Fear of Barbarians

Translated by Christina E. KramerGavdos: a remote island south of Crete, the southernmostpoint of Europe, surrounded by an endless expanse ofsea.To Oksana, who has come from Ukraine with her friendsto recover from illness in the aftermath of Chernobyl, itseems like a dream to live in a blue-and-white housewith a lemon tree.To Penelope, a Greek woman who was married off toan unsuitable man by nuns from the convent where shespent her teenage years, it is a kind of prison.Their two narratives, interwoven with other stories - ofthe other women of the sparse community, of their ownpast lives and loves - are skilfully combined with themesof otherness and the notions of 'foreign' and 'barbaric'in this poetic and timely short novel by acclaimedMacedonian writer Petar Andonovski, winner of theEuropean Union Prize for Literature.Translated from Macedonian