Élisa Shua Dusapin in conversation with Paula Cifuentes

Élisa Shua Dusapin is the first author to be invited to our K-Lit section where we bring together different representatives of current Korean literature and its diaspora. In her novels, Shua Dusapin explores the complex nature of shared identity and the divided self that defines her own origin. Her sober writing style, already evident in her debut, Winter in Sokcho (Alianza Editorial, 2017), was once again to the fore in Vladivostok Circus (Alianza Editorial, 2021), in which “each of her words encapsulates a world... The author’s style is equally as beautiful as the relationships she describes. She remains true to herself and allows cultures and continents embrace each other in a poetic way. A sublime spectacle", according to Le Figaro.

Élisa Shua Dusapin (Sarlat-la-Canéda, France, 1992) grew up in Paris, Seoul and Switzerland. She studied at the Swiss Literature Institute in Biel Winter in Sokcho (Alianza Editorial, 2017), her first novel, won the United States National Book Award for Literature in Translation in 2021. It also won the Robert Walser and the Régine Desforges Awards and has been translated into six languages. She subsequently published The Pachinko Parlour (Editions Zoe, 2018, yet to be translated into Spanish) and Vladivostok Circus (Alianza Editorial, 2021).

Paula Cifuentes (Madrid, 1985) holds a degree in Law from the Complutense University and the Sorbonne. The author of short stories that have been published in different anthologies, she has been recognised for her novels The Route of Storms (La ruta de las tormentas) (Martínez Roca, 2005) and Time of the Bastards (Tiempo de bastardos) (Martínez Roca, 2007), with which she was a finalist in the 7th Alfonso X el Sabio Historical Novel Prize. A finalist in the Rosetta Literary Translation Award, she also teaches creative writing and contributes to different media. Her latest book is the essay: María Cristina, Queen and Governor (María Cristina, reina gobernadora) (Ariel, 2020).

With the collaboration of the Alianza Publishing House and the Institut Français