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The Last Work of Carlos Fuentes (or the First of the Posthumous to Come Out)

Posted by bythefirelight on May 21, 2012 in Books

El Pais has an excerpt of a novel he was working on when he passed away. It is called Federico en su balcón and you can read an excerpt of it at El Pais. Given his last works, I’m not sure really how thrilling it will be, but you can be the judge.

Sesenta y seis. Esos son los años que estuvo atrapado Carlos Fuentes por la verdadera pasión de la literatura. Sesenta y seis años que hay entre el descubrimiento que hizo de El conde de Montecristo, a la edad de 17 años, y la escritura de sus dos últimos libros: Personas y Federico en su balcón que dejó a los 83 años, antes de morir el 15 de mayo. El primero son unas memorias sobre los personajes que conoció y el segundo una novela en la que salda cuentas con Nietzsche.

No es solo el legado póstumo de uno de los escritores e intelectuales más relevantes del mundo hispanohablante del último medio siglo. “El significado de Federico en su balcón”, explica Pilar Reyes, editora de Alfaguara que publicará la novela a finales de año, “es que Fuentes nunca pensó que fuera el último. Pero ahora cobra una gran dimensión simbólica. Resume dos aspectos: el Fuentes ciudadano y el literario e intelectual. Es una reflexión sobre el poder y la decisión moral en las pequeñas cosas de la vida. Una especie de combate entre lo público o el poder que incide en la vida de todos y las decisiones pequeñas y privados”.

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My Appreciation of Mexican Author Carlos Fuentes, RIP

Posted by bythefirelight on May 16, 2012 in Books

Carlos Fuentes was one of the first writers who I can really remember inspiring my interest in writing. I was not a reader of literature before I got to college. I read history, but fiction wasn’t something I thought much about. It took sometime for literature to interest me. The first author I can remember was James Baldwin, but after I ran across Juan Rulfo and Carlos Fuentes I saw the real possibilities of great writing. I had been taking one of those classes that only The Evergreen State College could create: one whole quarter (16 credits) dedicated to Mexican literature, history, and culture. It was a truly immersive experience and we read two works of Fuentes: The Death of Artemo Cruz and The Old Gringo. One was a masterpiece and the other one of his many less than stellar efforts. We all knew The Old Gringo was week, but when you have an Artemo Cruz it doesn’t really matter. It was Fuentes at his best: expansive, using history as his tablet, and letting his structural inventions wow young writers to be. After going over his works in class and out, I had to find other books, reading Where the Air is Clear, Aura, Burnt Water, and the Good Conscience shortly after. I particularly identified with the Good Conscience, a coming of age story that was set in Guanajuato, a city I had visited once. Thinking about it now it’s funny that I would find the book so compelling, but he was able to capture something. Later, when I finally made it to Mexico city several I spent a day or two with my head raised, looking for the mansard roofs he had mentioned over and over in Where the Air is Clear, as if finding a sloping roof would explain something about Mexico. It was unnecessary; Fuentes had already constructed a Mexico for me, one that I described in my piece, Just a Handshake is Enough.

A few years later I lost some of my fascination with his fiction. Perhaps it was the unevenness of his later works. They never seemed to have the exciting sense of a man forging a vision of a country. Instead they showed a man whose fiction seemed to be self absorbed. Even then, however, his literary criticism, his ability to talk about writing and writers was always interesting. His book La geografía de la novela was the first book I ever read in Spanish and was an exciting not because it delved into theory, but because he could make writing and the whole process of literature sound important and vital. For Fuentes, literature was more than games for grad students and that sense of passion you read in any article or heard in any interview was kept him interesting even after his later fiction lost some of its weight. Hearing of his passing was a shocker because just the other day I was reading an article in El Pais about his adventures in Buenos Aires for the book fair. He always seemed to be connected to the literary world and could talk about the newer generations and the same time as Cervantes, and, again, it made reading and writing exciting. In an age of e-books, hand wringing about the future of books, and enfeebled academia, despite Fuente’s flaws he made writing and love of literature seem one of the most important endeavors one could undertake.

RIP/DEP

There are plenty of articles and tributes in Spanish that you might want to read.

From La Jornada

Muere el novelista Carlos Fuentes

Travesías de un narrador

La literatura, faro en un país desviado

From El País

Adiós a uno de los pilares del ‘boom’ latinoamericano

Muere el escritor Carlos Fuentes

  • El novelista ha fallecido hoy a los 83 años en México, donde se encontraba hospitalizado
  • La obra y el rigor político del escritor definieron medio siglo de historia de las letras latinoamericanas
Carlos Fuentes, en 2009. / DANIEL MORDZINSKI
Juan Cruz Madrid 95

Era autor de más de 20 novelas y contaba con el Premio Cervantes (1987) y el Príncipe de Asturias (1994). Escribió obras como ‘La región más transparente’ o ‘La muerte de Artemio Cruz’. El velatorio será privado en su casa. A las 13.00 (hora de México) sus restos llegarán al Palacio de Bellas Artes

Memoria y deseo

Se marcha uno de los grandes intelectuales latinoamericanos. Ningún otro combina así creación literaria y reflexión política

Tiempos de Fuentes

Hace poco le decía a Fuentes que la historia de América Latina no era el recuento de sus fracasos, sino el proyecto de futuro

Reacciones en el mundo de las letras

Escritores y artistas lamentan el fallecimiento del autor de una gran obra conocida como ‘La edad del tiempo’

Nuestro Virgilio

Conocí a Carlos Fuentes dos veces, y las dos cambió mi vida. La primera, en 1984, cuando yo tenía 16 años

‘Una curiosidad universal’

Con él desaparece un escritor cuya obra y cuya presencia han dejado una huella profunda

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El corazón de los caballos (The Heart of the Horses) by Miguel Ángel Muñoz – A Review

Posted by bythefirelight on May 15, 2012 in Books

El corazón de los caballos (The Heart of the Horses)
Miguel Ángel Muñoz
Alcalá, 2009, 145 pg

El corazón de los caballos is the Spanish short story writer Miguel Ángel Muñoz’s first novel. A refreshingly short novel, it is a continuation of a story that first appeared in his collection Quédate donde estás (Stay Where You Are), called El reino químico and which was my favorite of the collection when I reviewed it a year or two ago. As in the short story, the novel opens with unspoken tension between  the narrator’s father and grandfather. It is a tension that has populates the world of the grandson, Victor, who doesn’t understand why his father does not like his grandfather. It is a relation that in the novel is distant and still remains unexplained, but it sets the tone of the novel. What seemed like the eccentric behaviors of a loving grandfather in the El reino químico, are actually the foundations of Victor’s problems.

Victor’s life hasn’t quite worked out as he wanted. He was a promising mathematics student but when he fails to get a scholarship after years of graduate study, he loses his patience and attacks the professor. He loses everything and on his journey to his final court date he goes to a Pyrenean town with his boyfriend Andrés, who is going to receive a literary award. It is a journey that begins to trigger a series of memories that he has if not suppressed, avoided. The first is of Eva, his former student, an anorexic and troubled girl who intrigued him. It isn’t so much as sexual, although there is some sort of tension, but one of shock, fear, confusion or even disappointment. When he does discover that she binges at night he is angry and like the mystery of his father and grandfather, she disappears and he hears nothing of her again. The second, darker memory is of a drug addict who likes to climb from balcony to balcony. Scared, a knife in his trembling hand, he watches as the man loses his balance on his porch and falls to his death without doing anything. He’s accused of pushing him, but he’s released because the man was a druggie known for that dangerous game.

With those incidents in the background, Victor and Andrés enter the Pyrenees. The awards ceremony is really just a chance for the town to feel important, but they meet two people of interest: the previous winner, Ines, a mysterious woman who has not let her photo appear on the cover of her books since her first book; and an old man and his granddaughter.  Each has a story that Andrés, a man who lives to gather stories and rewrite them as he sees fit, as if he is reconstructing the reality of those he has stolen from. And it is a form of theft, because he is unrepentant in his using of other people’s lives. The old man talks about a Portuguese man he met during the Spanish Civil War and who had been wrongly accused by the old man’s comrades of being a traitor. The story captivates both Andrés and Victor, and the old man promises they can see a photo of him the next day. From then on Victor’s life begins to get worse and over the next few hours he descends into darkness and violence as Andrés  dumps him, and Victor begins a search for the photo the old man promised. Ultimately, ending in a desperate moment of hate.

What makes the novel interesting is the interplay between the stories that the characters tell, and the way Andrés uses them to recreate Victor’s existence. A week man, Victor is at the mercy of Andrés ability to rewrite his own story, and when that story has ceased to be interesting, he leaves him; thus, rewriting his life again. It is that interweaving of Andrés power to draw a story from a character that creates Victor’s experience. It is as if, Andrés were actually the author of the book. It is a nice play on the journey narrative, and takes the reader deeper into the layers of story than just the Heart of Darkness references (in Spanish it is translated as El corazon de las tinieblas).  Muñoz is an author who is very interested in the interplay of story, reality, and how they construct each other and that playfulness is what makes him an interesting story teller and El corazón de los caballos a book worth reading.

You can read the first chapter here (pdf).

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Traveler of the Century (El viajero del siglo) by Andrés Neuman – A Review

Posted by bythefirelight on May 7, 2012 in Books, Review 2

Traveler of the Century
Andrés Neuman
Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2012, 564 pg

El viajero del siglo
Andrés Neuman
Alfaguara, 2009, 531 pg

Andrés Neuman’s Traveler of the Century (El viajero del siglo) is a broad novel of ideas that takes place in post a Napoleonic Europe that at first seems distant, but as he makes quite clear the same debates and the same arguments are still with us. It is an impressive bit of scholarship, bringing to life the philosophical arguments that have receded into the past. At the same time, Neuman also constructs a narrative that is equally interesting, giving the book a narrative impulse that is a good counterpoint to discussions about Schiller, Goethe and other 19th century German thinkers.

The novel follows Hans a world traveler who stops at the town of Wandernburg on the border of Saxony and Prussia. He intends to stay only a few days and move on, but he meets an organ grinder in the town square and they begin a friendship. The organ grinder is a kind of sage with whom he respects for his detached way of looking at the world, which lets him obverse the town, but stay distant from its intrigues. He also has seems to know that Hans should stay in the town and suggests after they first meet that he should stay an extra week. In that week, Hans who still plans to leave as he does every town he visits, meets the Gottlieb family and is taken with the daughter, Sophie. Once he has meet the family, striking up a friendship with the father and latter managing to get himself invited to the salon that Sophie hosts, he becomes, at least for a time, a resident of the town.

During the salon Hans, Sophie, an older professor named Mietter, a Spanish expat Alvaro, and several towns people discuss everything from the European union under Napoleon, the value of religion, which forms of government are best, and the merits of classicism versus romanticism.  While everyone chimes in, Hans as the worldly traveler brings the new liberal and romantic ideals to the group and often spars with Mietter who represents a conservative, Catholic, and classical view. The two are usually at odds and although Alvaro with his anti-clericalism can shock the group, Hans is the true rebel of the group expressing ideas that propose to overthrow the established order and many times are illegal in Saxony.

It is during these salons that the book returns over an over to the idea of identity. What is it that makes Europe, Europe? It seems to be odd to discussing these ideas again, and occasionally  during the salons I found myself thinking, yes, I already know this, why do I need to read this way. Yet these arguments are still going on and taking a gaze at Europe it is obvious that these arguments only seem settled because they are old. For example, at one point Alvaro notes it is better have less religious freedom because it leads to greater belief, unlike Spain which has such high disbelief thanks to the church. That friction still exists in Spain and has been an issue for a over a century. In other parts of the book, he looks at the desire for every ethnic group to have its own country, a topic that is still hotly debated in several countries. It is in these discussions that the book is more than just a rereading of German romantic thought, but rediscovery of the same problems that they tried to address and which have yet to be settled. While the novel was written between 2003 and 2008, the questions have taken on even more weight in light of the financial crisis that has exposed even more points of contention between the countries of Europe. (Alvaro’s funny take of the genius of Goya who knew to change the heads of the figures in the painting Allegory of the City of Madrid with the each change in politics, is particularly funny and telling.)

The narrative begins to move ahead at a quick pace when Hans and Sophie begin a passionate love affair. At first it is stolen glances and furtive meetings on country excursions, but soon the begin to meet in his rooms under the pretext of translating poems for publication. Between making love and delving into the subtlest meanings of words, they spend hours together in a world of romance and translation, as if each were part of the other. Neuman spends a fair amount of time talking about translation and his interest in the subject is quite deep. And within the greater theme of the book that Hans as a traveler is a translator of different places and ideas, it ties together all these discussions about politics with the simple need to be heard: without translation, in its specific sense of language, or the broader sense of different ideas into new forms that can be understood by new people, people stagnate. Of course, it is also a literary argument and Neuman shows great care in describing the process of translation, especially the argument between fidelity to the language versus fidelity to the meaning. As Sophie says, “Translation and manipulation are two different things wouldn’t you say?”

Eventually, Hans is found out to be the revolutionary he is–as men and women with new ideas are always called. As a result the love affair ends and Hans knowing that there is nothing left for him, has to leave town, finally, a year latter. At first the ending may see a little abrupt because Hans leaves town and nothing has really changed, except that Sophie is no longer engaged. But that is it. Yet that is really the perfect way for a traveler to come and go, both in the narrative and metaphorical sense. Hans is not meant to stay long, because like ideas, he must continue on, encountering new problems, new challenges to meet. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter where Hans is, because he has exposed Sophie to something that will continue to grow and help question what identity really is. And in that exploration Neuman has created a  work that is both prescient and needed.

A Note on the Translation

I read the first two thirds in Spanish. I had bought the book back in 2010 and had not gotten around to reading it until now. I switched to the English translation when the publisher sent it to me, mostly likely at the behest of Andrés (but who ever sent it, thanks).  Although it was a little strange to hear the characters all of a sudden in English instead of Spanish when I made the switch, I thought the translation was quite effective. It was a very good representation of the original Spanish and eminently readable.

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Alejandro Zambra Interviewed in El Pais – How the Cost of Books Shape His Desire for E-Books

Posted by bythefirelight on May 6, 2012 in Books

El Pais has an interview with Alejandro Zambra on the publishing of his book of criticism, No leer, in Spain. What is interesting about the article, especially in context of some recent articles questioning the structure of the publishing industry in the Spanish speaking world, is that he says he read most of his books in photocopied editions because they were too expensive otherwise. And due to all this, he is looking forward to the e-book which will reduce the cost of the book (although, there is a cost to entry in that you have to have a reader, but I suppose he takes that for granted).

“Muchas grandes obras que fueron importantes para mí las leí en fotocopia. Los libros en Chile son objetos de lujo, carísimos. Parecen diseñados como para que la gente no lea. Las fotocopias me recuerdan los tiempos que uno le pasaba sus poemas a la amiga que estabas conociendo y hacías como un libro, o cuando un amigo fotocopiaba Guerra y paz, de 30 en 30 páginas. Por eso me interesan los e-books. Si finalmente puedes pagar mucho menos por un libro, ¿por qué no? El libro es solo un producto, lo importante es el texto. Y a la vez soy hiperfetichista de los libros. Me interesan todos los formatos. También me gustan mucho los audiobooks, porque creo que un buen texto debiera uno poder escucharlo en voz alta. La prosa tiene que tener ritmo. Y ese ritmo tiene que sorprenderte, provocar efectos específicos. No hay que olvidar que así era la literatura. La costumbre de leer en silencio es relativamente nueva. En las ventas del Quijote se lee una novela para que varios la escuchen”.

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Essay from Javier Marías (in English) at Five Dials

Posted by bythefirelight on May 6, 2012 in Books

Five Dials has an Essay from Javier Marías (pdf) of The Leopard from Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa.

There is no such thing as the indispensable book or author, and the world would be exactly the same if Kafka, Proust, Faulkner, Mann, Nabokov and Borges had never existed. It might not be quite the same if none of them had existed, but the non-existence of just one of them would certainly not have affected the whole. That is why it is so tempting – an easy temptation if you like – to think that the representative twentieth-century novel must be the one that very nearly didn’t exist, the one that nobody would have missed (Kafka, after all, did not leave just the one work, and as soon as it was known that there were others, as well as Metamorphosis, any reader was then at liberty to desire or even yearn to read them), the one novel that, in its day, was seen by many almost as an excrescence or an intrusion, as antiquated and completely out of step with the predominant ‘trends’, both in its country of origin, Italy, and in the rest of the world. A superfluous work, anachronistic, one that neither ‘added to’ nor ‘moved things on’, as if the history of literature were something that progressed and was, in that respect, akin to science, whose discoveries are left behind or eliminated as they are overtaken or revealed to be incomplete, inadequate or inexact…

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New Words Without Borders: Writing from the Indian Ocean – Plus Etgar Keret

Posted by bythefirelight on May 4, 2012 in Books, News

The May issue of Words Without Borders is out now, featuring writing from the Indian Ocean. It also has a story fro perennial favorite, Etgar Keret.

This month we spotlight writing from the islands of Mauritius, Reunion, Madagascar, and Mayotte.  Francophone writing in the region dates back to the eighteenth century; the coexistence of French with the area’s other languages (Creole, Malagasy, Arabic, and Hindi), and its relationship to French colonialism, inflect writers’ thematic, stylistic, and syntactic choices.  See how J. William Cally, Ananda Devi, Nassuf Djailani, Michel Ducasse, Boris Gamaleya, Alain Gordon-Gentil, Carpanin Marimoutou and Françoise Vergès, Esther Nirina, Barlen Pyamootoo, Jean-Luc Raharimanana, and Umar Timol imaginatively engage with this complex heritage. And guest editor Francoise Lionnet provides an illuminating introduction. Elsewhere, Mauritian writer Nathacha Appanah joins Etgar Keret and Wojciech Jagielski in writing from cities not their own. And we deliver the third installment of Sakumi Tamaya’s “The Hole in the Garden.”
By Françoise Lionnet
Francophone writing in the Mascarene region dates back to the eighteenth century. more>>>

Ludwig and I Kill Hitler for No Particular Reason

By Etgar Keret       
Translated from Hebrew by Miriam Shlesinger
“Adolf, it’s you, I didn’t recognize you at first without the ridiculous mustache.” more>>>
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The Best Short Story Collections in Spanish Over the Last 5 Years

Posted by bythefirelight on May 3, 2012 in Books

The ever excellent blog El sindrome Chejov recently polled a series of Spanish language short story authors about what they thought were the best collections of short stories to be published over the last five years. It is a broad ranging list that includes authors English speakers would probably be familiar with, such as Alice Munro and Lydia Davis. Of interest to me were the books originally written in Spanish (I’m already sufficiently familiar with the English speakers). Some of these I’ve heard of and in a few cases I’ve even read some of the books. I certainly agree with some of the choices and am looking forward to finding some new authors.

The three most cited authors were Juan Eduardo Zúñiga, Alice Munro and Ángel Olgoso. However, I saw many references to Javier Sáez de Ibarra, Andres Neuman’s Hacerse el muerto (read my review), and Smanta Schweblin’s Pajaros en la boca, a book that I am looking forward to reading soon. Miguel Ángel Muñoz’s list is of particular interest especially since he has read 250 collections over the last 5 years. I also thought Miguel Ángel Zapata’s was interesting because it listed the writers and their approaches which gives you a little context. Lest the embarrassment of riches make you think things are all rosy over there, Muñoz does end his survey with a complaint that could be easily leveled here in the states:

Buenos libros y buena labor editorial. Mejora sensible en la atención de los medios. …Y pocos lectores. En un país con desesperantes bajos índices de lectura -disfrazados por la atención mayoritaria a unos pocos libros populares- pero con una media de cuatro horas diarias ante la televisión, el cuento, que requiere de un predisposición particular y una educación del gusto para disfrutar de sus resortes narrativos, tan distintos a los de la novela, no puede salir bien parado. Aun así, sigo pensando que el cuento posee un poder que nuestro sistema educativo no ha sabido aprovechar. Aún. Confío en centenares de profesores de bachillerato que van descubriendo, y difundiendo, las posibilidades que el relato corto ofrece para introducir a los alumnos en el placer de la literatura y, todavía más, en el mejor conocimiento y explicación de materias distintas de las estrictamente literarias. Historia o Filosofía, para empezar (¿se sigue estudiando eso en Bachillerato?).

From Zapata’s comment:

En la última década, el cuento español abandona las trincheras incómodas del gueto y comienza el lento acomodo en las mesas de novedades y en las reseñas de los diarios nacionales. Eso es un hecho; lento y a gotas, pero un hecho: llueve. Ya se ha apuntado muchas veces antes la labor encomiable y de zapa de editoriales especializadas en el género como Menoscuarto, Páginas de Espuma, Salto de Página, Tropo, Traspiés o Cuadernos del Vigía. Pero cabe anotar igualmente la proliferación de espacios en la blogosfera que promueven la expansión de los géneros breves y su rápida recepción por un público silente aunque masivo tras la pantalla del ordenador. En cuanto a las direcciones que asume el cuento actual, es precisamente la heterogeneidad de propuestas la clave para entender su auge: el terror contemporáneo entreverado de cierto apego a la sobriedad realista del cuento norteamericano en la obra de Jon Bilbao, la relectura del fantástico desde posiciones especulativas o metafísicas (en tres maestros del género en su estado más puro: Ángel Olgoso, Juan Jacinto Muñoz Rengel, Manuel Moyano), la experimentación formal en la renovación que parte del fantástico hacia territorios que lindan con lo telúrico (la portentosa cuentística de lo inaudito plausible que desarrolla David Roas), la orfebrería impresionista de altísimo octanaje literario (Óscar Esquivias, Jesús Ortega), lo cotidiano transfigurado (Miguel Ángel Muñoz, Andrés Neuman y Ernesto Calabuig, que hacen virtuosismo genuino de la lectura entre líneas y la fuerza emocional de las historias), el lirismo surreal (Juan Carlos Márquez en su estupendo “Llenad la tierra”, todo un despliegue talentoso de recursos y técnica)… Si a ello sumamos el trabajo de fondo de maestros contemporáneos que siguen trabajando el género aportando periódicamente nuevas obras de impronta clásica y generosos ejercicios de estilo (Merino, Calcedo, Aramburu, Díez, Aparicio, Fernández Cubas, Peri Rossi…), da la sensación de políptico generacional completo, de relevo asegurado y estupenda salud del género, como certifica el análisis que hizo del cuento en 2011 el artículo del crítico Ricardo Senabre para el último número del ”El Cultural” el año pasado. Otra cosa, por supuesto, es la flexibilidad de mercado, distribuidores y librerías en el sostenimiento de títulos suficientes de un género que siempre supone un quebradero de cabeza para las editoriales que funcionan con la calculadora y la cuenta de resultados ante la mesa. Mientras siga chispeando…”

If you are interested in the short story, these 7 posts are worth skimming through.

  1. First
  2. Second
  3. Third
  4. Fourth
  5. Fifth
  6. Sixth
  7. Seventh
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My Favorite Book Podcasts

Posted by bythefirelight on March 11, 2012 in Books

Some one was asking me recently what my favorite book podcasts are and I thought I’d put together this list. If any one has any more suggestions I’d be happy to include them. They are in general order of interest.

  1. La Estaction Azul – A Spanish language podcast from Spain.
  2. Writers and Company – A Canadian author interview program that has a lot of in depth with conversations with international authors.
  3. The Guardian Books podcast – from the Guardian UK. My window onto the UK.
  4. Book Worm – Once and a while the host’s questions are a little long, but he always has interesting things to say.
  5. Three Percent Podcast – This is the podcast from Open Letter books. It can go completely off topic and sound like grad students doing their own podcast, but it’s fun and usually insightful. Quite a bit about the industry.
  6. Writer’s Cast – Half of the shows are about the book publishing industry, the others are interviews with authors. In general they are all quite interesting.
  7. The Next Chapter – A Canadian books podcast. Not as good as Writers and Company which is more literary, but nice look out side of the US.
  8. NY Times books podcast – I don’t care much about the best sellers section at the end, but it has its moments.
  9. Scotts Whay Hae! – I haven’t listened to this one much yet, but it’s about Scottish books.
  10. PRI’s World in Words – Another recompilation of public radio stories about books, language and other things you can put in books.
  11. NPR Books – A Recompilation of books topics from NPR shows.
  12. El Ojo Critico – Another Spanish language show from Spain. It isn’t exclusively a book show, but it does have lots of book coverage.
  13. Your suggestions here…
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Bonsai – The Movie of Alejandro Zambra’s Novel – A Review

Posted by bythefirelight on May 27, 2012 in Books

While I thought Bonsai was well written and showed some inventiveness, I thought it was a little juvenile at times. Still I was curious how such a literary novel would be turned into a novel, especially all the references to writing and reading. I’ve long since gotten over the truism that the book and the movie are never the same. What interests me is what decisions they have made. As far as the literary content goes, they handled it quite nicely. The running joke about the main character writing a novel that he is really supposed to be transcribing is some ways is a little more interesting because it is subtle. Where as the narrator has to explain it in the novel, the film just shows it. It is one of those advantages that film can occasionally have. The real plus of the film, though, was it did not seem as juvenile as the book. The change in narrative perspective is most likely what created that feeling. The film it self is serious, the incidents are comic, whereas the narration of the novel is light and jokey. One is certainly not better than the other; they are their own things. The novel is certainly more revolutionary; the film is fairly straight forward. As literary movies go, though, it is one of the better ones. The film makers didn’t try to create a metaphor for the creation of writing, something that is usually tedious. Rather writing is just something one does and reading is something one enjoys. Moreover, they were able to use the same jokes from the book to show the two lovers injecting literature into their lives and constructing literary significances to even the smallest things. That sense of the primacy of literature in the book is stronger because in the movie the characters, almost comically, are often going to puny parties at the college that makes all their pretensions seem funny. So although Bonsai the movie is not Bonsai the book, as adaptations go, it is one of the better ones.

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Is The Center of Spanish Language Publishing Returning to Latin America?

Posted by bythefirelight on May 2, 2012 in Books, News

El Pais had an article recently about La Feria del LIbro de Buenos Aires and a group of Latin American authors who gave their thoughts on where the power base of Spanish publishing is. Historically it has gone back and forth. While Spain was under Franco Latin America was the publishing center. When Spain became a democracy and Latin America had its own problems the center of publishing moved to Spain. Now the question is, is it about to change? Many of the authors consulted hoped it would, pointing out it is silly that to get books published they have to go to Spain, and that if they only publish in their home country their book probably won’t leave their home country. Ebooks, of course, were touted as one of the solutions but it is uncertain if that is going to be as liberating as might be hoped for. Given that Spain refused to put in a large presence in the book fair do to a squabble with Argentina, things are certain to change.

Vale, no hay un nuevo Gabriel García Márquez en Latinoamérica. Ni “rayuelas”, ni “conversaciones en la catedral”. No hay millones de personas en el mundo esperando a que salga el último libro de la porteña Claudia Piñeiro, o de su compatriota Marcelo Cohen, premio de la Crítica en Argentina por su novela Balada. La gente no abarrota las salas donde habla la mexicana Guadalupe Nettel, ni se detiene el tráfico cuando cruza un semáforo con su mochila al hombro el chileno Alejandro Zambra o el colombiano Tomás González. Y sin embargo, a todos ellos les va bien dentro y, a veces, fuera de sus países. La Feria del Libro de Buenos Aires también goza de excelente salud: desde el 19 de abril y hasta el 7 de mayo se espera la asistencia de 1.250.000 personas que pagarán el equivalente a 4,5 euros por entrar en un recinto casi tan grande como cinco campos de fútbol lleno de libros. Los cinco novelistas se dieron cita el viernes en la Feria para hablar ante una audiencia de unas 200 personas no sobre sus propios libros, sino de sus experiencias como lectores. Muy pronto surgió la cuestión de España: ¿Por qué se depende tanto de las editoriales españolas para encontrar a los buenos autores de Latinoamérica? ¿Por qué siguen llegando los libros de otros idiomas traducidos al español de España?

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José Ovejero Wins the 40º Anagrama Prize for the Essay

Posted by bythefirelight on April 27, 2012 in Books

José Ovejero has won the 40th Anagrama Prize for the Essay. It is a work about cruelty in art, such as the work of Cormak McCarthy or Onetti.You can read the full post at El Pais.

Si bien Ovejero (Madrid, 1958) aborda ese aspecto en ámbitos como el cine y el teatro (como la obra de Peter Handke Insultos al público), es el peso de esa crueldad en la literatura donde disecciona con mayor profundidad. Para ello, escoge siete novelas que serían a su entender paradigmáticas de esa crueldad necesaria, como son El astillero (Juan carlos Onetti), Meridiano de sangre (Cormac McCarthy), Auto de fe (Elías Canetti), Historia del ojo (Georges Bataille), Tiempo de silencio (Luis Martín Santos) y dos obras de la Nobel Elfriede Jelinek: Deseo y La pianista.

¿Dónde está la crueldad de estas obras? “Son diferentes; está la de la sexualidad oscura de Bataille a la del relato sangriento de McCarthy, de esas horas de hombres de frontera que dan una nueva mirada sobre la historia de EEUU; o la crueldad más psicológica de Onetti y que demuestra que la literatura cruel no tiene por qué ser sangrienta sino que puede despojarnos de la fe y esperanza que nos hemos construido para creernos felices; Onetti desengaña al lector y lo confronta, como Jelinek desguaza la sociedad austríaca y sus mentiras”.

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The Women of the Boom – Why Is It Only Men Are Mentioned

Posted by bythefirelight on April 19, 2012 in Books

Ivan Thays has a recent article in El Pais about the forgotten writers of the Boom, especially the women. I have mentioned many times before in the pages of this blog about the seeming paucity of women in the best of lists and various literary pantheons that exist. Here Thays contemplates some reasons why the names of the Boom are all men, especially a certain four: Garcia Marquez, Fuentes, Vargas Llosa, and Cortazar. As he mentions the times and the authors were at least somewhat sexist, but it was also the image of the male writer as self assure, committed and hegemonic writer that gave little room for women writers. While that image is probably true, recent lists by Spanish speaking critics have shown that there is still a long way to go before that phenomenon has abated. (for more see the Letras Libres failure).

Esta semana en el FB de Andrea Jeftanovic, estupenda escritora chilena, se discutió el tema. Ella, además del nombre de Clarice Lispector, soltó el de la mexicana Elena Garro como otra olvidada del Boom. Sostuvo además que “siempre hay redes de poder en la legitimación y visibilidad” cuando se elabora un canon. Y por supuesto, el Boom es un canon absolutamente masculino por más que sus autores (pienso en las colaboraciones de Julio Cortázar con Carol Dunlop o en la admiración que siente Vargas Llosa por Nélida Piñón, a quien le dedicó La guerra del fin del mundo) no desprecien necesariamente a las escritoras. Más que el machismo de los autores, la ausencia de mujeres en el Boom es producto de la ideología de esos años en los que la escritura femenina ocupaba en América Latina un lugar marginal y opacado por una imagen del escritor masculino, comprometido, seguro de sí mismo, hegemónico. Cuando veo la serie Mad Men identifico a Don Draper con la imagen del escritor latinoamericano del Boom, exitoso, convincente, trajeado y encorbatado, fumando o bebiendo whisky, hablando de negocios, de arte o de política, mientras a su alrededor orbitan mujeres vulnerables.

El Boom fue un fenómeno comercial y un hito histórico instalado en su tiempo. Pero ajeno a este, la literatura latinoamericana permanece en movimiento y en discusión constante. Una prueba innegable de ello es la importancia que ha adquirido un autor que logró ingresar al Boom, aunque nunca fue muy bien considerado por sus pares, como Manuel Puig, quien en las últimas décadas se ha convertido en el principal referente de la literatura latinoamericana. El brillo de algunos nombre y libros concretos del Boom, en cambio, ha ido desluciéndose con el paso de los años. Todo puede ser replanteado a través de nuevas lecturas y, en especial, siguiendo el rastro que los escritores dejan en la obra de los autores posteriores. Por ello, Clarice Lispector (como quizá algún día Elena Garro) ocupa hoy un lugar excepcional en la literatura latinoamericana, más allá del detalle anecdótico de si perteneció o no al Boom.

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Five New Argentine Novels (in English!) – Via Argentina Independent

Posted by bythefirelight on April 19, 2012 in Books

The Argentina Independent has a list of five new Argentine novels that have come out in English recently. I have heard of two of the authors, Sergio Chejfec and César Aira and I am currently reading Andrés Neuman’s Viajero del siglo (Traveler of the Century). Hopefully, Ill finish it soon. It is enjoyable if a little long. A Full review will be forth coming. I trust the list will get peek your interests. (via)

Friends of Mine by Ángela Pradelli
For loyal readers of this series, Ángela Pradelli needs no introduction. An excerpt from her novel ‘Amigas Mías’, translated expertly by Andrea G. Labinger, helped us launch as our first installment a year ago. Now, after much anticipation, the full-length novel from which that excerpt was taken will be released in English from the Latin American Literary Review Press. Called ‘Friends of Mine’, and also translated by Labinger, the novel tells the story of a group of women living in the Buenos Aires province, who meet once a year on 30th December to eat dinner, celebrate the New Year, and reflect on the strange, difficult and wonderful passage of time. Structured in short, lucid fragments, the novel reads like a coming-of-age tale for a group of friends, a neighborhood, and an era of life in middle-class Argentina that has as much resonance today (and outside of Spanish) as it did when it was first published in 2002 and was awarded the Premio Emecé. Re-read our interview with Pradelli for more context, or peruse the sample we published last year. Then head over to the LALRP website to buy a copy for all your friends — after all, that’s what the novel is about.

The Islands by Carlos Gamerro
When we spoke to Carlos Gamerro last year, two of his acclaimed novels were in the process of being translated into English, both by his friend Ian Barnett (who also translated ‘The Peronist Princess’ by Marcelo Pitrola). Last year, the first of those books, ‘An Open Secret’ (Pushkin Press), was released to a critical consensus: The Economist — a publication not known for effluvient rhetoric — declared that Gamerro’s novel had “the makings of a classic,” and the Independent called it “haunting and disturbing.” This isn’t news to us; we’ve been enjoying Gamerro’s brand of darkly comic prose since we published his story ‘Bad Burgers’ in August. Now English-reading fans of his fiction will have another reason to cheer: this May, And Other Stories, a new British publishing concern, will release a translation of Gamerro’s first novel, ‘The Islands’. Like the spiralling narrator of ‘Bad Burgers,’ the protagonist of ‘The Islands’ chases his own trauma down a rabbit hole when he discovers that, despite the passage of ten years, the Falklands/Malvinas War is still raging — a reality he’s not quite ready to confront. Written with Gamerro’s trademark muscularity, we’re certain this new addition to the English-language cannon will only swell his growing fanbase. Head over to the And Other Stories site to pre-order a copy.

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Fernando Iwasaki’s Newest Collection of Short Stories – Papel Carbón – With Excerpt

Posted by bythefirelight on April 18, 2012 in Books

The Peruvian author Fernando Iwasaki has release a new book of short stories which collects his early works in one volume. The stories were written between 1987 and 1993 and published in two volumes. The ever interesting Paginas de Espuma has just reissued them. An excerpt from the publisher is available here. The story, in many ways, shows themes that he has mined since, especially in España, a parte de mi estés premios. It is about a Peruvian of Japanese descent who is given a Samurai sword that belonged to his grandfather, the last of the great Samurais. He uses the fabulistic and pop cultural images  of Japan to tell an emigrant’s story. For what I’ve read of Iwasaki, he tends towards the comical and plays with perceptions in his writing, avoiding the more realistic, something that can be refreshing.

You can also listen to an interview with him on El ojo critico and read about his method of writing short stories. He generally writes thematic collections, but the ones in these volumes are more disparate. (Via Moleskine Literario)

El escritor Fernando Iwasaki saca a la luz sus primeros relatos en el libro Papel carbón, en el que incluye los volumenes Tres noches de corbata y A Troya, Elena, en los que se incluyen los cuentos que el autor escribió entre 1987 y 1993. Este libro responde a “una época en la que acumulaba los cuentos que escribía y después decidia si tenía el número suficiente para reunirlos en un volumen”, ha explicado este lunes, en declaraciones a Europa Press.

Por tanto, a diferencia de lo que hace ahora, no tenía un “plan” establecido. “Era un método un tanto maternal: estaba de siete cuentos e iba a tener un libro”, indica. Según explica el autor, se trata de relatos que escribió entre los 22 y 32 años. “A esa edad no te ha pasado nada especialmente importante, las cosas relevantes ocurren en la adolescencia y después de los 40”, subraya.

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The Crime Novel Boom In Latin America

Posted by bythefirelight on April 18, 2012 in Books

El Pais had a short little bit on the crime novel in Latin America. Unsurprisingly, it is now a field of academic study. While I haven’t followed all the developments within the genre I have found it interesting to see the books develop a following. I don’t believe as I’ve heard some crime writers say that the crime novel is really the only type of novel that describes reality. However, they do capture something fascinating.

El escritor y periodista cubano Leonardo Padura -creador del teniente Mario Conde, protagonista de cuatro de sus novelas, todas ambientadas en La Habana- defiende la pujanza de la literatura policiaca iberoamericana. “Con autores como Rubén Fonseca o [Manuel] Vázquez Montalbán no puede ser considerada un género menor”, explica. Sin embargo, Padura no comparte en absoluto que esas obras puedan leerse en clave transatlántica, independientemente del lugar en el que estén ambientadas. “Son novelísticas nacionales. Cuando lees a [Henning] Mankell estás leyendo literatura sueca, cuando lees a Manolo [Vázquez Montalbán] lees literatura española. La novela policiaca, como se asienta tanto en los prototipos nacionales, en las estructuras nacionales, es marcadamente nacional”.

Sea como sea, no existe consenso acerca de si el género policiaco debe ser entendido en función de la idiosincrasia de los lugares donde acaece o debe abordarse desde la interculturalidad. Si bien, entre los ponentes que, además, son escritores, son muchos los que, como Padura, sostienen que el fin último de la novela negra es escrutar la sociedad, promover una mirada crítica sobre ella, por lo que la conexión entre el crimen y el ámbito en el que se comete es insoslayable. “Si no entiendes México, no entiendes la novela de Ignacio Taibo”, señala Rubén Varona, escritor colombiano de 32 años.

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Etgar Keret Short Story Like Bats at Asymptote Journal

Posted by bythefirelight on April 17, 2012 in Books

Asymptote Journal has a short story from Etgar Keret. I’m not sure what collection it is from, certainly not the newest one, Suddenly, a Knock on the Door, or any of the others as I recall. You can read some of his other stories here.

Sometimes I think about him, and then I miss him terribly. Especially at night. I can’t fall asleep. I’m too hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s never exactly right. Some animals don’t sleep either. They go out to hunt at night, but at night I don’t even get out of bed to pee. At night, I don’t even get up to go to the refrigerator. I once told him I was afraid of roaches. After that, the whole summer, every time we had sex, he’d hoist me on his back and take me to the shower or the bathroom like a taxi. I’d wrap my arms around his back and go wherever I wanted. Mom says that’s why he left me.

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Eraclio Zepeda’s New Chiapan Tetralogy Profiled in La Jornada

Posted by bythefirelight on April 17, 2012 in Books

La Jornada has an interesting write up of Eraclio Zepeda’s last installment of in his  tetralogy of Chiapas. I’m unfamiliar with his work but if you are interested in family/historical epics this sounds perfect.


Algunos años antes de terminar el siglo, Zepeda ya tenía en mente la escritura de una saga chiapaneca y sabía que abarcaría buena parte del siglo XIX y del XX, y serían cuatro libros y cada uno representaría uno de los cuatro elementos. Para fortuna de la literatura, se dedicó con afán y desvelo a la escritura de la tetralogía; sólo falta una que tiene como elemento el viento.

Ubicada en el cambio de siglo, entre fines de la década de los ochenta del XIX y fines de los años diez del XX, desde la segunda reelección de Porfirio Díaz al período presidencial carrancista, Sobre esta tierra, publicada hace unas semanas por el FCE, tiene como centro del mundo Los Altos de Chiapas, o más específicamente, Pichucalco y La Zacualpa, finca situada en las montañas cerca de la ciudad. En La Zacualpa pasa de hecho toda la novela, hasta la meticulosa destrucción que hacen de ella los carrancistas.

Las tres novelas publicadas hasta ahora nos parecen como una parte de una historia de México no contada, o de otro modo, como una historia que pasara aparte casi de nuestra historia. Como si de alguna manera Chiapas hubiera sido un país dentro del país.

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Mexican Novelist Juan Villoro’s New Novel Profiled

Posted by bythefirelight on April 16, 2012 in Books

Mexican novelist Juan Villoro has published his newest book and El Pais has a profile of the book and author, and a review. The Profile is the much more interesting piece of the two. Juan Villoro is not too well known in the English speaking world, but is well respected for his writing that often revolves around crime writing. You can see that in the recent Words Without Borders issue on the drug war in Mexico and the recent book of non-fiction about Latin America that he edited. His work looks interesting and perhaps with the interest in crime fiction in Mexico he’ll be translated into English.

En el origen de los relatos de Juan Villoro (México, 1956) suele ocultarse una imagen o un sueño detenido. En Arrecife (Anagrama), el núcleo argumental básico se corresponde con una postal paradisiaca, en un hotel de descanso en el Caribe, como hay tantos en México, pero en el lateral, una situación, que no se identifica si es de juego o de violencia, altera el paisaje. Esa arista perturbadora tiene que ver con la búsqueda de emociones fuertes y el contexto de violencia en que se mueve México, con cuerpos que aparecen decapitados en lugares imprevistos, como Acapulco, antaño edén turístico. “Me gustó poner en tensión ambas cosas. El narco y los clientes de un resort ansiosos de peligros controlados”, cuenta Juan Villoro, en su piso del Eixample barcelonés, decorado en un estilo minimalista, con los muebles justos y espacio para moverse. El escritor, uno de los autores de culto de su país, acaba de regresar de México. Vive entre los dos continentes. Ha gestionado la entrevista por su cuenta, sin agentes ni editores de por medio. Sobre la mesa de la cocina reposa el ordenador encendido. Escribe por las mañanas, en lo que denomina un horario bancario, regado con café. En un rato, saldrá para la Universidad Pompeu Fabra, donde imparte clases de literatura.

Con los alumnos debatirá sobre la importancia del cuento en América Latina, pero esta mañana su interés se centra en la violencia de los narcos y cómo han convertido los asesinatos en mensajes, según las distintas maneras de matar; unos los envuelven en mantas y otros practican la llamada corbata colombiana (sacar la lengua por la garganta). A través de ese discurso de la violencia se identifica a los autores de manera que las víctimas se conviertan en mensajes del horror y así matan dos veces. La situación suena escalofriante. Hasta ahora, los mexicanos vivían en dos mundos diferenciados, el de la violencia y el de la vida común, pero el crimen organizado se ha convertido ya en otra normalidad. En algunas regiones del país funcionan escuelas para narcos, hospitales donde son atendidos, clubes deportivos donde están inscritos e iglesias para ellos. “La vida mexicana transita del apocalipsis al carnaval y en ocasiones mezcla las dos categorías”, como su nueva novela.

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Fernando Iwasaki’s Ajuar funerario (Funeral Dress) Profiled in El Pais

Posted by bythefirelight on April 15, 2012 in Books

El Pais has a profile of Fernando Iwasaki’s Ajuar funerario, a collection of short stories that has sold the relatively phenomenal 60,000 copies over multiple printings. The stories are in the horror genre, but with Iwasaki there is always humor, and so I doubt the stories are particularly gruesome. If his España, a parte de mi estes premios is any indication the book aught to be rather funny.

Ahí va un ejercicio para los lectores. Imaginen a un escritor latinoamericano, peruano de nacimiento, japonés de origen, sevillano de facto (casado desde hace veinticinco años con una sevillana), director de una fundación de arte flamenco, que escribe un libro de microrrelatos de terror con retrogusto de humor y que se vende como churros en las dos orillas de Atlántico. Es Fernando Iwasaki y su Ajuar Funerario, de la editorial Páginas de espuma, un longseller que lleva más de 60.000 ejemplares vendidos desde 2004 sin perder el ritmo, y acaba de lanzar su séptima edición. ¿El secreto del éxito de sus microrrelatos? Contienen historias… de miedo.

“Empecé con este género de minificción hace años, cuando me encargaron lecturas y conferencias para la universidad. Verdaderamente me sentía incapaz de leer textos míos de ocho o diez páginas, el público no merecía que le aburriese, así que decidí escribir estas pequeñas historias. Pero para que sean microrrelatos tiene que haber historia, y si no lo hay entonces podrá ser un poema en prosa, una anécdota, un aforismo estirado como un chicle… Pero no un microrrelato”. Iwasaki afirma que vivimos en un mundo invadido de ficción aunque no nos demos cuenta. “Ficción son los currículum vitae, son las esquelas de los periódicos, son los anuncios por palabras… Esa persona que publica: ‘Licenciado, 42 años, culto, encantador, desearía conocer señorita…’ ¡Eso es ficción!, ¿Cómo es posible que nadie haya llegado a esa situación de abandono a los 42 con todas esas cualidades?” Bromea el escritor.

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My Little War by Louis Paul Boon – A Review

Posted by bythefirelight on March 28, 2012 in Review 2

My Little War
Louis Paul Boon
Dalkey Archive, 2010 125 pg

This scant book is one of the more interesting ways to write about war I have read. It is also what makes it difficult to capture. My Little War is a series of 1-3 page episodes and little paragraph length moments that are tacked to the end of the episodes without any real relationship. They are just more noise of war. All of it is narrated by a person claiming to be the author. I mention this because while the style is consistent, one has the impression that multiple voices are at work. Nevertheless, each of the episodes describes the chaotic lives of the Flemish during World War II. The stories aren’t related and do not create a narrative arc that ties the lives of the characters together, giving the reader much of a connection to the characters. Boon is not creating great heroic stories of the resistance or of the pathos of the long suffering. Instead, he shows a world that in many ways has always existed and which during the shifting power structures of the war force to the surface. In story after story he shows the Belgians stealing and lying to survive. At other times the fascist sympathizers parade around town, finally powerful, only to change their stripes when the allies come. It’s a vision of pettiness that makes some of the Belgians look anything but heroic. That view is part of his larger point about the war. Those who lived  through it were surviving each day lacking any information of what was going on or any power to control it. It is not a sympathetic view, but it is effective and the voices of the episodes that seem anonymous in their brevity begin to suggest one thing: what was it all for?

But all the poets who wrote so enthusiastically about the Eastern front peeked out cautiously in their socks, back to writing poems about the stars and their solitude and God–God for God’s sake–after having pissed right onto Christ’s loincloth.

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