Category Spanish
“Many Days of Slights and Oversights”: Zama by Antonio di Benedetto, Translated by Esther Allen
Reviewed by Andrea Shah Originally published in 1956, Zama took over 60 years to appear in English (as translated by Esther Allen), despite having been deemed a masterwork by literary luminaries such as Juan José Saer. Zama is the first and best-known novel written by Antonio di Benedetto, then a young Argentine journalist who had […]
Invisible Currents: Kyn Taniya’s Radio, Translated by David Shook
Reviewed by Brian McLaughlin As Arthur C. Clarke famously stated, “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic,” a claim which has obviously assumed the status of proverb, not only in science fiction but also in any vein of cultural criticism. Yet, as early as 1924, Mexican poet Kyn Taniya was already demonstrating the truth […]
Magic Formula: Alejandro Jodorowsky’s Albina and the Dog-Men, Translated by Alfred MacAdam
Reviewed by Jenny Buckland Alejandro Jodorowsky’s latest novel Albina and the Dog-Men is a sensual, surreal romp through the magical landscapes of Peru and the author’s native Chile. Employing a motley cast of absurd, technicolor and often overtly symbolic characters, Jodorowsky administers an exuberant dose of allegorical organized chaos in order to reveal truths about […]
Mexican Noir: Death in Veracruz by Héctor Aguilar Camín, Translated by Chandler Thompson
Reviewed by Charlotte Whittle In the 1970s, foreign debt, inflation, and political crises plagued Mexico’s previously strong economy, and the discovery of extensive oil reserves in the country’s rural Gulf Coast region seemed to many to offer a panacea for the nation’s ills. The resulting oil boom ushered in a period of speculation and prosperity […]
Negative Illumination: Ricardo Piglia’s Target in the Night, Translated by Sergio Waisman
Reviewed by Lucina Schell, Editor In November, 2015, Mauricio Macri won Argentina’s presidency in a run-off election, ending twelve years of Peronist-party rule by the Kirchners. Ricardo Piglia’s Target in the Night takes place before the fractured optimism of Perón’s brief return to power in the 1970s, but was published in 2010, the year President […]
Subverted Eden: Poems by Ramón López Velarde, Translated by M.W. Jacobs
Reviewed by Charlotte Whittle Ramón López Velarde enjoys the status of a national poet in Mexico, where his best-known work, “Suave patria” (Gentle Homeland), is recited in classrooms across the country. Yet López Velarde’s work is all but unknown to English-language readers. López Velarde, who was active around the time of the Mexican Revolution, came […]
A Catalog of Reviews of The Story of My Teeth by Valeria Luiselli, Translated by Christina MacSweeney
or, a hyperbolic meditation on the ways in which literary reviews manipulate value and affect sales HYPERBOLIC LOT NO. 1: “The Story of My Teeth” Starred Review WRITER: PW Staff PROVENANCE: Publishers Weekly LISTING: 10M The coveted starred review in Publisher’s Weekly, a steadier buzz-generator than an electric toothbrush, set a high valuation bar for […]
Passing in Translation: Jessica Powell on Antonio Benítez-Rojo’s Woman in Battle Dress
Interview by Lucina Schell, Editor Woman in Battle Dress, the last published work by renowned Cuban writer Antonio Benítez-Rojo, is just out in translation by Jessica Powell from City Lights Books. The sweeping epic imagines the remarkable life of 19th-Century historical figure Henriette Faber, who lived as a man in order to study medicine and […]
Not One: Asymmetries. Anthology of Peruvian Poetry by Cardboard House Press
Reviewed by Charlotte Whittle Asymmetries, an anthology of Peruvian poetry produced by new bilingual press Cardboard House, introduces readers to an extraordinary diversity of voices that represent the course of Peruvian poetry since the post-avant-garde moment of the 1940s. Edited by Paul Guillén, Giancarlo Huapaya, Cristian Medina, and Maggie Messerschmidt, the collection includes the work […]
City Blocks: Elvira Navarro’s The Happy City translated by Rosalind Harvey
Reviewed by Kate Lynch Granta introduced the anglophone world to Elvira Navarro by naming her one of the best young Spanish language novelists in 2010, but Rosalind Harvey’s translation of her second novel The Happy City marks her first full-length work in English. The 2009 Spanish original earned both the Jaén Fiction Award and the Tormenta […]
