The Pear Field

The Pear Field takes place in the 1990s in Tbilisi, capital of the recently independent country of Georgia. At the heart of the novel is the »School for Idiots«, a boarding school for »mentally deficient children«, actually visitied mostly by children whose parents are either dead or who have emigrated for economic reasons. Even the teachers leave the children and teens to their own devices.

The narrative unfolds from the point of view of 16-year-old Lela who has decided that she will murder Wano, the history teacher. Only over the course of the novel do the reasons become clear: sexual assault and even rape. However, Lela, a combative, angry young girl, has taken up the role of protector. She looks after the younger children, comforts them, and even tries to convince them to apply themselves, in other words, to study so that they can leave the School for Idiots behind. As strong as her hatred for the history teacher is, she has developed a tender, sister-like relationship with the boy Irakli. Every week Lela takes him to a nearby high-rise flat so he can talk on the phone with his mother in Greece. Irakli, however, refuses to believe what Lela has long known: his mother is never coming back, not even to pick him up. Lela nonetheless tries to encourage him and even manages to get him to learn English because she wants Irakli to have a better future. And then, one day, a married couple from the southern United States arrives and his dream threatens to become reality in a most bizarre way.

»[The Pear Field] has one of the best heroines I’ve come across in a while.« Aida Edemariam, International Booker judge

»In Lela, Ekvtimishvili has created an extraordinary character from a disadvantaged background determined to escape her apparent destiny, make the best of herself and do her best for a similarly disadvantaged friend. A gem.« Charlie Connelly, The New European

»With a striking and unsentimental story [...] film director Nana Ekvtimishvili casts a glance on to those who live at the margins of Georgian life.« Frankfurter Rundschau

»The [...] novel vibrates with the lives of those who have been left out, the silenced.« Ines Radisch, DIE ZEIT

»In her novel The Pear Field Nana Ekvtimishvili seeks the great in the small.« taz. die tageszeitung

»Ektimishvili’s language reveals that horror we associate with closed institutions. She tells of physical violence and spiritual poverty. She describes a normality of abnormality.« der Freitag

»Ekvtimishvili gives the suspended a voice: her novel allows one to sense just how long a way it is to a better life.« Börsenblatt

»This stylistically brilliant book explores abuse, neglect, prostitution, abandonment. [...] Nana Ekvtimischwili evokes the sad and dark side of Soviet and post-Soviet society.« Literaturblatt für Baden-Württemberg

»Ekvtimishvili has successfully told the bitter story of an invincible lust for life.« CulturMag

»The Pear Field is more than just a cleverly constructed novel. This book is the shrewd portrait of an entire society that has lost its humanity on its way into a new era. A stirring debut.« NDR

»Delicate, heartrending, and completely unsentimental but with poetic power, she tells the stories of children at the edge of the city, at the edge of society.« Bayerischer Rundfunk

»Nana Ekvtimishvili has written a merciless book that gives voice to those left behind while crying out against apathy and brutality.« WDR 5