Vásquez, Parra, Sada (links)

At READIN, Juan Gabriel Vásquez's essay on the how and why of novel reading, translated by Jeremy.

At Ricardo Blanco's Blog, translations of Nicanor Parra's poetry by Richard Gwyn.

At the Paris Review Daily, a memorial to Daniel Sada by Francisco Goldman.

Premio Cervantes

Regarded as the Spanish-language Nobel Prize for Literature, the Cervantes Prize is named after the author of the Quixote. It is considered the highest recognition of Spanish and Latin American writers whose works have contributed significantly to enriching the Spanish-language literary heritage. The list of authors awarded since its first edition in 1975 is clear evidence of the significance of the Prize for Spanish culture.

The prize winner is decided by a jury at the end of the year. It is awarded by the King of Spain to the recipient every April 23rd, the anniversary of the death of Cervantes, in the auditorium of the University of Alcalá de Henares, birthplace of the writer.

The winners are listed below. Nicanor Parra, Bolaño's favorite Chilean poet, wins the prize this year.

WINNERS OF PREMIO CERVANTES

2011 Nicanor Parra (Chile)

2010 Ana María Matute (Spain)

2009 José Emilio Pacheco (Mexico)

2008 Juan Marsé (Spain)

2007 Juan Gelman (Argentina)

2006 Antonio Gamoneda (Spain)

2005 Sergio Pitol (Mexico)

2004 Rafael Sánchez Ferlosio (Spain)

2003 Gonzalo Rojas (Chile)

2002 José Jiménez Lozano (Spain)

2001 Álvaro Mutis (Colombia)

2000 Francisco Umbral (Spain)

1999 Jorge Edwards (Chile)

1998 José Hierro (Spain)

1997 Guillermo Cabrera Infante (Cuba)

1996 José García Nieto (Spain)

1995 Camilo José Cela (Spain)

1994 Mario Vargas Llosa (Peru)

1993 Miguel Delibes (Spain)

1992 Dulce María Loynaz (Cuba)

1991 Francisco Ayala (Spain)

1990 Adolfo Bioy Casares (Argentina)

1989 Augusto Roa Bastos (Paraguay)

1988 María Zambrano (Spain)

1987 Carlos Fuentes (Mexico)

1986 Antonio Buero Vallejo (Spain)

1985 Gonzalo Torrente Ballester (Spain)

1984 Ernesto Sábato (Argentina)

1983 Rafael Alberti (Spain)

1982 Luis Rosales (Spain)

1981 Octavio Paz (Mexico)

1980 Juan Carlos Onetti (Uruguay)

1979 Jorge Luis Borges (Argentina)
1979 Gerardo Diego (Spain)

1978 Dámaso Alonso (Spain)

1977 Alejo Carpentier (Cuba)

1976 Jorge Guillén (Spain)

Sources: Ministerio de Cultura; Wikipedia

What happened in Symphony Space, Nov. 2010

Back in November 2010, a live reading of Bolaño's stories was staged in New York. The program was called "Selected Shorts: Roberto Bolano and the Writers He Admired". The event was described as:

An evening of stories by the late Chilean master (The Savage Detectives, 2666) and writers who inspired him, including pieces by Javier Marías, Nicanor Parra, and Jorge Luis Borges. Bolaño is known for a particular noirish, atmospheric, dangerous, edgy, cool, engrossing style that immediately draws you in to a world of writers, policemen, prostitutes, politicians, militants, lovers and dreamers. Bolaño won the National Book Critics Circle Award for 2666. Performers include Michael Stuhlbarg (Boardwalk Empire and A Serious Man), Felix Solis, Ivan Hernandez (the Public Theater's concert staging of Paul Simon's The Capeman) and Charles Keating.

How did the evening go, one may ask. There was, amazingly, a great recap of the show.

It is possible to see the imprint of Bolaño most beloved writers on his novels and stories. The elements of his influence were certainly put to best display on Wednesday. Both Bolaño’s elements of mystery and comedy were visible in the poem and two stories that were chosen for the evening. In Marías’ “On the Honeymoon,” the narrator describes watching a woman walking down the street “adjusting the elastic on a recalcitrant pair of panties.” When later, she gestures up toward the balcony where he is sitting and screams, “You’re mine, or I’ll kill you!” it is easy to recall scenes from his oeuvre. I thought of the three academics in the first section of 2666, who, at first trivially arguing in a taxicab, end up assaulting their driver. We get a sense that, at any moment, the comic banal can descend into violence. In his story, Marías has created a world that is chilling and mesmerizing. The reader is made squirmishly uncomfortable, and yet feels completely at ease. Bolaño’s humorous meditations on writers and literature within his novels was also evidenced in the Parra’s poem “Something Like That,” when the speaker muses: “The true problem of philosophy is who does the dishes.” And in Borges’s “The Shape of the Sword,” a story of an Irishman’s betrayal by a friend who turns out to be the narrator himself, we see where Bolaño found his playfulness with form.

Read the full account here.