An Interview with Felix Meran

Felix Meran is tall. Almost clumsily tall, like someone never fully at ease in his own height. His gait appears slightly delayed, as if each movement were preceded by a quiet internal question mark. The most striking feature about him are his glasses: heavy, dark-rimmed BOI spectacles from the 1930s, thick with patina and memories. The lenses are so strong they distort the world, which Meran finds entirely appropriate. He insists on describing their strength not in diopters but in calories. Asked why, he offers no explanation.

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His clothing is a blend of old Viennese bureaucratic elegance and deliberate anti-fashion: dark grey suits with barely visible herringbone patterns that smell faintly of tea and never of novelty. Shirts with slightly worn cuffs. No tie, just a loose strip of fabric that may once have been one, now more a memory than an accessory. His shoes are polished, but never proud. You can tell they have seen more of the world than he has.

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No recent photograph of Felix Meran exists in which he can be clearly identified. This has long been a source of mild frustration for his publishers, who by now respond with a certain tenderness, as though it were a literary peculiarity they have come to accept as part of the package. The reason for the absence of images has never been officially clarified. Some speak of a quiet form of world refusal. Others draw parallels to those indigenous beliefs found in distant places, according to which a photograph steals a piece of the subject’s soul.

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And then there is the simplest explanation of all: that Meran does not consider himself particularly photogenic. This is all the more curious given that he is by all accounts a remarkably handsome man.

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The publisher is said to own a single photograph, taken about five years ago, showing Meran at work on his mechanical typewriter. It has never been released.

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His name is pronounced with emphasis on the first syllable, Mé-ran, unlike the South Tyrolean town of Meran, which is stressed on the second syllable and with which he is often confused. Meran himself has never commented on any of this. But those who know him suspect that this very mixture of myth, misunderstanding and polite refusal suits him quite well.

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Meran always carries an old leather case, allegedly a gift from a woman “who preferred making notes to making decisions.” Inside: a fountain pen with a creaking soul, several torn pages from philosophical works, an invitation to a 2006 ball and sometimes a piece of fruit.

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His face is kindly noncommittal. A high forehead, but never pompous. A mouth slightly too narrow for his opinions. His voice is gentle, almost like the creak of an old armchair. He speaks slowly, not hesitantly but as if testing each word for authenticity before setting it free.

 

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CLARA VAN BROECK: Herr Meran, you've been living in Vienna again for two years. One often sees you at Café Prückel with a notebook, a newspaper and an unusually loud fountain pen. Are you working on a new book?

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FELIX MERAN: I’m always working on a book, but its title changes daily. Yesterday it was On the Slippage of Things, today more like The Gentle Pastness. Tomorrow it might just be a table of contents.

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CLARA: That sounds like a very fleeting work. Is that typical for your method?

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MERAN: I don’t write to fix things but to loosen them. I mistrust solidity, except in aperitifs. Literature should be like well-aged dust: everywhere, but never in the way.

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CLARA: Critics sometimes say your writing is cryptic, meandering, even deliberately inaccessible. Does that bother you?

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MERAN: Not at all. I’m often confused by my own manuscripts. That’s a good sign. I mistrust texts I like immediately. I also mistrust people I like immediately. And of course, I mistrust myself.

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CLARA: What’s your view of contemporary literature?

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MERAN: I rarely read it, but I admire how much is being produced. It’s comforting. Like the regular hooting of trains that no longer stop.

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CLARA: You’re known to avoid the media and not having no social media presence. Why?

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MERAN: I believe in disappearance. I think one should be as visible in public as a piece of furniture in a dark room: recognizable, but never imposing. Everything else is just opinion.

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CLARA: It is said that your son lives in Georgia. Is that true?

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MERAN: Possibly. I lost several things in Georgia: a beret, my trust in hotel rooms, perhaps even a son. But that might be too private.

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CLARA: May I ask what you're reading at the moment?

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MERAN: A damaged copy of the 1968 Vienna Building Code, preferably over breakfast. It calms me. It reminds me that there once were rules.

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CLARA: Herr Meran, thank you for the conversation.

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MERAN: I shall remember it tomorrow as if it happened to someone else

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