Devis Grebu

All in all, what generates my emotion and admiration is a special alliance of spontaneity and sincerity with an unexpected harmony. Style is for me the only path along which an individual discards all the inessential things which obstruct his vision. It is the result of a combination of general knowledge and vocation. General knowledge (studies and experience) opens and enlarges the horizon of the mind. It enables you to use a richer "vocabulary" (not only from a literary point of view, also aesthetically) and to discover a greater reality. It is the nutritional substance you carry in the depths of yourself. I believe vocation starts with your special gift for a mode of expression. But it cannot develop without tenacity and a consistent striving to obtain mastery of your specific tools and techniques. To these essential elements you add your own personal history, your mark, your sensitivity and temperament. As for myself, I have never tried to look or act "original", since I think originality should not be a deliberate goal in itself. It is, rather, the result, the reward of this long and difficult endeavor to hear at last, as Henry Miller wrote, "the sound of my own voice". It is a permanent striving to lose contact with the environment, in order to produce some isolated molecules, some essences, some absolute works. (D.G.)