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The Last Interview
L'ultima conversazione
L’autore di 2666 e I detective selvaggi si racconta in questa collezione di interviste realizzate in un arco di cinque anni, che si conclude con la famosa «Ultima conversazione», pubblicata per la prima volta pochi giorni dopo la scomparsa dello scrittore. L’infanzia in Cile, l’adolescenza in Messico, l’Europa da uomo maturo; la presa di coscienza civile e politica, i primi tentativi di scrittura; le letture, le influenze e le amicizie; le cose che adora e le cose che gli danno fastidio: queste conversazioni ci permettono di addentrarci in una delle menti migliori del Novecento, un’intelligenza pirotecnica che continua a emanare scintille e ad abbagliare i lettori di tutto il mondo.
Con un saggio di Nicola Lagioia.
Con un saggio di Nicola Lagioia.
124 pages, Hardcover
First published November 10, 2009
18 people are currently reading
705 people want to read
About the author
Roberto Bolaño
143 books6,937 followersFor most of his early adulthood, Bolaño was a vagabond, living at one time or another in Chile, Mexico, El Salvador, France and Spain. Bolaño moved to Europe in 1977, and finally made his way to Spain, where he married and settled on the Mediterranean coast near Barcelona, working as a dishwasher, a campground custodian, bellhop and garbage collector — working during the day and writing at night.
He continued with his poetry, before shifting to fiction in his early forties. In an interview Bolaño stated that he made this decision because he felt responsible for the future financial well-being of his family, which he knew he could never secure from the earnings of a poet. This was confirmed by Jorge Herralde, who explained that Bolaño "abandoned his parsimonious beatnik existence" because the birth of his son in 1990 made him "decide that he was responsible for his family's future and that it would be easier to earn a living by writing fiction." However, he continued to think of himself primarily as a poet, and a collection of his verse, spanning 20 years, was published in 2000 under the title The Romantic Dogs.
Regarding his native country Chile, which he visited just once after going into voluntary exile, Bolaño had conflicted feelings. He was notorious in Chile for his fierce attacks on Isabel Allende and other members of the literary establishment.
In 2003, after a long period of declining health, Bolaño passed away. Bolaño was survived by his Spanish wife and their two children, whom he once called "my only motherland."
Although deep down he always felt like a poet, his reputation ultimately rests on his novels, novellas and short story collections. Although Bolaño espoused the lifestyle of a bohemian poet and literary enfant terrible for all his adult life, he only began to produce substantial works of fiction in the 1990s. He almost immediately became a highly regarded figure in Spanish and Latin American letters.
In rapid succession, he published a series of critically acclaimed works, the most important of which are the novel Los detectives salvajes (The Savage Detectives), the novella Nocturno de Chile (By Night In Chile), and, posthumously, the novel 2666. His two collections of short stories Llamadas telefónicas and Putas asesinas were awarded literary prizes.
In 2009 a number of unpublished novels were discovered among the author's papers.
He continued with his poetry, before shifting to fiction in his early forties. In an interview Bolaño stated that he made this decision because he felt responsible for the future financial well-being of his family, which he knew he could never secure from the earnings of a poet. This was confirmed by Jorge Herralde, who explained that Bolaño "abandoned his parsimonious beatnik existence" because the birth of his son in 1990 made him "decide that he was responsible for his family's future and that it would be easier to earn a living by writing fiction." However, he continued to think of himself primarily as a poet, and a collection of his verse, spanning 20 years, was published in 2000 under the title The Romantic Dogs.
Regarding his native country Chile, which he visited just once after going into voluntary exile, Bolaño had conflicted feelings. He was notorious in Chile for his fierce attacks on Isabel Allende and other members of the literary establishment.
In 2003, after a long period of declining health, Bolaño passed away. Bolaño was survived by his Spanish wife and their two children, whom he once called "my only motherland."
Although deep down he always felt like a poet, his reputation ultimately rests on his novels, novellas and short story collections. Although Bolaño espoused the lifestyle of a bohemian poet and literary enfant terrible for all his adult life, he only began to produce substantial works of fiction in the 1990s. He almost immediately became a highly regarded figure in Spanish and Latin American letters.
In rapid succession, he published a series of critically acclaimed works, the most important of which are the novel Los detectives salvajes (The Savage Detectives), the novella Nocturno de Chile (By Night In Chile), and, posthumously, the novel 2666. His two collections of short stories Llamadas telefónicas and Putas asesinas were awarded literary prizes.
In 2009 a number of unpublished novels were discovered among the author's papers.
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September 1, 2022
نویسندههای بزرگ هیچوقت حتی در مصاحبههایشان هم نمیتوانند خالصانه خودشان باشند. انگار به ذات نویسنده بودن هر جملهای که میگویند از کاراکتری روایت میشود. آن هم نه کاراکتری معمولی. برای همین خواندن گفتگوهای رمان نویسان مواجهه با شخصیتیست که بخشی از شخصیت نویسنده است، بخشی که برای گفتگو بهتر عمل میکند. حتی گاها در خواندن چندین گفتگو از یک رمان نویس متوجه تغییرات لحن و زباناش میشویم... گویی هر مصاحبه کاراکتر خودش را میطلبد. خواندن چند گفتگوی کوتاه از بولانیو این مرد دیوانه پر از لذت بود از مواجهه با بخشی از شخصیت مردی که در میان بزرگانی مانند بورخس و یوسا توانست برای خود نامی بسازد. همین برای بزرگیاش کافیست
اگر کتابفروش بودم مواظبت میکردم افرادی که تازه ادبیات را شناختهاند بولانیو نخوانند. چون دیوانگی و جنون او در گسترش مرزهای داستان و روایتهای پر از شخصیت و عجیباش مخاطب تازهکار را ناامید میکند. اما به هر عاشق ادبیاتی یک کتاب از او هدیه میدادم. بیشک او برای تمامی کتابهایش برمیگشت
اگر کتابفروش بودم مواظبت میکردم افرادی که تازه ادبیات را شناختهاند بولانیو نخوانند. چون دیوانگی و جنون او در گسترش مرزهای داستان و روایتهای پر از شخصیت و عجیباش مخاطب تازهکار را ناامید میکند. اما به هر عاشق ادبیاتی یک کتاب از او هدیه میدادم. بیشک او برای تمامی کتابهایش برمیگشت
May 6, 2020
Sudeći na osnovu ova četiri intervjua, Bolanjo je baš bio druškan i momak na mestu. Duhovit, načitan i vrlo skroman; nije bio voljan da priča o svojim romanima, čak je otvoreno i sumnjao u njihovu vrednost, te ovde ima najmanje o njegovim knjigama, a mnogo više o tuđim knjigama o kojima je uvek ozbiljno želeo da razgovara. Verovao je da je čitanje važnije od pisanja, da je svaka književnost politična, da je Neruda napisao tri dobre zbirke pesama i dosta loših, ali da je Neruda živeo kao kralj sunce na čemu mu malo i zavidi, da vreme ništa neće naškoditi delima Markesa i Ljose, da ne voli Fuentesa i Oktavija Paza, ali da je Paz ipak bio bolji pisac od Fuentesa čak i u prozi, o mladosti pesnika anarhiste i kako su svi pesnici infrarealesti živeli asketski kao Spartanci ali slobodno kao Atinjani sodomiti, da sve više smatra da je Filip K. Dik bio realistični pisac, da tradicija fantastične književnosti ne postoji u latinoameričkoj književnosti jer žanrovska književnost ne može da se razvija u ekonomski nerazvijenim područijima, da su biblioteke oličenje nesputane darežljivosti itd. Sve o čemu Bolanjo priča se čini zanimljivim, te žalim što neko nije uradio sa njim intervju na 1000 stranica.
A onda dođe taj poslednji intervju, dat za meksički Plejboj, nekoj novinarki koja kao da je došla sa Pinka, i u njemu je Bolanjo odgovorio na salvu najglupljih pitanja (da li volite muziku? Kako reagujete kada pročitate negativnu kritiku? Zašto nemate klimu u sobi? Omiljenih 5 knjiga? Šta kažete na to da su vas prozvali mladom nadom latinske književnosti? Koga birate princezu Dajanu ili Elvisa Prislija?), a na sve je odgovorio sa strpljivošću sveca, ne gubeći ni za trenutak smisao za humor, iako mu je tada bilo jako loše te je i umro nekoliko dana kasnije.
A onda dođe taj poslednji intervju, dat za meksički Plejboj, nekoj novinarki koja kao da je došla sa Pinka, i u njemu je Bolanjo odgovorio na salvu najglupljih pitanja (da li volite muziku? Kako reagujete kada pročitate negativnu kritiku? Zašto nemate klimu u sobi? Omiljenih 5 knjiga? Šta kažete na to da su vas prozvali mladom nadom latinske književnosti? Koga birate princezu Dajanu ili Elvisa Prislija?), a na sve je odgovorio sa strpljivošću sveca, ne gubeći ni za trenutak smisao za humor, iako mu je tada bilo jako loše te je i umro nekoliko dana kasnije.
May 17, 2025
roberto bolaño was extremely annoying in a lot of ways (he has come to represent for me audacious, ostensibly leftist litfic men online who don’t pick up books by women except once in a blue moon). he was also unusually combative/contrarian with his women interviewers in particular—opinionated women seemed to rankle him in a way opinionated men didn’t (surprise, surprise). his personal canon also (unsurprisingly) skewed mostly male, and the aesthetics of his ideological bent therefore mimicked this gender bias. in other words, it shows in his books. all this to say, he was always himself and never pulled his punches. i am endlessly fascinated by him, even if i find parts of his work contentious or (sorry….) boring/mid.
December 14, 2009
Worth it as a wafer-thin dessert after the gluttony session of 2666. The "last interview" itself seemed to offer short witty Bolanoesque responses to questions from Padgett Powell's The Interrogative Mood: Do you like cats or dogs? What makes your jaw hurt laughing? The other interviews often read like excerpts from his other books about other books. The part I found most interesting was the part of the intro called "the part about the journalist" -- about the Mexico City journalist Bolano fictionalized in 2666. Might also be worthwhile to read before reading 2666, especially if you're hesitant to swim without a lifeguard on duty in that pool of sharks.
November 25, 2015
گفتوگو های کمی از روبرتو بولانیو در دست است -او خیلی دیر مشهور شد و مرگش در سن پنجاه سالگی هم نابههنگام بود. این کتابِ کم حجم شامل چهار گفتوگو با او و یک مقاله دربارهی اوست. در این میان، آخرین گفتوگوی او که در سال 2003 و با مجله ی «پلی بوی»ِ مکزیک انجام داده بود و در آمریکای لاتین به «آخرین گفتوگو» مشهور است بسیار خواندنیست. این گفتوگو شامل نزدیک به صد سوال و جواب کوتاه است که ترجمه ی برخی از آنها را اینجا می گذارم. ای-بوکِ انگلیسیِ کتاب را میتوانید براحتی و رایگان از اینترنت دانلود کنید و متن کامل گفتوگو ها را بخوانید
آیا تا به حال هیچ کتابی دزدیده اید که بعدا از آن خوشتان نیاید؟
بولانیو: هرگز. جنبه ی خوب دزدیدنِ کتاب این است که برخلافِ دزدیدنِ گاوصندوق، شخص میتواند قبل از ارتکاب جُرم، محتوای آن را با دقت بررسی کند
آیا بخاطر عشق رنج کشیده اید؟
بولانیو: در مرتبه ی اول بسیار زیاد. اما بعدا یاد گرفتم به اتفاقات از منظر شوخی نگاه کنم
چه چیز را بیشتر دوست دارید؟
بولانیو: سکس و بورخس
دوست دارید قبل از مرگ چه کاری انجام دهید؟
چیز خاصی وجود ندارد که آرزو داشته باشم انجام یدهم. خب، فقط ترجیح می دهم نمیرم. اما دیر یا زود آن بانوی متینِ موقر از راه می رسد. اما مسئله این است که گاهی اوقات نه بانو است و نه متین، بلکه همانطور که نیکانور پارا در یکی از شعرهایش می گوید، همانند یک بدکاره است که باعث می شود دندانهایت به سختی به هم بخورند
چه چیزی شما را به قهقهه می اندازد؟
بولانیو: بداقبالی های خودم و دیگران
چه چیزی شما را به گریه می اندازد؟
بولانیو: باز هم بداقبالی های خودم و دیگران
اگر نویسنده نمی شدید چه شغلی را انتخاب می کردید؟
بولانیو: بیشتر دوست داشتم یک کارگآاه می شدم تا یک نویسنده. کاملا مطئن هستم. قتلهای زنجیره ای. من همان شخصی بودم که می توانستم شبانه به تنهایی به صحنه جُرم بازگردم و از ارواح نترسم
آیا تا به حال هیچ کتابی دزدیده اید که بعدا از آن خوشتان نیاید؟
بولانیو: هرگز. جنبه ی خوب دزدیدنِ کتاب این است که برخلافِ دزدیدنِ گاوصندوق، شخص میتواند قبل از ارتکاب جُرم، محتوای آن را با دقت بررسی کند
آیا بخاطر عشق رنج کشیده اید؟
بولانیو: در مرتبه ی اول بسیار زیاد. اما بعدا یاد گرفتم به اتفاقات از منظر شوخی نگاه کنم
چه چیز را بیشتر دوست دارید؟
بولانیو: سکس و بورخس
دوست دارید قبل از مرگ چه کاری انجام دهید؟
چیز خاصی وجود ندارد که آرزو داشته باشم انجام یدهم. خب، فقط ترجیح می دهم نمیرم. اما دیر یا زود آن بانوی متینِ موقر از راه می رسد. اما مسئله این است که گاهی اوقات نه بانو است و نه متین، بلکه همانطور که نیکانور پارا در یکی از شعرهایش می گوید، همانند یک بدکاره است که باعث می شود دندانهایت به سختی به هم بخورند
چه چیزی شما را به قهقهه می اندازد؟
بولانیو: بداقبالی های خودم و دیگران
چه چیزی شما را به گریه می اندازد؟
بولانیو: باز هم بداقبالی های خودم و دیگران
اگر نویسنده نمی شدید چه شغلی را انتخاب می کردید؟
بولانیو: بیشتر دوست داشتم یک کارگآاه می شدم تا یک نویسنده. کاملا مطئن هستم. قتلهای زنجیره ای. من همان شخصی بودم که می توانستم شبانه به تنهایی به صحنه جُرم بازگردم و از ارواح نترسم
May 11, 2021
Essendomi appassionato da poco alla prosa di Roberto Bolaño, uno di quegli scrittori di cui vorrei leggere l'opera omnia sulla fiducia, mi ha incuriosito molto questa piccola raccolta di interviste che lo scrittore cileno rilasciò negli ultimi anni della sua vita. Devo dire che, sebbene solitamente tali tipologie di libri non entusiasmino molto, qui invece emerge tutta la straordinarietà di questo scrittore, un personaggio quasi romanzesco che ha viaggiato per il mondo, un letterato ed intellettuale curiosissimo e coltissimo che sembrava aver letto tutti i libri, ascoltato tutte le canzoni (persino Nicola Di Bari!) e guardato tutti i film, un poeta autodidatta che ha sofferto la fame e la solitudine, un sognatore che ha sempre voluto scrivere non per arricchirsi ma per emanciparsi e per esercitare la propria libertà di pensiero, un divoratore di libri che ha trovato nella lettura e nella scrittura un conforto durante i momenti bui, un outsider che ha fatto i lavori più disparati e disperati per guadagnarsi da vivere, ha combattuto coraggiosamente per quello in cui credeva, sia in campo politico che in campo artistico, ha perso amici e ha affrontato una malattia terribile, ha avuto molte sfortune ma sempre mantenendo un atteggiamento lucido, razionale, persino distaccato, molto ironico e soprattutto auto-ironico nei confronti dell'esistenza e, infine, ha potuto, almeno nei suoi ultimi anni, godere di un certo riconoscimento, riconoscimento che dopo la sua morte è diventato vero e proprio culto.
Nelle quattro interviste qui raccolte, in cui Bolaño dialoga ed entra in sintonia con suoi colleghi, amici e stimati giornalisti, da Hector Soto e Matias Bravo a Carmen Boullosa, da Eliseo Alvarez a Monica Maristain, emergono sia i tratti salienti del Bolaño scrittore e pensatore, sia i lati più intimi e teneri del Bolaño uomo, che in questo caso più di ogni altro rappresentano due aspetti inscindibili, in quanto si tratta di uno scrittore che ha messo tutto se stesso nelle sue pagine (la leggenda vuole che rifiutò un trapianto di fegato per finire di scrivere 2666, non facendo più in tempo ad ottenere un'altra possibilità).
Bolaño è piacevole conversatore e mostra intelligenza vulcanica e grande senso dell'umorismo, è un fiume in piena e parla a tutto campo: della letteratura ispanoamericana, dove con sincerità spiazzante non risparmia frecciate, pur riconoscendone l'altissimo valore, ai vari Gabriel Garcia Marquez e Mario Vargas Llosa, Octavio Paz e Pablo Neruda, e demolendone gli altisonanti e ridicoli imitatori, gli ambiziosi epigoni che mirano alla consacrazione nazionale e gli scribacchini votati al successo commerciale (bersagli prediletti sono, in quest'ultimo caso, Paulo Coelho, Marcela Serrano e Isabel Allende); della sua produzione letteraria, incentrata sull'indagine del male e dell'irrazionalità nell'uomo, un'opera fatta in prosa poetica, costellata di frammenti narrativi che sembrano nascere da un unico universo letterario, ricco di voci polifoniche, ripetizioni e variazioni sul tema, motivi ricorrenti e tentativi spesso fallimentari di rivoluzione in campo artistico e politico, un mondo abitato da scrittori tristi, sognatori sconfitti e personaggi marginali e spiantati, esistenze precarie e derelitte; del tentativo di dare nuova linfa alla letteratura del nuovo millennio, portandola da una dimensione locale ad una vocazione globale, cosmopolita, attingendo sia dalla propria tradizione ispanica (il Don Chisciotte di Cervantes è il testo seminale di tutti gli scrittori di lingua spagnola) e latinoamericana (quella degli amatissimi Nicanor Parra, Bioy Casares, Borges e Cortazar, rispettivamente considerati da Bolaño come padri e fratelli maggiori letterari), sia dalla letteratura nordamericana (egli stesso vede l'influenza nelle sue due opere principali, “I detective selvaggi” e “2666”, rispettivamente de “Le avventure di Huckleberry Finn” di Mark Twain e di “Moby Dick” di Herman Melville; ma cita anche Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, Edgar Allan Poe, William Faulkner, Kennedy Toole e persino Philip K. Dick tra gli scrittori ammirati) ed europea (e qui i riferimenti spaziano da Pascal a Jarry, da Schwob a Wilcock, da Rimbaud a Kafka, da Joyce a Pound, da Perec a Montale); del debito verso “Sotto il vulcano” di Malcolm Lowry, che come “I detective selvaggi” è stato definito il grande romanzo messicano; del bisogno di una nuova critica letteraria, della stessa qualità di quella creata da Harold Bloom; del suo rapporto con il movimento infrarealista, da lui creato insieme al suo migliore amico, Mario Santiago, il quale non riuscì a leggere l'omaggio che Bolaño gli fece ne “I detective selvaggi” con il personaggio di Ulises Lima, a lui ispirato, perché morì poco prima della pubblicazione; dei suoi genitori, soprattutto del padre, camionista e campione di pesi massimi del Cile meridionale, digiuno di letteratura e proveniente da cinquecento anni di analfabetismo; del suo teppismo letterario, della sua iconoclastia artistica, dei suoi ideali politici e delle sue battaglie rivoluzionarie, dal marxismo ortodosso al trotskismo all'anarchismo, dei molti esili e del contrasto ma anche della gratitudine verso Salvador Allende; delle sue tre patrie, il Cile, il Messico e la Spagna, che poi per Bolaño sono una sola, la lingua spagnola; del tentativo di sintetizzare e conciliare cultura alta e bassa, dei suoi gusti musicali e cinematografici, dei lavori da guardiano notturno in un camping e da venditore di bigiotteria in un negozio di souvenir, dei concorsi letterari spagnoli ai quali partecipava per farsi notare e del suo editore Herralde; del sesso e dell'amore e dell'affetto per la sua famiglia, della malattia e di tantissime altre cose.
Ho amato tantissimo, tra le lapidarie e fulminanti sentenze e le memorabili battute di spirito, la definizione che Bolaño, con grandissima ironia e un pizzico di modestia, dà di sé come scrittore con più passato, quando l'intervistatore gli fa notare che alcuni lo hanno definito come lo scrittore con più futuro.
A impreziosire la raccolta di interviste, in apertura troviamo una preziosa introduzione di Marcela Valdes, che inquadra dapprima il Roberto Bolaño scrittore e poi il suo capolavoro, 2666, spiegandone la genesi, citando le fonti di principale ispirazione (tra cui spicca su tutti il coraggioso “Ossa nel deserto”, libro-inchiesta dell'amico Sergio Gonzalez Rodriguez sui fatti di Ciudad Juarez) e fornendo una sintetica interpretazione del romanzo, come dell'intera opera letteraria, che è soprattutto un meraviglioso invito alla lettura. In chiusura, invece, troviamo un'appendice che regala ai lettori italiani la trascrizione dell'intervista che Raul Schenardi fece a Bolaño alla Fiera del Libro di Torino nel maggio del 2003, pochi mesi prima che morisse, e una postfazione di Nicola Lagioia, grande ammiratore di Bolaño, che riesce in modo molto efficace a far risaltare la vita e l'opera di questo straordinario scrittore.
Nella sua postfazione, Lagioia fa giustamente notare la grandezza di Bolaño come “riapritore di giochi”, avendo scritto in un'epoca, gli anni novanta del secolo scorso, culturalmente dominata dal grande romanzo americano, da una generazione di scrittori che denunciava gli effetti aberranti del capitalismo sfrenato ma da una prospettiva comunque borghese, altolocata, confortevole (si pensi alle opere-mondo che possono ben paragonarsi per mole e portata a “2666”, “Underworld” di Don DeLillo e “Infinite Jest” di David Foster Wallace, ma anche alla Trilogia Americana di Philip Roth), e che, diversamente da quella dei loro padri (Hemingway, Salinger, Vonnegut), di formazione europea, fossilizzandosi nella sua grandezza rischia di chiudersi in se stessa (la grande eccezione è qui William T. Vollmann), di non guardarsi più al di fuori del proprio contesto e di fare un discorso che alla lunga risulta monotono, ripetitivo e sterile, qualcosa di assolutamente originale, qualcosa di nuovo e di non ancora compreso a fondo, qualcosa in grado di dare nuova linfa alla letteratura del ventunesimo secolo e di far luce sul nostro mondo da una prospettiva inedita, quella dell'America Latina che per l'Europa è stata manicomio, allo stesso modo per cui il Nord America ne è stata la fabbrica. Un continente verticale, disperato e folle, povero e sottosviluppato, violento e grottesco, misterioso e ferino, picaresco e irrazionale, una terra di confine che rappresenta l'insensatezza del mondo intero, che sublima i drammi della Storia di tutti i tempi e luoghi e che si rispecchia in quel cuore di tenebra in mezzo al deserto che è Ciudad Juarez nella realtà, o Santa Teresa in 2666.
Per tutti questi motivi, non soltanto consiglierei la lettura di questo libretto agli estimatori già consolidati di Bolaño, che hanno già letto quasi tutto di lui e che vogliono completare la sua produzione letteraria, ma anche ai semplici curiosi che, come me, hanno appena iniziato a conoscerlo e ad apprezzarlo e si sono già innamorati della sua scrittura, intuendo una certa empatia e riconoscendo un'anima affine.
Nelle quattro interviste qui raccolte, in cui Bolaño dialoga ed entra in sintonia con suoi colleghi, amici e stimati giornalisti, da Hector Soto e Matias Bravo a Carmen Boullosa, da Eliseo Alvarez a Monica Maristain, emergono sia i tratti salienti del Bolaño scrittore e pensatore, sia i lati più intimi e teneri del Bolaño uomo, che in questo caso più di ogni altro rappresentano due aspetti inscindibili, in quanto si tratta di uno scrittore che ha messo tutto se stesso nelle sue pagine (la leggenda vuole che rifiutò un trapianto di fegato per finire di scrivere 2666, non facendo più in tempo ad ottenere un'altra possibilità).
Bolaño è piacevole conversatore e mostra intelligenza vulcanica e grande senso dell'umorismo, è un fiume in piena e parla a tutto campo: della letteratura ispanoamericana, dove con sincerità spiazzante non risparmia frecciate, pur riconoscendone l'altissimo valore, ai vari Gabriel Garcia Marquez e Mario Vargas Llosa, Octavio Paz e Pablo Neruda, e demolendone gli altisonanti e ridicoli imitatori, gli ambiziosi epigoni che mirano alla consacrazione nazionale e gli scribacchini votati al successo commerciale (bersagli prediletti sono, in quest'ultimo caso, Paulo Coelho, Marcela Serrano e Isabel Allende); della sua produzione letteraria, incentrata sull'indagine del male e dell'irrazionalità nell'uomo, un'opera fatta in prosa poetica, costellata di frammenti narrativi che sembrano nascere da un unico universo letterario, ricco di voci polifoniche, ripetizioni e variazioni sul tema, motivi ricorrenti e tentativi spesso fallimentari di rivoluzione in campo artistico e politico, un mondo abitato da scrittori tristi, sognatori sconfitti e personaggi marginali e spiantati, esistenze precarie e derelitte; del tentativo di dare nuova linfa alla letteratura del nuovo millennio, portandola da una dimensione locale ad una vocazione globale, cosmopolita, attingendo sia dalla propria tradizione ispanica (il Don Chisciotte di Cervantes è il testo seminale di tutti gli scrittori di lingua spagnola) e latinoamericana (quella degli amatissimi Nicanor Parra, Bioy Casares, Borges e Cortazar, rispettivamente considerati da Bolaño come padri e fratelli maggiori letterari), sia dalla letteratura nordamericana (egli stesso vede l'influenza nelle sue due opere principali, “I detective selvaggi” e “2666”, rispettivamente de “Le avventure di Huckleberry Finn” di Mark Twain e di “Moby Dick” di Herman Melville; ma cita anche Emily Dickinson, Walt Whitman, Edgar Allan Poe, William Faulkner, Kennedy Toole e persino Philip K. Dick tra gli scrittori ammirati) ed europea (e qui i riferimenti spaziano da Pascal a Jarry, da Schwob a Wilcock, da Rimbaud a Kafka, da Joyce a Pound, da Perec a Montale); del debito verso “Sotto il vulcano” di Malcolm Lowry, che come “I detective selvaggi” è stato definito il grande romanzo messicano; del bisogno di una nuova critica letteraria, della stessa qualità di quella creata da Harold Bloom; del suo rapporto con il movimento infrarealista, da lui creato insieme al suo migliore amico, Mario Santiago, il quale non riuscì a leggere l'omaggio che Bolaño gli fece ne “I detective selvaggi” con il personaggio di Ulises Lima, a lui ispirato, perché morì poco prima della pubblicazione; dei suoi genitori, soprattutto del padre, camionista e campione di pesi massimi del Cile meridionale, digiuno di letteratura e proveniente da cinquecento anni di analfabetismo; del suo teppismo letterario, della sua iconoclastia artistica, dei suoi ideali politici e delle sue battaglie rivoluzionarie, dal marxismo ortodosso al trotskismo all'anarchismo, dei molti esili e del contrasto ma anche della gratitudine verso Salvador Allende; delle sue tre patrie, il Cile, il Messico e la Spagna, che poi per Bolaño sono una sola, la lingua spagnola; del tentativo di sintetizzare e conciliare cultura alta e bassa, dei suoi gusti musicali e cinematografici, dei lavori da guardiano notturno in un camping e da venditore di bigiotteria in un negozio di souvenir, dei concorsi letterari spagnoli ai quali partecipava per farsi notare e del suo editore Herralde; del sesso e dell'amore e dell'affetto per la sua famiglia, della malattia e di tantissime altre cose.
Ho amato tantissimo, tra le lapidarie e fulminanti sentenze e le memorabili battute di spirito, la definizione che Bolaño, con grandissima ironia e un pizzico di modestia, dà di sé come scrittore con più passato, quando l'intervistatore gli fa notare che alcuni lo hanno definito come lo scrittore con più futuro.
A impreziosire la raccolta di interviste, in apertura troviamo una preziosa introduzione di Marcela Valdes, che inquadra dapprima il Roberto Bolaño scrittore e poi il suo capolavoro, 2666, spiegandone la genesi, citando le fonti di principale ispirazione (tra cui spicca su tutti il coraggioso “Ossa nel deserto”, libro-inchiesta dell'amico Sergio Gonzalez Rodriguez sui fatti di Ciudad Juarez) e fornendo una sintetica interpretazione del romanzo, come dell'intera opera letteraria, che è soprattutto un meraviglioso invito alla lettura. In chiusura, invece, troviamo un'appendice che regala ai lettori italiani la trascrizione dell'intervista che Raul Schenardi fece a Bolaño alla Fiera del Libro di Torino nel maggio del 2003, pochi mesi prima che morisse, e una postfazione di Nicola Lagioia, grande ammiratore di Bolaño, che riesce in modo molto efficace a far risaltare la vita e l'opera di questo straordinario scrittore.
Nella sua postfazione, Lagioia fa giustamente notare la grandezza di Bolaño come “riapritore di giochi”, avendo scritto in un'epoca, gli anni novanta del secolo scorso, culturalmente dominata dal grande romanzo americano, da una generazione di scrittori che denunciava gli effetti aberranti del capitalismo sfrenato ma da una prospettiva comunque borghese, altolocata, confortevole (si pensi alle opere-mondo che possono ben paragonarsi per mole e portata a “2666”, “Underworld” di Don DeLillo e “Infinite Jest” di David Foster Wallace, ma anche alla Trilogia Americana di Philip Roth), e che, diversamente da quella dei loro padri (Hemingway, Salinger, Vonnegut), di formazione europea, fossilizzandosi nella sua grandezza rischia di chiudersi in se stessa (la grande eccezione è qui William T. Vollmann), di non guardarsi più al di fuori del proprio contesto e di fare un discorso che alla lunga risulta monotono, ripetitivo e sterile, qualcosa di assolutamente originale, qualcosa di nuovo e di non ancora compreso a fondo, qualcosa in grado di dare nuova linfa alla letteratura del ventunesimo secolo e di far luce sul nostro mondo da una prospettiva inedita, quella dell'America Latina che per l'Europa è stata manicomio, allo stesso modo per cui il Nord America ne è stata la fabbrica. Un continente verticale, disperato e folle, povero e sottosviluppato, violento e grottesco, misterioso e ferino, picaresco e irrazionale, una terra di confine che rappresenta l'insensatezza del mondo intero, che sublima i drammi della Storia di tutti i tempi e luoghi e che si rispecchia in quel cuore di tenebra in mezzo al deserto che è Ciudad Juarez nella realtà, o Santa Teresa in 2666.
Per tutti questi motivi, non soltanto consiglierei la lettura di questo libretto agli estimatori già consolidati di Bolaño, che hanno già letto quasi tutto di lui e che vogliono completare la sua produzione letteraria, ma anche ai semplici curiosi che, come me, hanno appena iniziato a conoscerlo e ad apprezzarlo e si sono già innamorati della sua scrittura, intuendo una certa empatia e riconoscendo un'anima affine.
March 30, 2020
đâu đó 3-4 sao, nhiều thông tin thú vị, tiếp cận chút nào đó con người Bolano
October 27, 2017
Il libro è parecchio interessante per qualsiasi aficionado del grande romanziere scomparso prima del completamento di 2666 (il grande libro che verrà pubblicato postumo). Oltre alle brillanti interviste (di Hectòr Soto e Matìas Bravo, di Carmen Boullosa, di Eliseo Alvarez, di Monica Maristain, di Raul Schenardi) che compongono la parte centrale del breve volume (e una di esse era già stata pubblicata in “Fra Parentesi” -Adelphi 2010), concesse negli ultimi anni di vita, poco dopo la pubblicazione ed i riconoscimenti ricevuti per “I Detective Selvaggi” (e quindi mentre 2666 era ancora in corso di stesura), il libro contiene una interessante prefazione di Marcela Valdes ed una densa postfazione di Nicola Lagioia in appendice. Nella prima si fa luce sulla genesi proprio di 2666, la seconda è un breve saggio critico sulla sua opera completa.
Quello che ne viene fuori è un ritratto abbastanza completo di questo artista, il più interessante della letteratura latino-americana, o più ampiamente di quella in lingua spagnola (ma forse anche della letteratura mondiale) degli ultimi 20 anni. Forse “il primo grande romanziere del nuovo secolo, anche se lo ha attraversato per pochissimi anni” (è infatti deceduto nel 2003) scrive Lagioia.
E dalle interviste e dai brevi saggi introduttivo e conclusivo viene fuori il ritratto di uno scrittore inserito nel solco di una letteratura che da Cervantes arriva fino a lui attraverso Sterne, Kafka, Borges e Cortazar senza che nessuno di essi possa considerarsene un suo padre putativo (giusto Cortazar viene dallo steso Borges considerato tuttalpiù un fratello maggiore), mentre gli epigoni dei pur grandi Garcia Marquez o Vargas Llosa (ma intenti a costruire il loro personale Pantheon) non sono che pallide ombre dei loro riferimenti (e Bolano si riferisce apertamente a Isabel Allende, a Coelho, ma non solo a loro).
In realtà i due principali punti di riferimento di Bolano per i due suoi romanzi maggiori sono due scrittori nordamericani: Mark Twain e Melville. E se la storia picaresca, romanzo di formazione, adventure on-the-road, “Detective Selvaggi” con la sua coppia di amici Belano-Lima è in fondo una versione moderna delle avventure di Tom Sawyer- Hukleberry Finn, “2666”, nel suo ruotare intorno alla città–inferno Santa Teresa nel Sonora (trasposizione letteraria della reale Ciudad Juarez), ai suoi ripetuti e rigorosamente documentati violenti femminicidi, coperti dal potere economico in mano ai trafficanti di droga e dalle connivenze col potere politico e con la stessa polizia locale, non è che un progressivo inabissarsi nel regno dell’oscurità del male, che assume valore assoluto nel capitolo finale dove si rievocano gli orrori della guerra e del nazismo (di cui è testimone il fantomatico Benno Von Arcimboldi), è una ricerca nelle radici del male, un po’ come quella ossessiva del Capitano Achab alla ricerca della Balena bianca.
Ma l’interesse di Bolano per la letteratura nordamericana si ferma tutt’al più alla generazione degli Hemingway e dei Faulkner, e si ferma a Bellow e Updike. Probabilmente non riconosce nella generazione successiva altro che un’ espressione della cultura del benessere che rimira il proprio ombelico, incapace di guardare (salvo rare eccezioni) al di là dei propri confini (e sarà proprio Frenzen ad ammettere sconsolatamente la propria ignoranza di ciò che accade nel resto del mondo).
“Il Sudamerica è stato il manicomio dell’Europa, il Nordamerica la sua fabbrica”. E per raccontare il mondo occidentale inoltratosi nel XXI Secolo in un crescendo di difficoltà, con le sue crisi non solo economiche, “un manicomio è sempre più utile ed interessante di una fabbrica” (così Lagioia).
In fondo gli USA hanno saputo riconoscere la propria fragilità solo a partire da un 11 settembre dell’alba di questo nuovo secolo, mentre l’Europa e il Sudamerica hanno attraversato violenza politica e distruzioni continue anche attraverso i secoli precedenti.
E non a caso per Bolano l’11 Settembre rimane una data legata al Cile, e agli anni 70 del secolo precedente, .
Quello che ne viene fuori è un ritratto abbastanza completo di questo artista, il più interessante della letteratura latino-americana, o più ampiamente di quella in lingua spagnola (ma forse anche della letteratura mondiale) degli ultimi 20 anni. Forse “il primo grande romanziere del nuovo secolo, anche se lo ha attraversato per pochissimi anni” (è infatti deceduto nel 2003) scrive Lagioia.
E dalle interviste e dai brevi saggi introduttivo e conclusivo viene fuori il ritratto di uno scrittore inserito nel solco di una letteratura che da Cervantes arriva fino a lui attraverso Sterne, Kafka, Borges e Cortazar senza che nessuno di essi possa considerarsene un suo padre putativo (giusto Cortazar viene dallo steso Borges considerato tuttalpiù un fratello maggiore), mentre gli epigoni dei pur grandi Garcia Marquez o Vargas Llosa (ma intenti a costruire il loro personale Pantheon) non sono che pallide ombre dei loro riferimenti (e Bolano si riferisce apertamente a Isabel Allende, a Coelho, ma non solo a loro).
In realtà i due principali punti di riferimento di Bolano per i due suoi romanzi maggiori sono due scrittori nordamericani: Mark Twain e Melville. E se la storia picaresca, romanzo di formazione, adventure on-the-road, “Detective Selvaggi” con la sua coppia di amici Belano-Lima è in fondo una versione moderna delle avventure di Tom Sawyer- Hukleberry Finn, “2666”, nel suo ruotare intorno alla città–inferno Santa Teresa nel Sonora (trasposizione letteraria della reale Ciudad Juarez), ai suoi ripetuti e rigorosamente documentati violenti femminicidi, coperti dal potere economico in mano ai trafficanti di droga e dalle connivenze col potere politico e con la stessa polizia locale, non è che un progressivo inabissarsi nel regno dell’oscurità del male, che assume valore assoluto nel capitolo finale dove si rievocano gli orrori della guerra e del nazismo (di cui è testimone il fantomatico Benno Von Arcimboldi), è una ricerca nelle radici del male, un po’ come quella ossessiva del Capitano Achab alla ricerca della Balena bianca.
Ma l’interesse di Bolano per la letteratura nordamericana si ferma tutt’al più alla generazione degli Hemingway e dei Faulkner, e si ferma a Bellow e Updike. Probabilmente non riconosce nella generazione successiva altro che un’ espressione della cultura del benessere che rimira il proprio ombelico, incapace di guardare (salvo rare eccezioni) al di là dei propri confini (e sarà proprio Frenzen ad ammettere sconsolatamente la propria ignoranza di ciò che accade nel resto del mondo).
“Il Sudamerica è stato il manicomio dell’Europa, il Nordamerica la sua fabbrica”. E per raccontare il mondo occidentale inoltratosi nel XXI Secolo in un crescendo di difficoltà, con le sue crisi non solo economiche, “un manicomio è sempre più utile ed interessante di una fabbrica” (così Lagioia).
In fondo gli USA hanno saputo riconoscere la propria fragilità solo a partire da un 11 settembre dell’alba di questo nuovo secolo, mentre l’Europa e il Sudamerica hanno attraversato violenza politica e distruzioni continue anche attraverso i secoli precedenti.
E non a caso per Bolano l’11 Settembre rimane una data legata al Cile, e agli anni 70 del secolo precedente, .
March 15, 2016
Although I enjoyed Monica Maristain's oral biography Bolaño: A Biography in Conversations, her "last interview" for the Mexican edition of Playboy is kind of silly. The intro, however, by Marcela Valdes is an essential introduction to 2666.
March 30, 2018
Un Bolaño così vicino eppur così lontano: l’uomo prima dello scrittore, un lettore onnivoro che ha fatto della scrittura il suo mestiere.
December 3, 2009
Roberto Bolaño: The Last Interview actually consists of a short introduction and four intelligently-annotated interviews, trim with Bolaño's sharp insight and unsentimental charm. Unfortunately, the last interview (for Playboy) is the worst. The interviewer, who is far from stupid, can't hold back from asking questions like "Is the world without remedy?" or (for the final question, which would have killed Bolaño even if he hadn't been dying) "Do you confess to having lived?" Maybe that sounds less retarded in Spanish, but I doubt it.
For the most part this is a perfect little book. The introduction by Marcela Valdes is a gift to American readers such as I who have grabbed up RB's books as they've appeared. Especially 2666. I've been reading that monster for months, very slowly, because I'm now reading it in Spanish with the English translation as support. There's nothing quite like this book – I couldn't even say if I think it's "good" or not – but I will say it's an experience, transforming, profoundly disheartening, very sad, the kind of book that makes you laugh even while it cuts you. Valdes provides a fine bit of background for this final masterpiece, but Bolaño describes its meaning best in response to the last interviewer's inane question.
MM: Is the world without remedy?
RB: The world is alive and no living thing has any remedy. That's our fortune.
That last word may be full of hope. Or not. That's the beauty of Bolaño.
For the most part this is a perfect little book. The introduction by Marcela Valdes is a gift to American readers such as I who have grabbed up RB's books as they've appeared. Especially 2666. I've been reading that monster for months, very slowly, because I'm now reading it in Spanish with the English translation as support. There's nothing quite like this book – I couldn't even say if I think it's "good" or not – but I will say it's an experience, transforming, profoundly disheartening, very sad, the kind of book that makes you laugh even while it cuts you. Valdes provides a fine bit of background for this final masterpiece, but Bolaño describes its meaning best in response to the last interviewer's inane question.
MM: Is the world without remedy?
RB: The world is alive and no living thing has any remedy. That's our fortune.
That last word may be full of hope. Or not. That's the beauty of Bolaño.
October 10, 2019
Great, but short. Short, but specific. Specific, but honest. Honest, but melancholic. Melancholic, but real.
Insights of Bolaño's mind and intellectualism.
His bookworm's mental library. The top of his iceberg : Nicanor Parra, all by Borges, Moby Dick, Don Quixote, Kafka's Process + Castle, Cortazar's Rayuela , Wittgenstein's Tractatus, Life: a User's Manual by Perec, The invention of Morel by Casares, A Confederacy of Dunces by Toole, Nadja by Breton, Pensees by Pascal, Satyricon, The History of Rome by Titus Livius.
Insights of Bolaño's mind and intellectualism.
His bookworm's mental library. The top of his iceberg : Nicanor Parra, all by Borges, Moby Dick, Don Quixote, Kafka's Process + Castle, Cortazar's Rayuela , Wittgenstein's Tractatus, Life: a User's Manual by Perec, The invention of Morel by Casares, A Confederacy of Dunces by Toole, Nadja by Breton, Pensees by Pascal, Satyricon, The History of Rome by Titus Livius.
December 27, 2021
È il primo libro che leggo di e su Bolaño. Percepisco chi è stato rivoluzionario per la letteratura mondiale e chi diventerà fondamentale per la mia opera di lettore da subito, e su Bolaño ho avuto la stessa impressione che ho avuto prima di leggere Roth, McCarthy, Borges, Bukowski, Fante, e tanti altri.
Questo è un ottimo libro per avvicinarsi allo scrittore e alla sua arte. L'ultima conversazione, in appendice ad altre interviste, fa capire quanto un uomo possa amare il proprio lavoro mettendoci tutto sé stesso. È interessante anche capire in che contesto culturale si è mosso Roberto e che rapporti ha avuto con i suoi contemporanei e con gli idoli del passato.
Tutto questo è L'ultima conversazione, edito Sur, un libro che non può mancare in nessuna libreria di appassionati di letteratura sudamericana. Ma Bolaño non rimane chiuso nella sua nazionalità: lui, ad un certo punto, parlerà del mondo. Questo è fare letteratura.
Questo è un ottimo libro per avvicinarsi allo scrittore e alla sua arte. L'ultima conversazione, in appendice ad altre interviste, fa capire quanto un uomo possa amare il proprio lavoro mettendoci tutto sé stesso. È interessante anche capire in che contesto culturale si è mosso Roberto e che rapporti ha avuto con i suoi contemporanei e con gli idoli del passato.
Tutto questo è L'ultima conversazione, edito Sur, un libro che non può mancare in nessuna libreria di appassionati di letteratura sudamericana. Ma Bolaño non rimane chiuso nella sua nazionalità: lui, ad un certo punto, parlerà del mondo. Questo è fare letteratura.
September 5, 2022
"بولانيو همواره برای نوشتن داستانهای پلیسی و هیجانی شور و شوق داشت؛ یک بار هم جيمز اِلروی را بهترین نویسنده انگلیسیزبان نامید. اما علاقه بولانيو به داستانهای پلیسی از پیرنگ داستان و سبک آن فراتر میرود. از نظر ماهوی داستانهای پلیسی به معنای تحقیق در زمینة انگیزهها و عملکرد خشونتند. بولانيو که در ۱۹۸۶ و در دوران قتلعام تليتلولكو به مکزیک مهاجرت کرده و به ادعای خودش در دوران کودتای نظامی ۱۹۷۳ شیلی مدت کوتاهی را در زندان وطنش به سر برده بود؛ همواره درگیر افکار مربوط به آن حوادث بود. رابطة میان هنر و رسوایی، هنروری و جنایت، نویسنده و دولتهای مستبد از مهمترین موضوعهای آثار او بهشمار میروند."
July 26, 2019
Two short passages from The Last Interview and Other Conversations:
For me, the word “writing” is the exact opposite of the word “waiting.” Instead of waiting, there is writing. Well, I’m probably wrong – it’s possible that writing is another form of waiting, of delaying things. I’d like to think otherwise. But, as I said, I’m probably wrong.
Those who have power – even for a short time – know nothing about literature; they are solely interested in power. I can be a clown to my readers, if I damn well please, but never to the powerful.
For me, the word “writing” is the exact opposite of the word “waiting.” Instead of waiting, there is writing. Well, I’m probably wrong – it’s possible that writing is another form of waiting, of delaying things. I’d like to think otherwise. But, as I said, I’m probably wrong.
Those who have power – even for a short time – know nothing about literature; they are solely interested in power. I can be a clown to my readers, if I damn well please, but never to the powerful.
September 17, 2017
I love this guy now xD
February 7, 2012
As regular readers of this blog will know, I have a great admiration for the Chilean poet and novelist Roberto Bolaño. Bolaño died in 2003, leaving behind him a series of novels (some already published, others forthcoming through the next few years), at least one of which will last: 2666 (2004). This collection of interviews Bolaño held with Capital, Bomb, Turia and Playboy (the Mexican edition), introduced by fellow Bolaño-ite Marcela Valdes has clearly been assembled to benefit from the recent interest shown by the wider reading public in Bolaño. Before reading these interviews, I had not heard Bolaño’s views other than those expressed through his writing, and consequently I purchased this with great interest.
First of all is Marcela Valdes’s introduction: a superb introduction to this writer and to Bolaño, specifically his interest in the Juárez killings that inspired 2666. Much of his level of interest in them was new to me, and I think in future editions of 2666, Valdes’s introduction should be included – it has certainly expanded my thinking on this great novel. Sadly Bolaño was still finishing 2666 when he died, so the interviews that follow this make no mention of this work; instead Bolaño talks about The Savage Detectives and his other works.
The first of the interviews, conducted for Capital magazine, in Santiago, in 1999, is a short interview – as most magazine interviews are – but there is depth here: Bolaño talks about the importance of reading and his own writing, but avenues of thought are left unexplored – Bolaño almost seems to be setting things up and the interviewers miss them. The second interview, with Bomb, a Brooklyn based magazine, is much more detailed – though the interviewer seems to show-off to Bolaño with his own learning. The interview with Turia expands upon the Bomb one, and is again more detailed. It comes as such a shame, then, that the last interview, for Playboy, doesn’t allow much room for Bolaño to really speak – the interviewer keeps cutting him short, and asking him stupid questions: “What makes your jaw hurt laughing?” “What makes you cry?” Stupid, stupid questions that Bolaño swats away with short, curt answers. It reveals nothing. A shame that it ends the collection as there is much to savour here: for the fan of Bolaño, for the general reader, and for the writer.
There is much to be written on Bolaño, and these few interviews will provide some form of initial basis upon which to build that critical commentary: as such it is a useful volume. I do not know how many interviews Bolaño gave in his lifetime, but that some can be gathered (and annotated wonderfully by Tom McCartan) and distributed by a small, but brilliant publishing house, Melville, well, we should be grateful. Congratulations to them.
There is more on Bolaño at their website, http://www.mhpbooks.com/index.php – where you can also browse their small collection of publications.
First of all is Marcela Valdes’s introduction: a superb introduction to this writer and to Bolaño, specifically his interest in the Juárez killings that inspired 2666. Much of his level of interest in them was new to me, and I think in future editions of 2666, Valdes’s introduction should be included – it has certainly expanded my thinking on this great novel. Sadly Bolaño was still finishing 2666 when he died, so the interviews that follow this make no mention of this work; instead Bolaño talks about The Savage Detectives and his other works.
The first of the interviews, conducted for Capital magazine, in Santiago, in 1999, is a short interview – as most magazine interviews are – but there is depth here: Bolaño talks about the importance of reading and his own writing, but avenues of thought are left unexplored – Bolaño almost seems to be setting things up and the interviewers miss them. The second interview, with Bomb, a Brooklyn based magazine, is much more detailed – though the interviewer seems to show-off to Bolaño with his own learning. The interview with Turia expands upon the Bomb one, and is again more detailed. It comes as such a shame, then, that the last interview, for Playboy, doesn’t allow much room for Bolaño to really speak – the interviewer keeps cutting him short, and asking him stupid questions: “What makes your jaw hurt laughing?” “What makes you cry?” Stupid, stupid questions that Bolaño swats away with short, curt answers. It reveals nothing. A shame that it ends the collection as there is much to savour here: for the fan of Bolaño, for the general reader, and for the writer.
There is much to be written on Bolaño, and these few interviews will provide some form of initial basis upon which to build that critical commentary: as such it is a useful volume. I do not know how many interviews Bolaño gave in his lifetime, but that some can be gathered (and annotated wonderfully by Tom McCartan) and distributed by a small, but brilliant publishing house, Melville, well, we should be grateful. Congratulations to them.
There is more on Bolaño at their website, http://www.mhpbooks.com/index.php – where you can also browse their small collection of publications.
December 11, 2009
the last interview & other conversations is obviously a must read for anyone seeking greater understanding of the enigmatic chilean author. comprised of four interviews, this slim collection begins with an insightful and very well written introductory essay entitled "alone among the ghosts," by marcela valdes, that further elucidates how and why bolaño came to write 2666. while two of these interviews (bomb & playboy mexico) were easily available before this book, to have four distinct portraits of bolaño in one place is quite the gift. all of the interviews were conducted during the time he was writing 2666, and, thus, he would have been well aware of his impending fate when he allowed the interviewers to query him at length. perhaps the most valuable part of these interviews, however, are the annotations included in the margins, offering brief biographical sketches of the latin american authors bolaño read often and loved well. these priceless additions also indicate whether the writer has works available in english translation. as if bolaño's fiction didn't inspire a long enough reading list, these interviews could fill shelves with prospective reads. with so much hype and misinformation regarding bolaño circulating in print and on the internet, it's often difficult to discern the fact from the fiction, so it may well be that the last interview & other conversations is the most candid glimpse we shall ever have into the late author, his personality, and the details of his life.
from "the last interview" (playboy mexico, july 2003)
monica maristain: have you shed one tear about the widespread criticism you've drawn from your enemies?
roberto bolaño: lots and lots. every time i read that someone has spoken badly of me i begin to cry, i drag myself across the floor, i scratch myself, i stop writing indefinitely, i lose my appetite, i smoke less, i engage in sport, i go for walks on the edge of the sea, which by the way is less than 30 meters from my house, and i ask the seagulls, whose ancestors ate the fish who ate ulysses: why me? why? i've done you no harm.
~
mm: do you have hope? for what and for whom?
rb: my dear maristain, again you push me toward the land of bad taste, which is not my native land. i have hope for children. for children and warriors. for children who fuck like children and warriors who fight like brave men...
from "the last interview" (playboy mexico, july 2003)
monica maristain: have you shed one tear about the widespread criticism you've drawn from your enemies?
roberto bolaño: lots and lots. every time i read that someone has spoken badly of me i begin to cry, i drag myself across the floor, i scratch myself, i stop writing indefinitely, i lose my appetite, i smoke less, i engage in sport, i go for walks on the edge of the sea, which by the way is less than 30 meters from my house, and i ask the seagulls, whose ancestors ate the fish who ate ulysses: why me? why? i've done you no harm.
~
mm: do you have hope? for what and for whom?
rb: my dear maristain, again you push me toward the land of bad taste, which is not my native land. i have hope for children. for children and warriors. for children who fuck like children and warriors who fight like brave men...
December 21, 2009
Editorial note that has nothing to do with the book's content: I've heard some rumblings about how lots of the interviews and essays in this book are available for free on the internet. It's true; I can't deny this. But, honestly, if you're a fan of Bolaño, you should still pick this up. It's been translated with editorial direction, not just by some guy on the internet using Google Translate; the footnotes are great, giving micro-bios about the many Spanish-language authors mentioned; and it's just great to have all of these in one place, you know? That last reason should be enough. And if you'd rather just read them online or print them out, you can keep your $14.95, of course. I do have one complaint, though: the pages are made out of very cheap-feeling paper, and I feel like this won't last too long. Oh well. There's always the internet.
I'd say the best thing to come out of the interviews themselves is Bolaño's humor. Everyone who has read more than five pages of any of his novels knows that humor keeps them afloat. If Bolaño weren't viciously hilarious, no one would read any further than those five pages. This comes across in the interviews as a very dark, yet somehow heart-warming personality that is eager to talk about anything and everything. What he talks about most, of course, is Latin literature, writing, and just about anything that can go with those things. So if you're not into that, you should probably stay away. But maybe, just maybe, if you're into interviews or stuff like that, it'd be enjoyable.
I'd say the best thing to come out of the interviews themselves is Bolaño's humor. Everyone who has read more than five pages of any of his novels knows that humor keeps them afloat. If Bolaño weren't viciously hilarious, no one would read any further than those five pages. This comes across in the interviews as a very dark, yet somehow heart-warming personality that is eager to talk about anything and everything. What he talks about most, of course, is Latin literature, writing, and just about anything that can go with those things. So if you're not into that, you should probably stay away. But maybe, just maybe, if you're into interviews or stuff like that, it'd be enjoyable.
January 16, 2016
Bolaño in conversation can sometimes crack you up, sometimes give you serious pause. He's very quotable. And what a bibliophile! He seemed to have read all the essential works from Latin America and beyond. He is generous in sharing his opinionated estimations of writers; he certainly knows his titans (Cervantes, Borges, Rulfo, Kafka, Twain, Melville, etc.).
This book of interviews is tailored for Bolaño aficionados. Considering that about 40% of its content is available online, this appears at first to be a book that capitalizes too much on the B hype. However, this is the first and so far the only available book-length compilation of interviews (in English translation) with the writer. It's also important in that regard.
This book of interviews is tailored for Bolaño aficionados. Considering that about 40% of its content is available online, this appears at first to be a book that capitalizes too much on the B hype. However, this is the first and so far the only available book-length compilation of interviews (in English translation) with the writer. It's also important in that regard.
November 7, 2017
Roberto Bolaño is a great writer, but he died before his literary reputation took off. Consequently, before 2003, there weren't that many good interviews with him. The Last Interview and Other Conversations is an interesting read, but I get the feeling that the interviewers didn't know the right questions to ask.
July 13, 2018
صرفا از سر کنجکاوی گرفتمش تا بیشتر با نویسنده آشنا بشم، تا جایی که فهمیدم اثری ازش ترجمه نشه و طبیعتا به شناخت خاصی از مدل ذهنی نویسنده نرسیدم.
بخشهایی از نظراتش خیلی برام ملموس بود و جالب، خصوصا دیدگاهش دربارهٔ ترجمهٔ آثار و نقد ادبی. در ضمن حجم زیادی پانویس در معرفی نویسندگان اکثرا اسپانیاییزبان هم در کتاب هست که امیدوارم روزی برم سراغشون
بخشهایی از نظراتش خیلی برام ملموس بود و جالب، خصوصا دیدگاهش دربارهٔ ترجمهٔ آثار و نقد ادبی. در ضمن حجم زیادی پانویس در معرفی نویسندگان اکثرا اسپانیاییزبان هم در کتاب هست که امیدوارم روزی برم سراغشون
May 22, 2013
Necessary for the completist. You can't miss the essence of your favortire writer.
Sample this:
"Positions are positions, sex is sex."
Indian girls might be excited about the fact that the most beautiful woman Bolano glimpsed in his life was an Indian woman in Spain.
Sample this:
"Positions are positions, sex is sex."
Indian girls might be excited about the fact that the most beautiful woman Bolano glimpsed in his life was an Indian woman in Spain.
November 29, 2015
tons of hilarious assessments and recommendations from bolaño here - i underlined a bunch of stuff!!!
January 26, 2020
INTERVIEWER: Why do you always take the opposite view of things?
Bolaño: I never take the opposite view of things.
INTERVIEWER: Have you shed one tear about the widespread criticism you've drawn from your enemies?
Bolaño: Lots and lots. Every time I read that someone has spoken badly of me I begin to cry, I drag myself across the floor, I scratch myself, I stop writing indefinitely, I lose my appetite, I smoke less, I engage in sport, I go for walks on the edge of the sea, which by the way is less than 30 meters from my house, and I ask the seagulls, whose ancestors ate the fish who ate Ulysses: Why me? Why? I've done you no harm.
INTERVIEWER: How does it feel to be regarded as the Latin American writer with the most promising future by critics like Darío Osses?
Bolaño (literally dying of liver failure as he speaks): It must be a joke. I am the Latin American writer with the least promising future. But on that point, I am the type with the most past, which is what matters anyway.
This guy's sense of irony is so sharp, yet kind and matter-of-fact that it's just astonishing to me. Having passed away at fifty, the world will never know what it lost or, to put it more presicely, we'll never know what we may have gained had he gone on to live longer. But he knew it was coming, having postponed the liver transplant he needed so much so that he could go on working on 2666. The ever uncompromising, ever brilliant Bolaño.
"I was the only anarchist I knew and thank God, because otherwise I would have stopped being an anarchist. Unanimity pisses me off immensely. Whenever I realize that the whole world agrees on something, whenever I see that the whole world is cursing something in chorus, something rises to the surface of my skin that makes me reject it."
"Mexico is a tremendously vital country, despite the fact that, paradoxically, it's the country where death is the most present. Perhaps being that vital is what keeps death so close."
Bolaño: I never take the opposite view of things.
INTERVIEWER: Have you shed one tear about the widespread criticism you've drawn from your enemies?
Bolaño: Lots and lots. Every time I read that someone has spoken badly of me I begin to cry, I drag myself across the floor, I scratch myself, I stop writing indefinitely, I lose my appetite, I smoke less, I engage in sport, I go for walks on the edge of the sea, which by the way is less than 30 meters from my house, and I ask the seagulls, whose ancestors ate the fish who ate Ulysses: Why me? Why? I've done you no harm.
INTERVIEWER: How does it feel to be regarded as the Latin American writer with the most promising future by critics like Darío Osses?
Bolaño (literally dying of liver failure as he speaks): It must be a joke. I am the Latin American writer with the least promising future. But on that point, I am the type with the most past, which is what matters anyway.
This guy's sense of irony is so sharp, yet kind and matter-of-fact that it's just astonishing to me. Having passed away at fifty, the world will never know what it lost or, to put it more presicely, we'll never know what we may have gained had he gone on to live longer. But he knew it was coming, having postponed the liver transplant he needed so much so that he could go on working on 2666. The ever uncompromising, ever brilliant Bolaño.
"I was the only anarchist I knew and thank God, because otherwise I would have stopped being an anarchist. Unanimity pisses me off immensely. Whenever I realize that the whole world agrees on something, whenever I see that the whole world is cursing something in chorus, something rises to the surface of my skin that makes me reject it."
"Mexico is a tremendously vital country, despite the fact that, paradoxically, it's the country where death is the most present. Perhaps being that vital is what keeps death so close."
April 24, 2023
“Well, I continue to live, to read, to write and to watch films, and as Arturo Prat said to the suicides of Esmeralda, “While I am still alive, this flag will not come down.”
A fantastic collection of interviews with the late, great Roberto Bolaño. I even liked the last interview, despite there being some really trite questions as many others have noted. Admittedly, this is my first real intro to Bolaño. I’m hoping to start really reading his novels soon, but this is a great view into his personal aesthetics and life. And especially for someone who is trying to develop a deeper appreciation for Latin American Literature, these interviews basically contain a whole primer of Latin American modernism. It’s quite easy to see that Bolaño was a voracious and prodigious reader, going so far to exclaim:
“There’s something about poetry. Whatever the case, the important thing is to keep reading it. That’s more important than writing it, don’t you think? The truth is, reading is always more important than writing.”
And of course, as I’m sure we all know, within every truly great writer is a truly great reader. Bolaño comes off in these interviews as being fun, funny, witty, intelligent, and deeply self-deprecating in all the best ways. Truly a wonderful guy and I read through these quickly, really wanting more. I’m excited to delve in.
“The silence of death is the worst kind of silence, because Rulfian silence is accepted and Rimbaudian silence is sought, but the silence of death is the one that cuts the edge off what could have been and never will be, that which we will never know.”
“I’m moved by those youths who sleep with a book under their head. A book is the best pillow that exists.”
A fantastic collection of interviews with the late, great Roberto Bolaño. I even liked the last interview, despite there being some really trite questions as many others have noted. Admittedly, this is my first real intro to Bolaño. I’m hoping to start really reading his novels soon, but this is a great view into his personal aesthetics and life. And especially for someone who is trying to develop a deeper appreciation for Latin American Literature, these interviews basically contain a whole primer of Latin American modernism. It’s quite easy to see that Bolaño was a voracious and prodigious reader, going so far to exclaim:
“There’s something about poetry. Whatever the case, the important thing is to keep reading it. That’s more important than writing it, don’t you think? The truth is, reading is always more important than writing.”
And of course, as I’m sure we all know, within every truly great writer is a truly great reader. Bolaño comes off in these interviews as being fun, funny, witty, intelligent, and deeply self-deprecating in all the best ways. Truly a wonderful guy and I read through these quickly, really wanting more. I’m excited to delve in.
“The silence of death is the worst kind of silence, because Rulfian silence is accepted and Rimbaudian silence is sought, but the silence of death is the one that cuts the edge off what could have been and never will be, that which we will never know.”
“I’m moved by those youths who sleep with a book under their head. A book is the best pillow that exists.”
July 19, 2024
B+/A-
Without the book’s introduction (which takes up about a third of the page count), my score would probably be lower. I’m not an expert on Spanish language literature and discussion of that literature dominates this book, and Bolaño’s poetry and writing process (the two things that would interest me most in an interview with him) are basically never addressed, besides a question or two here and there.
That being said, the interviews collected here are mostly pretty interesting and the interviewers do manage to goad some interesting quotes out of Bolaño, who often seems somewhat reticent and more than a little confused by the attention he was receiving.
The footnotes for this book were largely pretty good although I do wish they were more in-depth. If the footnotes had offered things like plot summaries and more context about what kind of writing the authors mentioned had done then they would have been far more interesting and edifying and relevant.
The intro, as stated above, is super long, but is definitely required reading for anyone who has read or is about to read 2666. While other works of Bolaño’s are mentioned, the intro is heavily concerned with the context and content of that novel. I dearly wish I had read the intro before my last read of 2666, it would have made the experience even more enjoyable.
Without the book’s introduction (which takes up about a third of the page count), my score would probably be lower. I’m not an expert on Spanish language literature and discussion of that literature dominates this book, and Bolaño’s poetry and writing process (the two things that would interest me most in an interview with him) are basically never addressed, besides a question or two here and there.
That being said, the interviews collected here are mostly pretty interesting and the interviewers do manage to goad some interesting quotes out of Bolaño, who often seems somewhat reticent and more than a little confused by the attention he was receiving.
The footnotes for this book were largely pretty good although I do wish they were more in-depth. If the footnotes had offered things like plot summaries and more context about what kind of writing the authors mentioned had done then they would have been far more interesting and edifying and relevant.
The intro, as stated above, is super long, but is definitely required reading for anyone who has read or is about to read 2666. While other works of Bolaño’s are mentioned, the intro is heavily concerned with the context and content of that novel. I dearly wish I had read the intro before my last read of 2666, it would have made the experience even more enjoyable.
March 31, 2020
Se aprende y se descubre leyendo, y viendo entrevistas de maestros como Roberto Bolaño. Me muestra muchas puertas que puedo abrir que no sabía existían. Para mi es vital, ya que fui educado en colegios en inglés , universidades en inglés, he leído más libros en inglés, y en este libro sale una lista de autores latino americanos desconocidos para mi. Es un alivio descubrirlos. Gracias Roberto.
January 5, 2025
“Shortly before he died of liver failure in July 2003, Roberto Bolaño remarked that he would have preferred to be a detective rather than a writer. Bolaño was fifty years old at the time, and by then he was widely considered to be the most important Latin American novelist since Gabriel García Márquez. But when Mónica Maristain interviewed him for the Mexican edition of Playboy, Bolaño was unequivocal. ‘I would have liked to be a homicide detective, much more than a writer,’ he told the magazine. ‘Of that I’m absolutely sure. A string of homicides. Someone who could go
back alone, at night, to the scene of the crime, and not be afraid of ghosts.’
Detective stories, and provocative remarks, were always passions of Bolaño’s—he once declared James Ellroy among the best living writers in English—but his interest in gumshoe tales went beyond matters of plot and style. In their essence, detective stories are investigations into the motives and mechanics of violence, and Bolaño—who moved to Mexico the year of the 1968 Tlatelolco massacre and said he was briefly imprisoned during the 1973 military coup in his native Chile—was also obsessed with such
matters. The great subject of his oeuvre is the relationship between art and infamy, craft and crime, the writer and the totalitarian state.
In fact, all of Bolaño’s mature novels scrutinize how writers react to repressive regimes. Distant Star (1996) grapples with Chile’s history of death squads and desaparecidos by conjuring up a poet turned serial killer. The Savage Detectives (1998) exalts a gang of young poets who joust against state-funded writers during the years of Mexico’s dirty wars. Amulet (1999) revolves around a middle-aged poet who survives the government’s 1968 invasion of the Autonomous University of Mexico by hiding in a bathroom. By Night in Chile (2000) depicts a literary salon where writers party in the same house in which dissidents are tortured. And Bolaño’s final, posthumous novel, 2666, is also spun from ghastly news: the murder, since 1993, of more than 430 women and girls in the Mexican state of Chihuahua, particularly in Ciudad Juárez.”
“Bolaño was forty-three when he sent this missive, and as near to failure as he’d ever been. Though he’d published two books of poetry, co-written a novel and spent five years entering short story contests all over Spain, he was so broke that he couldn’t afford a
telephone line, and his work was almost entirely unknown. Three years earlier, he and his wife had separated; around the same time he was diagnosed with the liver disease that would kill him eight years later. Though Bolaño won many of the short story contests he entered, his novels were routinely rejected by publishers. Yet late in 1995 he would begin an astonishing rise.
The turning point was a meeting with Jorge Herralde, the founder and director of the publishing house Editorial Anagrama. Though Herralde couldn’t buy Nazi Literature in the Americas—it was snapped up by Seix Barral—he invited Bolaño to visit him in Barcelona. There Bolaño told him about his cash problems and the desperation he felt over the many rejections he’d received. ‘I told him that … I’d love to read his other manuscripts, and shortly afterward he brought me Distant Star (later I
found out that it had also been rejected by other publishing houses, including Seix Barral),’ the editor recalls in an essay. Herralde, however, found the book extraordinary. Thereafter, he published all of Bolaño’s fiction: nine books in seven years.”
“2666, like all of Bolaño’s work, is a graveyard. In his 1998 acceptance speech for the Rómulo Gallego’s Prize, Bolaño revealed that in some way everything he wrote was ‘a letter of love or of goodbye’ to the young people who died in the dirty wars of Latin America. His previous novels memorialized the dead of the 1960s and ’70s. His ambitions for 2666 were greater: to write a postmortem for the dead of the past, the present and the future.”
“The truth is, I don’t believe all that much in writing. Starting with my own. Being a writer is pleasant—no, pleasant isn’t the word—it’s an
activity that has its share of amusing moments, but I know of other things that are even more amusing, amusing in the same way that literature is for me. Holding up banks, for example. Or directing movies. Or being a gigolo. Or being a child again and playing on a more or less apocalyptic soccer team. Unfortunately, the child grows up, the bank robber is killed, the director runs out of money, the gigolo gets sick and then there’s no other choice but to write. For me, the word ‘writing’ is the exact opposite of the word ‘waiting.’ Instead of waiting, there is writing. Well, I’m probably wrong—it’s possible that writing is another form of waiting, of delaying things. I’d like to think otherwise. But, as I said, I’m probably wrong. As to my idea of a canon, I don’t know, it’s like everyone else’s—I’m almost
embarrassed to tell you, it’s so obvious: Francisco de Aldana, Jorge Manrique, Cervantes, the chroniclers of the Indies, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Fray Servando Teresa de Mier, Pedro Henríquez Ureña, Rubén Darío, Alfonso Reyes, Borges, just to name a few and without going beyond the realm of the Spanish language. Of course, I’d love to claim a literary past, a tradition, a very brief one, made up of only two or three writers (and maybe one single book), a dazzling tradition prone to amnesia, but on the one hand, I’m much too modest about my work and on the other, I’ve read too much (and too many books have made me happy) to indulge in such a ridiculous notion.”
“EA: One of your characters says, ‘One has the moral obligation to be responsible for one’s actions and for one’s words but also for one’s silence.’
RB: One of my characters says that? It sounds so good it hardly seems written by me.
EA: Is that also fair to say about writers?
RB: No, for writers that isn’t fair, but without a doubt, in predetermined moments, yes. If I’m walking down the street and see a pedophile molesting a kid and I stop and silently stare, not only am I responsible for my silence but I am also a complete son of a bitch. However, there is a certain type of silence in which—
EA: Are there literary silences?
RB: Yes, there are literary silences. Kafka’s, for example, which is a silence that cannot be. When he asks that his papers be burned, Kafka is opting for
silence, opting for a literary silence, all in a literary era. That is to say, he was completely moral. Kafka’s literature, aside from being the best work, the highest literary work of the twentieth century, is of an extreme morality and of an extreme gentility, things that usually do not go together either.
EA: And what of Rulfo’s silence?
RB: Rulfo’s silence, I think, is obedient to something so quotidian that explaining it is a waste of time. There are several versions: One told by
Monterroso is that Rulfo had an uncle so-and-so who told him stories and when Rulfo was asked why he didn’t write anymore, his answer was that his uncle so-and-so had died. And I believe it too. Another explanation is simple and natural and it is that everything has an expiration date. For example I am much more worried about Rimbaudian silence than I am about Rulfian silence. Rulfo stopped writing because he had already written everything he wanted to write and because he sees himself incapable of writing anything better, he simply stops. Rimbaud would probably have been able to write something much better, which is to say bringing his words up even higher, but his is a silence that raises questions for Westerners. Rulfo’s silence doesn’t raise questions; it’s a close silence,
quotidian. After desert, what the hell are you going to eat? There is a third literary silence—one doesn’t seek it—of the shade which one is sure was there under the threshold and which has never been made tangible. There stands the silence of Georg Büchner for example. He died at twenty-five or twenty-four years of age, he leaves behind three or four stage plays, masterworks. One of them is Woyzeck, an absolute masterwork. Another is about the death of Danton, which is an enormous masterwork, not absolute but quite notable. The other two—one is called Leonce y Lena, I can’t remember the other one—are fundamentally important. All before he turned twenty-five. What might have happened had Büchner not died; what kind of writer might he have been? The kind of silence that isn’t sought out is the silence of … I do not dare call it destiny … a manifestation of impotence. The silence of death is the worst kind of silence, because Rulfian silence is
accepted and Rimbaudian silence is sought, but the silence of death is the one that cuts the edge off what could have been and never will be, that which we will never know. We’ll never know if Büchner would have been bigger than Goethe. I think so, but we’ll never know. We’ll never know what he might have written at age thirty. And that extends across the whole planet like a stain, an atrocious illness that in one way or another puts our habits in check, our most ingrained certainties.”
back alone, at night, to the scene of the crime, and not be afraid of ghosts.’
Detective stories, and provocative remarks, were always passions of Bolaño’s—he once declared James Ellroy among the best living writers in English—but his interest in gumshoe tales went beyond matters of plot and style. In their essence, detective stories are investigations into the motives and mechanics of violence, and Bolaño—who moved to Mexico the year of the 1968 Tlatelolco massacre and said he was briefly imprisoned during the 1973 military coup in his native Chile—was also obsessed with such
matters. The great subject of his oeuvre is the relationship between art and infamy, craft and crime, the writer and the totalitarian state.
In fact, all of Bolaño’s mature novels scrutinize how writers react to repressive regimes. Distant Star (1996) grapples with Chile’s history of death squads and desaparecidos by conjuring up a poet turned serial killer. The Savage Detectives (1998) exalts a gang of young poets who joust against state-funded writers during the years of Mexico’s dirty wars. Amulet (1999) revolves around a middle-aged poet who survives the government’s 1968 invasion of the Autonomous University of Mexico by hiding in a bathroom. By Night in Chile (2000) depicts a literary salon where writers party in the same house in which dissidents are tortured. And Bolaño’s final, posthumous novel, 2666, is also spun from ghastly news: the murder, since 1993, of more than 430 women and girls in the Mexican state of Chihuahua, particularly in Ciudad Juárez.”
“Bolaño was forty-three when he sent this missive, and as near to failure as he’d ever been. Though he’d published two books of poetry, co-written a novel and spent five years entering short story contests all over Spain, he was so broke that he couldn’t afford a
telephone line, and his work was almost entirely unknown. Three years earlier, he and his wife had separated; around the same time he was diagnosed with the liver disease that would kill him eight years later. Though Bolaño won many of the short story contests he entered, his novels were routinely rejected by publishers. Yet late in 1995 he would begin an astonishing rise.
The turning point was a meeting with Jorge Herralde, the founder and director of the publishing house Editorial Anagrama. Though Herralde couldn’t buy Nazi Literature in the Americas—it was snapped up by Seix Barral—he invited Bolaño to visit him in Barcelona. There Bolaño told him about his cash problems and the desperation he felt over the many rejections he’d received. ‘I told him that … I’d love to read his other manuscripts, and shortly afterward he brought me Distant Star (later I
found out that it had also been rejected by other publishing houses, including Seix Barral),’ the editor recalls in an essay. Herralde, however, found the book extraordinary. Thereafter, he published all of Bolaño’s fiction: nine books in seven years.”
“2666, like all of Bolaño’s work, is a graveyard. In his 1998 acceptance speech for the Rómulo Gallego’s Prize, Bolaño revealed that in some way everything he wrote was ‘a letter of love or of goodbye’ to the young people who died in the dirty wars of Latin America. His previous novels memorialized the dead of the 1960s and ’70s. His ambitions for 2666 were greater: to write a postmortem for the dead of the past, the present and the future.”
“The truth is, I don’t believe all that much in writing. Starting with my own. Being a writer is pleasant—no, pleasant isn’t the word—it’s an
activity that has its share of amusing moments, but I know of other things that are even more amusing, amusing in the same way that literature is for me. Holding up banks, for example. Or directing movies. Or being a gigolo. Or being a child again and playing on a more or less apocalyptic soccer team. Unfortunately, the child grows up, the bank robber is killed, the director runs out of money, the gigolo gets sick and then there’s no other choice but to write. For me, the word ‘writing’ is the exact opposite of the word ‘waiting.’ Instead of waiting, there is writing. Well, I’m probably wrong—it’s possible that writing is another form of waiting, of delaying things. I’d like to think otherwise. But, as I said, I’m probably wrong. As to my idea of a canon, I don’t know, it’s like everyone else’s—I’m almost
embarrassed to tell you, it’s so obvious: Francisco de Aldana, Jorge Manrique, Cervantes, the chroniclers of the Indies, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, Fray Servando Teresa de Mier, Pedro Henríquez Ureña, Rubén Darío, Alfonso Reyes, Borges, just to name a few and without going beyond the realm of the Spanish language. Of course, I’d love to claim a literary past, a tradition, a very brief one, made up of only two or three writers (and maybe one single book), a dazzling tradition prone to amnesia, but on the one hand, I’m much too modest about my work and on the other, I’ve read too much (and too many books have made me happy) to indulge in such a ridiculous notion.”
“EA: One of your characters says, ‘One has the moral obligation to be responsible for one’s actions and for one’s words but also for one’s silence.’
RB: One of my characters says that? It sounds so good it hardly seems written by me.
EA: Is that also fair to say about writers?
RB: No, for writers that isn’t fair, but without a doubt, in predetermined moments, yes. If I’m walking down the street and see a pedophile molesting a kid and I stop and silently stare, not only am I responsible for my silence but I am also a complete son of a bitch. However, there is a certain type of silence in which—
EA: Are there literary silences?
RB: Yes, there are literary silences. Kafka’s, for example, which is a silence that cannot be. When he asks that his papers be burned, Kafka is opting for
silence, opting for a literary silence, all in a literary era. That is to say, he was completely moral. Kafka’s literature, aside from being the best work, the highest literary work of the twentieth century, is of an extreme morality and of an extreme gentility, things that usually do not go together either.
EA: And what of Rulfo’s silence?
RB: Rulfo’s silence, I think, is obedient to something so quotidian that explaining it is a waste of time. There are several versions: One told by
Monterroso is that Rulfo had an uncle so-and-so who told him stories and when Rulfo was asked why he didn’t write anymore, his answer was that his uncle so-and-so had died. And I believe it too. Another explanation is simple and natural and it is that everything has an expiration date. For example I am much more worried about Rimbaudian silence than I am about Rulfian silence. Rulfo stopped writing because he had already written everything he wanted to write and because he sees himself incapable of writing anything better, he simply stops. Rimbaud would probably have been able to write something much better, which is to say bringing his words up even higher, but his is a silence that raises questions for Westerners. Rulfo’s silence doesn’t raise questions; it’s a close silence,
quotidian. After desert, what the hell are you going to eat? There is a third literary silence—one doesn’t seek it—of the shade which one is sure was there under the threshold and which has never been made tangible. There stands the silence of Georg Büchner for example. He died at twenty-five or twenty-four years of age, he leaves behind three or four stage plays, masterworks. One of them is Woyzeck, an absolute masterwork. Another is about the death of Danton, which is an enormous masterwork, not absolute but quite notable. The other two—one is called Leonce y Lena, I can’t remember the other one—are fundamentally important. All before he turned twenty-five. What might have happened had Büchner not died; what kind of writer might he have been? The kind of silence that isn’t sought out is the silence of … I do not dare call it destiny … a manifestation of impotence. The silence of death is the worst kind of silence, because Rulfian silence is
accepted and Rimbaudian silence is sought, but the silence of death is the one that cuts the edge off what could have been and never will be, that which we will never know. We’ll never know if Büchner would have been bigger than Goethe. I think so, but we’ll never know. We’ll never know what he might have written at age thirty. And that extends across the whole planet like a stain, an atrocious illness that in one way or another puts our habits in check, our most ingrained certainties.”
February 16, 2025
Useful but limited interview collection. Great for finding other books to read!
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