Kapka Kassabova

Kapka Kassabova, author of Street Without A Name discloses her worst job and favourite smells, among other things.

Kapka Kassabova

1. When were you happiest?

Whenever I’m writing.

2. What is your principal defect?

I call it honesty, others call it tactlessness.

3. What makes you depressed?

People treating each other with inhumanity.

4. What do you most dislike about your appearance?

From certain angles, my nose looks like a papercutter, but that’s a minor gripe.

5. What is your favourite word?

Komshu. It means neighbour in Turkish and it’s used throughout the Balkans. If only it was applied more often.

6. What is your most unappealing habit?

Speaking with a full mouth.

7. What is your favourite smell?

Coffee in the morning, jasmin in the evening.

8. What is your guiltiest pleasure?

I’m not a Catholic, I don’t do guilt. I’m fond of all my pleasures and I’d like some more please.

9. Who are your favourite writers?

Graham Greene, Clive James, Patricia Highsmith, Daphne du Maurier, Jan Morris.

10. What is the worst job you've done?

Modelling in the nude for a schizophrenic artist in New Zealand.

11. When did you last cry, and why?

Last week. Not telling.

12. What do you most value in you friends?

Compassion and insight.

13. What gift would you most like to possess?

The ability to go on very little sleep.

14. What was your most embarrassing moment?

When I was a high-school student in Sofia, a pantomime artist came into our classroom to tell us without words about his show. I was so smitten with him that I started nervously leaning back in my chair. I was leaning quite far and suddenly, I found myself on the floor with my legs in the air, still in my chair and unable to move, like an upturned cockroach. I wanted to die on the spot. ‘Wow,’ the sexy mime said, ‘You really fell for my show.’

15. What is your most treasured possession?

My brain – though sometimes I wonder.

16. What is the worst thing anyone's said to you?

You just wait.

17. If you could edit your past, what would you change?

I would be kinder to myself and others.

18. If you could go back in time, where would you go?

I wouldn’t live in any other era, I’m very grateful for antibiotics and gender equality. But I would visit Buenos Aires in the 1900s when the tango first took off.

19. What is your greatest fear?

Losing love and the people I love.

20. What is the most important lesson life has taught you?

Life is hugely stranger than fiction.