Interview with Carlos Ruiz Zafon

Breandain O'Shea interviews Spanish author Carlo Ruiz Zafón.

Deutsche Welle: How have Spanish and Catalan literature influenced your writing?
Carlos Ruiz Zafon: I look at literature as one big thing. I never think of it as coming from the English tradition, or the French tradition, or the Catalan tradition, or the Russian tradition. To me, literature itself is a country, and that's what I am interested in. So, I never thought of myself as being influenced by one side or the other.
I am interested in specific authors; in good writing in general, wherever it may come from. And in that sense, I am very interested in writers from (different) countries. I know that there are people who tend to be very political about that, or tend to see schools of thought - but it's not the way I think.
For me, there's good writing and bad writing. And I am interested in good writing.

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Juan Carlos Onetti

Jonathan Blitzer on Juan Carlos Onetti.

Born in 1909 in Montevideo, Uruguay, Onetti was one of the most idiosyncratic and virtuosic Latin American writers of the twentieth century. His readers in Spanish know this. In his later decades, after years of writing in relative obscurity, he earned a reputation as a quirky, cosmopolitan Modernist--a South American Faulkner who also enjoyed an aesthetic kinship with Borges and Céline (an unlikely pairing that only Onetti could provoke). In 1980 Onetti won the Premio Cervantes. He also became known as a writer's writer. Mario Vargas Llosa, Roberto Bolaño, Juan Rulfo, Julio Cortázar and Antonio Muñoz Molina are among his admirers, all of them better-known (and very different) masters who have acknowledged, always in intensely personal terms, the debt they owe Onetti. Bolaño, who attempted to interview Onetti in Mexico in 1975, once joked that he was himself a terrible writer by comparison. Vargas Llosa, for his part, said no other modern writer has grasped the human need for fiction "with more force or originality" than Onetti.

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Reading the spanish originals

Josef Braun on passing the language barrier, reading in Spanish.

Part of my motivation for reading in Spanish, besides not wanting to feel like a moron, stems from my interest in authors whose works haven't been translated into English. Books in English translation are pathetically rare these days, with only a handful of Spanish-language authors winning the literary sweepstakes that allows them to have their work reach an English readership. It seems just more salt in the wound that the latest author to be regarded as a hot property in English-reading countries is a dead guy. Roberto Bolaño has been receiving generous and totally justified attention by English-readers, thanks in large part to New Directions and the recommendations of certain members of the cross-cultural literati, such as Francisco Goldman. But he's still only one great writer among many, and it will take a long time to get all of his work into English. If you're impatient and really want to delve into Bolaño—or Horacio Castellanos Moya, or Cesar Aira, to name but the most recent benefactors of New Directions' persistence—you need to find this stuff in Spanish, and Mexico is one book-loving country, a place where you can find people selling Borges, or Gabriel García Márquez, or Julio Cortázar or at least Isabel Allende, outside of every subway station. If only Canadian booksellers were so discerning!

In any case, I found myself on the hunt for writers who haven't been translated into English at all, as far as I know. I picked up Sergio González Rodríguez's Huesos en el desierto (Bones in the Desert), a highly caustic work of investigative journalism of enormous importance, concerning the infernal epidemic of female slayings in Ciudad Juarez—González Rodríguez was a friend and advisor to Bolaño, who by his own admission couldn't have written 2666 without González Rodríguez's assistance. It's a book I'm both desperate and kind of dreading to read but, fairly dense in its prose, I'll need to save for later. I picked up a volume of Francisco Tario's stories entitled Algunas Noches, Algunos Fantasmas (Certain Nights, Certain Phantoms), which seemed promising in its concision and simplicity, yet nonetheless frustrated me with its allusive turns of phrase and occasional use of antiquated terms. Strangely, the book's biographical introduction was a breeze. This struck me as an interesting development. Could it be that non-fiction, or at least non-fiction of a more digestible sort than Huesos en el desierto, was the way to go for this impatient novice?

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Roque Dalton (El Salvador, 1935-1975)

Roque Dalton  was executed in El Salvador 35 years ago on may 10th 1975.

Dolor Antiguo

Sólo has visto dolor en tu llegada.


Dolor en los cañales explotados
sobre el dolor de tus hermanos;
dolor en las palabras en secreto,
dolor
en las lagunas y los pájaros;
dolor en la palabra incomprensible del caporal estraño,
dolor en sus patadas, en sus insultos, en sus manos ladronas.


Dolor en las mujeres y las piedras,
dolor en el crepúsculo, en el sol calcinante,
en la ficticia aurora cotidiana;
dolor en cada metro de nagüilla, en cada tecomate,
en cada par de caites abrumados;
dolor en cada rostro, en cada nueva música,
en cada cordillera de sucesos;
dolor entronizado en las aradas, en las milpas ajenas,
en los candentes pechos de tu pueblo
y en los ojos con lágrimas mirando
sus solitarias manos.

Narcolibros

Leonardo Padura, Pedro Cabiya, Mario Mendoza, Paco Ignacio Taibo II and Élmer Mendoza comment on the new boom in Latin American literature, where the heads of drug cartels replace the dictators.

Lo que para los autores del boom representaron el paraguayo José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia, el dominicano Rafael Leónidas Trujillo, el guatemalteco Estrada Cabrera o el chileno Augusto Pinochet lo representan hoy para sus herederos los jefes de las bandas mafiosas de Medellín o Ciudad Juárez. Los capos del narcotráfico han sustituido a los dictadores en la literatura latinoamericana. Los jeeps militares han dado paso a una flota de aparatosos cuatro por cuatro con cristales ahumados y la violencia ha dejado de moverse en sentido vertical para colonizar horizontalmente la sociedad entera.

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Festival de la Palabra

The Festival de la Palabra started yesterday in Puerto Rico.


Ezequiel Martínez reports on it in the blog En minúscula from Ñ magazine.


The festival will count with the presence of Antonio Sarabia, Carmen Boullosa, Jorge Volpi, Paco Ignacio Taibo II, Adriana Lisboa, Alfredo Bryce Echenique, Mempo Giardinelli, Leonardo Padura, Mario Mendoza, Mayra Montero, Junot Díaz, José Saramago, Luís Sepúlveda, William Ospina, Sergio Ramírez, Rosa Montero, José Eduardo Agualusa, Santiago Gamboa and Karla Suárez, among others.

Gabriela Mistral. Niña errante

"Gabriela Mistral. Niña errante" is a new book that compiles the letters of Gabriela Mistral to her personal assistant Doris Dana.
The book has been  published in Spain by Lumen and brings a new light on the relationship between these two women.

"Yo sé bien que nadie, ninguna persona en este mundo, puede saber qué cosa es nuestra vida sino (excepto) nosotros mismos" . Así escribe la poeta chilena Gabriela Mistral en una de sus cartas a su asistente personal y compañera sentimental Doris Dana, reunidas ahora en "Gabriela Mistral. Niña errante".

Un libro que se publica en España de la mano de Lumen y que muestra la apasionante relación entre la premio Nobel de Literatura (1945) y Doris Dana, secretaria y compañera de sus últimos años de vida y albacea de sus bienes materiales e intelectuales.

Un epistolario que tiene su origen a finales de los años cuarenta, en el verano de 1948, cuando Gabriela Mistral vivía en Santa Bárbara (California) y Doris en Nueva York, y que comenzó después de que ambas hubieran mantenido un fugaz encuentro personal en el Bernard College de Nueva York, donde la poeta dio una charla sobre "la industria del odio" , con eco internacional.

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Portuguese Language

Last flower of Latium, wild, uncultured beaty,
You are at once both splendor and the grave:
You're gold which, in the gang's impurity,
Doth veil a giant mine in graveled lave.

I love you thus, unknown, obscure and hidden,
A blaring trumpet, lyre of singleness,
Tour fury's like the sea that's tempest ridden,
Your lullaby's of love and tenderness!

I love your lush green woods and perfumes, wrung
From virgin jungles and expansive sea!
I love you, rude and sorrowful native tongue,

In which my mother called: "Dear son of mine!"
In which Camões bemoaned, grieved exile he,
His luckless genius and love's tarnished shine!

Olavo Bilac (1865-1918)

100 Portuguese Books of the 20th Century

A selection of 20th Century Portuguese literary works by Fernando Pinto do Amaral.

Very few of the books in this list are available in English, even those of more known authors, Portuguese literature is still largelly unknown in the English speaking world.

A Cidade e As Serras, Eça de Queirós (1845-1900) (The City and the Mountains)
Gente Singular, Manuel Teixeira Gomes (1860-1941)
Marânus, Teixeira de Pascoaes (1877-1952)
Húmus, Raul Brandão (1867-1930)
Pedro o Cru, António Patrício (1878-1930)
Terras do Demo, Aquilino Ribeiro (1885-1963)
Clepsidra, Camilo Pessanha (1867-1926)
Ensaios, António Sérgio (1883-1968)
Canções, António Botto (1897-1959)
Poemas de Deus e do Diabo, José Régio (1901-1969)
A Selva, Ferreira de Castro (1898-1974) (Jungle. A Tale of the Amazon Rubber-Tapping)
Charneca em Flor, Florbela Espanca (1894-1930)
Gladiadores, Alfredo Cortês (1880-1946)
Mensagem, Fernando Pessoa (1888-1935) (Message)
A Criação do Mundo, Miguel Torga (1907-1995) (The Creation of the World)
Sedução, José Marmelo e Silva (1913-1991)
Nome de Guerra, Almada-Negreiros (1893-1970)
Contos Bárbaros, João de Araújo Correia (1899-1985)
Gaibéus, Alves Redol (1911-1969)
Solidão/Notas do Punho de Uma Mulher, Irene Lisboa (1892-1958)
Apenas Uma Narrativa, António Pedro (1909-1967)
O Barão, Branquinho da Fonseca (1905-1974) (The Baron)
Historiazinha de Portugal, Adolfo Simões Müller (1909-1989)
Noite Aberta Aos Quatro Ventos, Adolfo Casais Monteiro (1908-1972)
Mau Tempo No Canal, Vitorino Nemésio (1901-1978) (Stormy isles: An Azorean tale)
O Caminho da Culpa, Joaquim Paço D'Arcos (1908-1979)
O Dia Cinzento, Mário Dionísio (1916-1993)
Poesia, Sophia de Mello Breyner Andresen (n.1919)
Poesias, Álvaro de Campos (The Collected Poems of Alvaro de Campos)
Odes, Ricardo Reis
Poemas, Alberto Caeiro (The Collected Poems of Alberto Caeiro)
Poesias, Mário de Sá-Carneiro (1890-1916)
A Toca do Lobo, Tomás de Figueiredo (1902-1970)
Ossadas, Afonso Duarte (1884-1958)
As Mãos e os Frutos, Eugénio de Andrade (n.1923)
Poesia I, José Gomes Ferreira (1900-1985)
Retalhos da Vida de Um Médico, Fernando Namora (1919-1989)
A Secreta Viagem, David Mourão-Ferreira (1927-1996)
O Fogo e As Cinzas, Manuel da Fonseca (1911-1993)
Pelo Sonho É Que Vamos, Sebastião da Gama (1924-1952)
A Sibila, Agustina Bessa-Luís (n. 1922)
História da Literatura Portuguesa, António José Saraiva (1917-1993) e Óscar Lopes (n. 1917)
Movimento Perpétuo, António Gedeão (1906-1997)
Dimensão Encontrada, Natália Correia (1923-1993)
Pena Capital, Mário Cesariny (n. 1923)
Teatro, Bernardo Santareno (1924-1980)
A Origem, Graça Pina de Morais (1929-1992)
Léah, José Rodrigues Miguéis (1901-1980)
No Reino da Dinamarca, Alexandre O'Neill (1924-1986)
A Cidade das Flores, Augusto Abelaira (n. 1926)
Bastardos do Sol, Urbano Tavares Rodrigues (n. 1923)
Tanta Gente, Mariana..., Maria Judite de Carvalho (1921-1998)
A Colher na Boca, Herberto Helder (n. 1933)
Felizmente Há Luar!, Luís de Sttau Monteiro (1926-1993)
O Palhaço Verde, Matilde Rosa Araújo (n. 1921)
Rumor Branco, Almeida Faria (n. 1943)
Xerazade e os Outros, Fernanda Botelho (n. 1926)
A Torre da Barbela, Ruben A. (1920-1975)
Praça da Canção, Manuel Alegre (n. 1936)
Estou Vivo e Escrevo Sol, António Ramos Rosa (n. 1924)
Teoria da Literatura, Vítor Manuel de Aguiar e Silva (n. 1939)
O Delfim, José Cardoso Pires (1925-1998)
A Noite e o Riso, Nuno Bragança (1929-1985)
As Aves, Gastão Cruz (n.1941)
Maina Mendes, Maria Velho da Costa (n. 1938)
Peregrinação Interior, António Alçada Baptista (n. 1927)
A Raiz Afectuosa, António Osório (n. 1933)
Novas Cartas Portuguesas, Maria I. Barreno (n.1938), Maria T. Horta (n. 1937) e Maria V. da Costa (The Three Marias - New Portuguese Letters)
Os Sítios Sitiados, Luiza Neto Jorge (1939-1989)
Paisagens Timorenses com Vultos, Ruy Cinatti (1915-1986)
Toda a Terra, Ruy Belo (1933-1978)
O Que Diz Molero, Dinis Machado (n. 1930)
Finisterra, Carlos de Oliveira (1921-1981)
O Labirinto da Saudade, Eduardo Lourenço (n.1923)
Rosa, Minha Irmã Rosa, Alice Vieira (n.1943)
Sinais de Fogo, Jorge de Sena (1919-1978)
Instrumentos Para a Melancolia, Vasco Graça Moura (n. 1942)
Uma Exposição, João M. F. Jorge (n. 1943), Joaquim M. Magalhães (n. 1945), Jorge Molder (n. 1947)
O Silêncio, Teolinda Gersão (n. 1940)
Livro do Desassossego, Fernando Pessoa-Bernardo Soares (The Book of Disquiet)
Memorial do Convento, José Saramago (n.1922) (Baltasar and Blimunda)
Os Universos da Crítica, Eduardo Prado Coelho (n.1944)
Para Sempre, Vergílio Ferreira (1916-1996)
Amadeo, Mário Cláudio (n. 1941)
Um Falcão no Punho - Diário I, Maria Gabriela Llansol (n. 1931)
Adeus, Princesa, Clara Pinto Correia (n.1960)
As Moradas 1 & 2, António Franco Alexandre (n. 1944)
O Medo, Al Berto (1948-1997)
Gente Feliz com Lágrimas, João de Melo (n. 1949)
O Pequeno Mundo, Luísa Costa Gomes (n. 1954)
A Ilha dos Mortos, Luís Filipe Castro Mendes (n. 1950)
A Musa Irregular, Fernando Assis Pacheco (1937-1995)
Um Canto na Espessura do Tempo, Nuno Júdice (n. 1949)
Um Deus Passeando pela Brisa da Tarde, Mário de Carvalho (n. 1944) (A God Strolling in the Cool of the Evening)
Vulcão, Luís Miguel Nava (1957-1995)
Guião de Caronte, Pedro Tamen (n. 1934)
Geórgicas, Fernando Echevarría (n. 1929)
O Vale da Paixão, Lídia Jorge (n. 1946)
Cenas Vivas, Fiama Hasse Pais Brandão (n. 1938)
Não Entres Tão Depressa Nessa Noite Escura, António Lobo Antunes (n. 1942)

Júlio Cortázar

Norberto Fuentes: The Autobiography of Fidel Castro

Terry Eagleton reviews Norberto Fuentes' The Autobiography of Fidel Castro.

Revolutions, as Marx recognised, are inherently theatrical events, both more and less real than everyday life. The Cuban revolution, Castro comments here, was "a miracle of the imagination". In all such mighty upheavals, fact and fiction become hard to tell apart, just as they are in this book. It is part of Fuentes's achievement to make us more conscious of these ironies. Yet there is something disturbing as well as revealing about this blow-by-blow life history. Why invest so much energy in a portrait of your persecutor? How can this avoid paying him homage in the very act of cutting him down to size?

There is something curiously obsessive about Fuentes's fascination with Fidel. Stealing someone else's selfhood is a wickedly effective way of getting even with them; yet wanting to become someone else suggests admiration as much as antagonism. For all his imaginative ventriloquism, it is hard to feel that Fuentes is aware of these ambiguities, let alone that he has resolved them.

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Alberto Manguel: A Reader on Reading

Ian Sansom reviews Alberto Manguel's A Reader on Reading.

It is very rare indeed for someone to have devoted their lifetime to making these complex and delightful reconstructions, to sharing and reporting on their experiences as a reader; much rarer, say, than the many who devote themselves simply to criticism, to judgment or to commentary. It's so rare, in fact, that it's difficult to know what to call it. Manguel might best be described not so much as a critic but rather as a devotee of reading; one thinks of Susan Sontag, or of Clive James – observers, admirers, enthusiasts. This enthusiasm leads to what one might perhaps describe as a sentimental strain in Manguel's writing, though it might also accurately be described as morality, the imaginative extension of oneself and one's sympathies to others. In his revealing essay on erotic literature, "The Gates of Paradise", he argues that in "reading or making love, we should be able to lose ourselves in the other, into whom – to borrow Saint John's image – we are transformed: reader into writer into reader, lover into lover into lover.

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