Celebrating José Saramago

  

Margaret Jull Costa's profile of José Saramago can be read "online only" at Granta. What caught my eye was her quote of Saramago in an interview, discussing the point where he realized a way to proceed more effectively with his storytelling, the very point of his transition to a "non-punctuated style".

I was already at the twentieth section of the book [Levantado do chão (Raised from the Ground)] and not very happy with it, when I realised how it could be written. I saw that I would only be able to write it if I did so as if I were actually telling the story. That could not be done by putting so-called oral language into writing, because that’s impossible, but by introducing into my writing a mechanism of apparent spontaneity, apparent digression and apparent disorganisation in the discourse. I say ‘apparent’ since I am only too aware of how much work it took to ensure that it turned out like that.

I underlined "apparent spontaneity ...". It described a realistic style which I find very absorbing, a style in which method is closely tied to content and form. It's the same spontaneous style one can also detect in César Aira and Javier Marías. Spontaneity in these writers can be a result of a desire for "authenticity" (I use this term loosely, as it has many pitfalls).

Margaret Jull Costa analyzed this writing style (which is closer to that of Marías whom she also translated):
 

In reducing punctuation down to commas and full stops, in letting a sentence follow the natural digressions of thought, Saramago cuts himself free from the straitjacket of conventional realistic literature, allowing himself, as narrator, to carry the reader along on the wave of those thought processes, those digressions. [...]

One cannot help but see this egalitarian approach to both punctuation and narration as an expression of Saramago’s declared anarcho-communism and atheism, as cocking a snook at orthodoxy and authority, be it God or Government, and as a way of privileging the spoken voice, the ordinary human voice. [...]

Read more here.




Image sources: Asymptote and The New York Times, from Small Memories; prae.hu

Cross-posted from Bifurcaria bifurcata.

Max's maxims

It’s always gratifying to learn something when one reads fiction. Dickens introduced it. The essay invaded the novel. But we should not perhaps trust ‘facts’ in fiction. It is, after all, an illusion.

It’s good to have undeclared, unrecognized pathologies and mental illnesses in your stories. The countryside is full of undeclared pathologies. Unlike in the urban setting, there, mental affliction goes unrecognized.

There has to be a libidinous delight in finding things and stuffing them in your pockets.

The collected maxims of W. G. Sebald can be found in the fifth issue of Five Dials, a magazine of his UK publisher Hamish Hamilton. The issue (at this link, in pdf) was mostly dedicated to Max. There's an "A to Z" guide on him where one reads, for instance, under "X":

Coincidence, the point where paths cross, is at the heart of Max’s writing – and the X at the end of his name always seemed emblematic to me. When I asked him once about the role of coincidence he said that whatever path he took in his writing he always, sooner or later, came across another path which led quickly back to some detail from his own life. He also said that the more one was attuned to look out for such things, the more frequently they occurred.

Five Dials is a recommended online literary resource. You can subscribe to the magazine here.



(via Vertigo)

November is German Literature Month

November is German Literature Month. Caroline of Beauty is a Sleeping Cat and Lizzy of Lizzy's Literary Life will host.

My reading list will include the novel Visitation by Jenny Erpenbeck, translated by Susan Bernofsky, and The Silent Angel by Heinrich Böll, translated by Breon Mitchell. Böll's posthumously published novel is also part of Caroline's "Literature and War Readalong 2011", slated for 26 November.

If there's still time, I might be able to squeeze in Anna Funder's Stasiland: Stories From Behind the Berlin Wall. The book was winner of the Samuel Johnson Prize for Non-fiction. I've already read a couple of chapters. Already, the beginning is quite compelling.

Giveaways abound in this reading challenge. In fact, I already won something wunderbar from last week. The prize: All the Lights by Clemens Meyer. I can't wait to receive that one.

German literature is something I really want to explore more of. Two of my all-time favorite writers wrote in this language – W. G. Sebald and Thomas Bernhard. Since I started blogging in 2009, I've reviewed a handful of translations from German. Here are the review links for reference.

Perfume by Patrick Süskind
Wittgenstein's Nephew and Yes by Thomas Bernhard 
The Rings of Saturn by W. G. Sebald
          Chapter I; Chapter II; Chapter III; Chapter IV
          Chapter V-VIII; Chapter IX; Chapter X        
On the Natural History of Destruction by W. G. Sebald
          Air War and Literature, 1; Air War and Literature, 2
          Against the Irreversible; The Remorse of the Heart
The Stalin Front by Gert Ledig
Journey Into the Past and Chess by Stefan Zweig
Austerlitz by W. G. Sebald

Test post

I'm having problem with my Blogger layout, here and in my other blog. The sidebar has moved to the bottom of the page. I'll try to work on it.

The Savage Detectives Group Read

For details, see Bifurcaria bifurcata and Caravana de recuerdos.

Just leave a comment to join.

Every book in the world is out there waiting to be read by me, says one Juan García Madero. A book is the best pillow there is, says Roberto Bolaño.

Richard of Caravana de recuerdos and I think one of these notable pillow books could be Bolaño's cult object Los detectives salvajes (The Savage Detectives, translated by Natasha Wimmer). We are hosting a group read of this novel in January 2012.

All are cordially invited – rebels, poets, bloggers, slackers. It's not poetry reading but it could have the same effect.

Savagery or previous experience as detective isn't required to participate. Nor is one expected to be a member of an avant-garde group like the visceral realists.

All one needs to do is sleep on the book and maybe join in on the discussion. Readers become "salvajes" in their own right.

Bloggers may post reviews and impressions anytime in January but "official" discussion starts on the last weekend of the month (Jan. 27-29). We'll link to your reviews.

About the book. At around 600 pages, it's a hefty pillow. We can't promise a wild poet chase, but wildness and unwieldiness shouldn't be in short supply. (Here's an excerpt.)

This early announcement should give readers plenty of headway. It's probably best to start early with the detective work. Or you can wait till All Souls Day, when our narrator began to write his adventures. Or the new year. It may turn out to be a firecracking yearstarter.

You can read this as part of the Bolaño Reading Challenge. It's supposed to end this year, but we'll count this toward your future Godzilla status.

"Detectives-Readers"

Richard, Caravana de recuerdos

mel u, The Reading Life

Amateur Reader (Tom), Wuthering Expectations

Emily, Evening All Afternoon

Scott, seraillon

Frances, Nonsuch Book

Stu, Winstonsdad's Blog

Anthony, Time's Flow Stemmed

Bettina, Liburuak
Gavin, Page247
Sarah, A Rat in the Book Pile 
Caroline, Beauty is a Sleeping Cat
Jeremy, READIN
Becky, Page Turners    
Séamus, Vapour Trails
Amy, The House of the Seven Tails
nicole, bibliographing
Bellezza, Dolce Bellezza
Sarah, what we have here is a failure to communicate
Col, Col Reads
Selena, luxe hours
Claire, kiss a cloud





 

(Image design by Jenny Volvovski)