Marie-Luise Scherer: a Discovery I Celebrate
Marie-Louise Scherer’s ‘The Beast of Paris and Other Stories’ blends true crime with other cultural themes, all told in a defiant and lyrical prose style.
Book Reviews
Book Reviews
Book Reviews
Byung-Chul Han, Fatigue and the Illusion of Freedom
A book that diagnoses a late modern society where the illusion of freedom and excessive positivity generate self-exploitation, depression, and a loss of contemplative capacity, without offering any refreshing alternatives.
Book Reviews
‘Labyrinth of Fortune’: An Architecture of Power
The poem represents one of the most systematic attempts in pre-Renaissance Castilian literature to construct a cultured poetic language, of Latin descent, suitable for allegorical and moralizing expression.
Book Reviews
‘The Leopard’ or a Certain Predilection
Despite initial rejection, this is a novel that endures as a masterful elegy to a lost world, whose narrative force continues to withstand the test of time and misreadings.
Book Reviews
Suzanne Jill Levine, ‘Unfaithful: a Translator’s Memoir’
The death of Vargas Llosa marks the end of the Latin American boom, while Suzanne Levine’s ‘Unfaithful’ recounts her key role in its translation and personal transformation.
Book Reviews
‘Hilarotragoedia’: Rhetoric of Descent
A book that marked the radical debut of Manganelli, who turned an allegorical descent into an exploration of language, with self-referential and philosophical prose that subverted traditional narrative.
Book Reviews
‘La invención de todas las cosas’: Much Ado about Nothing
A book that fails on every level: in its conception, composition, and structure, but also in the prose itself.
Book Reviews
German Beauties: About ‘Bestiario búlgaro’
A book of poems by Mario Arteca, notable for its poetic and artistic merit, as well as its profound reflection on social and political decline.
Book Reviews
Getting to the Truth through Pain
‘Boys in Zinc’ by Svetlana Alexievich: a book that explores the trauma of the war in Afghanistan through testimonies and the idea that truth cannot be achieved without going through pain.
Book Reviews
Avant-garde + Rearguard ≠ Complementarity
An analysis of contemporary art, proposing a rearguard where survival, the ephemeral, and technology redefine art and its ontology.