The Mookse and the Gripes discussion
This topic is about
Mac and His Problem
International Booker Prize
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2020 International Booker Longlist: Mac and His Problem
What a superstar translation team!! The person who has written most of any author of books I've read - I once totted up Jull Costa translation reads and it came to 30+ (and I once had the pleasure to tell her that to her face) and someone who is double long-listed this year after shortlisting last year.As for the author - I admire him more in theory than in practice - the intention of his novels is wonderful but none of the 4 previous books I've read has quite lived up to the premise. But always worth reading and looking forward to this.
I enjoyed this to some extent but thought it had some issues as well. I’ve written a short review of it on Goodreads.As for connections between the longlisted titles, I remember Vila-Matas’ narrator making reference to Schweblin in this novel.
Just a note that in the US this was published as "Mac's Problem" last year by New Directions, and as far as I've checked, not a lot of booksellers will notify you of this.
That’s right, a local bookshop was selling copies of the US edition and that’s how I ended up with one (and kept misspelling the UK title in my dynamic rankings).
The opening page features My Darling Clementine, the song that brought my fledging musical career to a close and pushed me into the world of mathematics and derivatives.I used to play folk guitar, singing with the music, buy my rendition of this was so bad my guitar teacher rang up my mother and told her she couldn't cope with teaching me anymore (at the time my mother rather softened the blow when telling me).
The memory of you murdering that song haunts me more than 40 years later.
I still sing it to get my children to sleep ...or rather to get them to go upstairs and hide in their bedrooms.
Still in a broad Norfolk accent?
Paul wrote: "The opening page features My Darling Clementine, the song that brought my fledging musical career to a close and pushed me into the world of mathematics and derivatives.I used to play folk guitar..."
Haha you're reminding me of what my grade 4 teacher said when I preformed Jingle Bells on a recorder.
Robert is a pupil who shows that he has a lot of potential in many subjects, However I assure you that in music (and gym) they will never be fulfilled.
If anyone has managed a good rendition of 'My Darling Clementine', I haven't heard it.
I flatter myself a little Val but let’s just say I continued my guitar lessons with the same teacher that sacked Paul.
Gumble's Yard wrote: "I flatter myself a little Val but let’s just say I continued my guitar lessons with the same teacher that sacked Paul."Can you sing My Darling Clementine without resolving into Deputy Dawg-esque twang? I can't. It seems to call for silliness in some deep part of my soul.
It sounds very different in a country accent.
I was going to say - huckleberry hound pulled it off nicely
You are thinking American country - I am thinking broad Norfolk.
Robert wrote: "I was going to say - huckleberry hound pulled it off nicely"I just knew it was some dog cartoon -- good memory!
We used to sing this in the car on road trips to annoy my dad in a broad American country accent. We also sank "Hark the herald angels sing" in our version of cockney (once in the middle of Trafalgar square on New Years, much to the chagrin of my parents. They threatened to leave us there forever - in the square.)
Ella wrote: "Robert wrote: "I was going to say - huckleberry hound pulled it off nicely"I just knew it was some dog cartoon -- good memory!
We used to sing this in the car on road trips to annoy my dad in a..."
haha thanks but I remember because my mother's name is Clementine and she used to get irritated every time Huckleberry Hound (or Daws Butler if you are a stickler for these things) would sing it and my sisters and I would just laugh.
We've commented a few times on the list on books that draw on other key books (particularly foundational myths). Here the key novel appears to be the author's own Una casa para siempre - has anyone read that? (not translated into English)
Paul wrote: "We've commented a few times on the list on books that draw on other key books (particularly foundational myths). Here the key novel appears to be the author's own [book:Una casa para siempre|179598..."I read it a very very long time ago while I was in someone's beach house, and sadly I remember more about the situation as I read than what I read. But I do recall it being pretty wild.
There is an interesting translation thing going on with epigraphs. The epigraph to the novel from Joe Brainard, in the English translation is I remember that I almost always went dressed as a hobo or a ghost. Once I went as a skeleton. But I think the English original, from The Collected Writings is actually I remember usually getting dressed up as a hobo or a ghost. One year I was a skeleton.
Very slightly different and one initially presumes a result of Vila-Matas taking the line from a Spanish translation and the translators translating it back. Although a little surprising for such superstar translators.
But now halfway through the book I think the translators may be playing a cheeky game.....
On page 134 (Uk edition) and as the narrator starts to rewrite the source text, he cites the epigraph from Bolaño’s Distant Star. He says Bolaño cites is as being from William Faulkner but “as far as I know, no one has yet been able to locate this line in Faulkner’s work.”And Vila-Matas himself, not just the narrator, thought that was the case.
The Bolaño version of the line is "¿Qué estrella cae sin que nadie la mire?” And Chris Andrews the English translator of Distant Star rendered it as “What star falls unseen?”
But the two English translators of this novel pointed out to the author that the line does appear in a Faulkner poem, from A Green Bough. And the English original is “What star is there that falls with none to watch it.?”
So in the English version they give the original Faulkner version of the line. And they also added the “as far as I know” qualification to make it the narrator’s mistake - the original I believe just stated no-one had found it.
Clever!!!! And it makes me suspect the epigraph “error” is deliberate.
Vila-Matas tells the story here (although English speakers will need their own translator!): http://www.enriquevilamatas.com/texto...
Mod
Have to disagree with his narrator though on this point:I’ve always had trouble being confronted by the sight of a person similar to me but not me—that is, the same idea contained in another body, someone identical to me and yet different.
that's called normal life isn't it? At least for me it's been like that since before I was born.
The way sentence structure works in Spanish is so different from English, especially when pronouns start coming in (not sure that was the case there...) Argh - It is hard to explain, but Spanish doesn't care as much as English about word order. It does care about other things that help make the meaning clear. I'd have to look at the originals and the translations to see what's going on.
But I very much like the idea that they were playing with the Faulkner line. Heh.
The epigraph in Vila-Matas’s Spanish original is“Me acuerdo de que casi siempre me vestía de vagabundo o de fantasma. Un año fui de esqueleto”
The Faulkner line was accidental and simply due to translation tennis. Bolaño did his own translation and people struggled to trace it back to an original. Vila-Matas thought it was unsourced but equally believed it must be somewhere as Bolaño, unlike Vila-Matas, didn’t invent epigraphs. The English translator of Distant Star presumably failed to find it.But the English language translators of this one solved it - or perhaps Google did since there is a Reddit thread. And then - this is my theory - they played a deliberate game with the epigraph to this book.
I collected this one from the library this morning, but haven't read much of it yet. (I would have missed the Next day:
I still haven't read all that much of it, although I have spent some time looking up literary references. It is only 211 pages and I would usually have finished a book of that length by now.
It must be time to go for a walk around the neighbo(u)rhood and see if I meet anyone I erroneously recognise.
Third book in (half-way through), and it's continuing this year's theme of nice but not amazing books with very little in the way of plot...
Mod
I finished yesterday. I think this has the potential to stand the test of time, but it was not a light read.
Tony wrote: "Really? I find this very light!"Keep reading.
No, just finished this, nothing really special; in fact, light is pretty much how I would describe this. I much preferred 'Dublinesque' (which we gave our Shadow IFFP prize to)...
I actually preferred this to Dublinesque - I thought that lent far to heavily on Joyce and didn’t add anything to the source. Wasn’t that up against Satantango as well that year?
As the novel progressed, my focus moved away from the literary references and more toward Mac’s increasingly unreliable narrative and his declining mental health, which was precarious from the start. I thought Vila-Matas did an excellent portrayal of gradual mental decline- but it was hard to read.
WndyJW wrote: "Hard to read because sad?"Hard to read because putting oneself in Mac’s place is unsettling.
Paul wrote: "I actually preferred this to Dublinesque - I thought that lent far to heavily on Joyce and didn’t add anything to the source. Wasn’t that up against Satantango as well that year?"Yes, it was a split decision in favour of 'Dublinesque' from our five judges (in the real prize, Krasznahorkai didn't even make the shortlist..).
I have to wonder if personal experience/ concerns doesn't play into how difficult this (and similar books) are for different readers. I worry constantly about mental decline, so I'm unsettled before I even start. I have some version of resident's syndrome that comes w/ getting older. We need a name for it.
Ella wrote: "I have to wonder if personal experience/ concerns doesn't play into how difficult this (and similar books) are for different readers. I worry constantly about mental decline, so I'm unsettled befor..."I hope you read it- I’d like to see your take on it.
I know in my case, that syndrome is “The pharmacist needs a vacation!”
This is one of the books I do want to read and it sounds like everyone liked it or at least didn’t disagree with it being Longlisted.
Mod
Hugh wrote: "I found this one hard work - partly because of the unreliable narrator, partly because of all of the literary references and partly because I felt the structure was a little too clever for its own ..."I liked it a little more than you did by the sounds of it, but I don't think it came off as well as it might have.
That all sounds discouraging. Though perhaps I don't need one more thing that makes me sure I'm losing my mind, at least not today.I am still going to read it, but not in time for prizes. Real life has taken over.
Struggling with this one and may give up if I don’t make good progress tonight. I’m super distracted anyway, plus frustrated that I’m not well read enough to get most of the literary references. Also think I have a bit of a book hangover from The Eighth Life, which IMO was more story than literary and held my attention so well. So I’ll plug away tonight and see how it goes, and if I DNF I’ll probably come back to it if it’s shortlisted.
this is my first vila-matas book and i’ve enjoyed my time in this scattered world, although it’s taken longer to read than expected. despite the sometimes too clever postmodern layering, i found this a much more enjoyable ride compared to rushdie’s similarly structured quichotte from last year’s booker list. any suggestions on which vila-matas to read next for a newbie?
Personally I liked Bartleby & Co best of those I have read.
The Mookse and the Gripes
Books mentioned in this topic
Una casa para siempre (other topics)Mac and His Problem (other topics)
Mac's Problem (other topics)
Mac and His Problem by Enrique Vila-Matas (Spanish – Spain), tr. Margaret Jull Costa & Sophie Hughes
Published in 2019, in the UK by Harvill Secker and in the US by New Directions.
US title: Mac's Problem
From the Booker Prize site:
https://thebookerprizes.com/books/mac...
Mac is not writing a novel. He is writing a diary, which no one will ever read. At over 60, and recently unemployed, Mac is a beginner, a novice, an apprentice – delighted by the themes of repetition and falsification, and humbly armed with an encyclopaedic knowledge of literature.
Mac's wife, Carmen, thinks he is simply wasting his time and in danger of sliding further into depression and idleness. But Mac persists, diligently recording his daily walks through the neighbourhood. It is the hottest summer Barcelona has seen in over a century.
Soon, despite his best intentions (not to write a novel), Mac begins to notice that life is exhibiting strange literary overtones and imitating fragments of plot. As he sizzles in the heatwave, he becomes ever more immersed in literature – a literature haunted by death, but alive with the sheer pleasure of writing.