The next book by Native American author Tommy Orange will not be read for 90 years.
The author of There There and Wandering Stars has been selected as the 11th author for the Future Library project, which asks one author each year to write a manuscript that will be kept under lock and key until 2114.
Begun in 2014, the project aims to culminate in an anthology of a century’s worth of secret works, printed on paper from trees planted by the artist behind the project, Katie Paterson.
Orange was announced as the latest contributor during an event at the Edinburgh International Book Festival. His writing “is marked by a deep exploration of identity, belonging and intergenerational trauma, particularly in the context of Indigenous experience,” Paterson said. Orange’s work “will resonate with 22nd century readers.”
Orange was born and raised in Oakland, California, and is a member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes of Oklahoma. His debut novel, There There, was a finalist for the 2019 Pulitzer Prize, and his second book, Wandering Stars, was longlisted for the Booker Prize last month.
“I had never heard of this project before, but when I saw the list of other authors’ names from previous years, I was overwhelmed to be among such people,” said Orange. Previous contributors include Tsitsi Dangarembga, Ocean Vuong, Karl Ove Knausgård and Elif Shafak. “I initially said yes because I was recommended by Margaret Atwood,” added Orange. Atwood was the project’s first contributor.
Working on the Future Library “means that I still have hope that in a hundred or 90 years we will have a world with books to live in, and I think I have to keep that hope alive and actively promote that the human project will last for a long time,” Orange said.
In May 2014, Paterson planted 1,000 Norwegian spruce trees in Nordmarka, a forest area north of Oslo, which will provide the paper for the 2114 anthology.
Orange said that writing “for such a distant future” will be “very different” from writing his other works. “With that kind of reader, everything is different, almost every context will be different, but stories are always stories, and if I tell a good one, I think it will probably resonate with every type of reader.”
The manuscripts are kept in the specially designed Room of Silence at Oslo’s Deichman Bjørvika library. The room is lined with wood and has 100 hand-made cast glass drawers, each engraved with the author’s name and the year the text was written.
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“The day after I found out I was being asked to do this, I woke up with a phrase in my head: I was born in the future,” Orange said. “The phrase itself doesn’t mean anything, but I thought: could this be the beginning of what I’m writing for this project? I think it’s a little scary to write for people who will surely think we’re stupid and inferior in many ways, just as if we look back a hundred years, we can clearly see all the problems we had when we were just decent people.”
The Future Library welcomes works of all genres and languages. The length of the work is determined by the author. Each spring, the authors hand over their works at a ceremony in Nordmarka.
David Mitchell, Sjón, Han Kang and Judith Schalansky also contributed. Last year, Valeria Luiselli was chosen as the author.
