Atlantica - 01.05.2007, Síða 17

16 a t l a n t i c a
sara says: so tell me a
little bit about the process
of writing the novel. did
you write it on a computer
(mimicking how you would write
an SMS?) or did you write the
messages on an actual mobile
phone?
Hannu says: I wrote it on a
computer (a laptop) and then
I counted the characters to
be sure the number of them
didn’t exceed more than 160 in
one message. I wrote the story
mostly on my Holiday in Spain
in summer 2005. To write it,
it took about 8 months in
total.
sara says: how many
characters total is the entire
book?
Hannu says: One message is
no more than 160. There are a
total of about 1000 messages.
So it means....uh...160.000
characters... oh my God! Now
I think I am crazy, perhaps
others think so too...
sara says: so you must be a
wizard when it comes to speed
typing SMS, no?
Hannu says: Well, I am not
a professional in that. I have
noticed that my sons are twice
as fast as me. I normally
send 4-10 messages a day and
receive as much. Recently a
little bit more because of the
book. A Finnish magazine even
made an interview via text
messages. And my publisher,
Tammi Publishers informed me
of the publishing deal by
sending a text message to me.
sara says: i read today
that a 16-year-old student
from Singapore has earned the
Guinness world record title
for SMS -- he wrote a 160-
character message in 41.52
seconds. I’m guessing you’re
probably not as fast as him…?
Hannu says: No... I think
speed is not the thing, the
content is. As a matter
of fact I have tried to
make the messages in the
novel to be as fluent and
even beautiful language as
possible. I am a multiple
prize winner in Finland both
in poetry and short stories.
One appreciated poet told
me that the messages look
like poems, and some of
them also remind of poetry.
I think it is important to
use good language, that’s
why I have avoided in the
messages in the book all the
abbreviations, icons and so
on.
sara says: i understand.
so no yellow smiley faces?
Hannu says: none.
sara says: so how did you
come up with this idea? why?
Hannu says: I have to give
two reasons. One: 25 years
ago I was in a country far
away from Finland. I was in
a bus and saw a young man
walking in front of the rail
way station. He was blind.
Within 5 minutes an event took
place, very touching and
impressive, which changed my
life. Then I decided I would
tell that to as many people as
possible sometime.
Hannu says: Two: 5 years ago
I had the idea of my novel in
my head and also I wondered
how to put this event in
the story. The novel itself
is about a man who travels
abroad. It is typical for
Finns to send text messages
when travelling. Then I
decided, why not have the
whole story be a collection of
messages. It worked.
sara says: which country
were you traveling in when
you encountered the blind man?
Hannu says: It is a secret,
I don’t want to spoil the
readers excitement. It is not
in Europe, some news has said
it is India. Not quite, but
the direction is good...
sara says: ha. ok, but
the readers figure out where
you’re traveling, i assume?
Hannu says: Yes. The
readers can easily follow
where we are travelling. The
messages include information
on cities and for example
Museums and Jazz bars and
also some messages from the
teleoperators (Vodafone,
TeleSpain etc.) give
Numbers-wise, The Last Messages is three hundred pages long and comprised of 1,000 messages totaling roughly 160,000 characters. And
we’re not talking about obsolete Morse Code. These are the statistics of Hannu Luntiala’s recently published Finnish novel composed
solely from text messages rife with grammatical errors and abbreviations commonly used in SMS traffic. In the spirit
of electronic and unconventional communication, Atlantica’s Sara Blask interviewed the author one afternoon over
MSN Messenger – so please forgive the grammatical errors, most of which have been preserved.
SMS: the new novel H a n n u L u n t i a L a