Short Story Masterclass with Archil Kikodze
Archil Kikodze, a writer, led a workshop devoted to writing as an art of observation, selection and giving form to experience. One of the starting points was the literary inspiration of Francisco Coloane and his “Marine Method” — the idea that any situation can be approached like a boat: an enclosed space where people, tensions and stories meet. Such a “boat” might be a classroom, a family dinner or a traffic jam.
The conversation focused on several essential elements of the short form. Writing begins with reading, curiosity about oneself and the attentive gathering of observations — a personal journal can become a kind of “savings bank” for future stories. A good story requires condensation: it often centres on a moment of initiation or turning point and ends precisely at the threshold beyond which the protagonist’s life will no longer be the same.
Working on form also means that you are aware that characters had lives before the story being told began; that you exercise restraint in the use of metaphors; that you resist the temptation to use literature for settling personal scores; and that you are willing to confide the text to trusted readers and editors. Style does not have to be something conceived in advance — it emerges through the practice of writing.
LITERATURE, POWER AND POINT OF VIEW
The Stories We Live By: Literature, Narrative, and the Way We See the World with Monika Herceg
The lecture and discussion with Monika Herceg explored the ways in which literary narratives shape social and political reality, as well as gender relations. The starting point was Ursula K. Le Guin’s essay The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction, which challenges the dominant model of storytelling centred on the hero, conquest and victory. The conversation also drew on the texts and ideas of Svetlana Alexievich, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, George Orwell and Judith Butler.
One of the important themes was the ability of younger generations of women to increasingly recognise the patriarchal structures embedded in language and storytelling. We also discussed the material conditions of writing. Women continue to perform a disproportionate share of care work — looking after children, older people and those who are ill — as well as everyday household labour. This directly affects their experience of time, and therefore their ability to create.
Similar constraints have an economic dimension. Poverty deprives people not only of the opportunity to participate in culture and the arts, but also of the opportunity to create them.
The conversation also explored how perspective, rhythm and deliberately preserved silence can transform experience into literature. The question of the time and space needed to tell an experience kept returning — as did the idea of narrative as a possible space for working through what is difficult.
ART, ARCHITECTURE AND THE CONTINUITY OF A BORDERLAND CITY
City at the Crossroads: Art and Architecture in Uzhhorod as a Borderland Experience with Rosana Tuzhanska
Rosana Tuzhanska took participants on a virtual journey through Uzhhorod, drawing on materials from Varosh magazine as well as the experiences of local organisations and grassroots initiatives. Situated at the intersection of empires, cultures and traditions, Uzhhorod is a city whose urban fabric contains successive layers of history: the Middle Ages, Baroque, Art Nouveau, Czechoslovak modernism and Soviet architecture.
An important part of the session was the story of the Transcarpathian School of Painting — its history, continuity and contemporary artists who continue to develop this tradition. The workshop became a starting point for a broader conversation about how borderland cities can recognise and protect their complex heritage without turning it into a closed museum, while remaining open to change and the future.
DILEMMA CINEMA
9 Month Contract (2025, 79 min)
dir. Ketevan Vashagashvili (Georgia)
We ended the day with a screening of Ketevan Vashagashvili’s documentary 9 Month Contract. Its protagonist, Zhana, is a homeless single mother who decides to become a surrogate in order to secure a better future for her daughter, Elene.
The screening was followed by a conversation with the director about maternal sacrifice, bodily autonomy and economic vulnerability to exploitation — and about how material conditions influence decisions we tend to regard as deeply personal.
The Dilemma Cinema programme was curated and moderated by Anna Dziapshipa