Product Description

Ernest Hemingway once said that a good story was like an iceberg; what is visible is always smaller than the part that remains hidden beneath the water, which confers intensity, mystery, power and meaning on what floats on the surface. This is certainly true of the fourteen stories here, the first collection by the universally acclaimed Chilean author to be published in English. Imbued with 'the melancholy folklore of exile', as Roberto Bolano once put it, and set largely in the world of the Chilean diaspora in Central America and Europe, the narrators of these stories are usually writers grappling with private quests (Bolano's beloved 'failed generation'), who typically speak in the first person, as if giving a deposition, like witnesses to a crime. They are characters living in the margins, on the edge, in constant flight from nightmarish threats.In 'Sensini' an elderly South American writer instructs another younger writer, also living in exile, in the subterfuges of entering work for provincial literary prizes. The title story tells of a journey to Acapulco that gradually becomes a descent into the underworld. 'Dance Card' provides the reader with sixty-nine reasons not to dance with Pablo Neruda. And the story 'Mauricio ("The Eye") Silva' opens with the following sentence: 'Mauricio Silva, also known as The Eye, always tried to avoid violence, even at the risk of being considered a coward, but violence, real violence, is unavoidable, at least for those of us who were born in Latin America during the fifties and were about twenty years old at the time of Salvador Allende's death.'

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #32874 in Books
• Published on: 2008-04-03
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 288 pages

Amazon.co.uk Review
Haunting, unsettling, evocative, Roberto Bolanã's Last Evenings on Earth is a remarkable book, and as the first of celebrated Chilean author's work to be translated into English (by Chris Andrews), it's the perfect introduction to the man who Susan Sontag called 'the most influential and admired novelist of his generation in the Spanish-speaking world'.

The protagonists have one thing in common in these stories: often on the fringes of society, they are engaged in difficult, challenging quests, their lives frequently on the line. And when they find what they are seeking, those lives are often changed irrevocably – and forever. The bleak undercurrent of life in Pinochet's regime is the background here, but the narratives of the stories contain a whole universe. In the title tale, the central character pursues – rather desperately – a hedonistic, erotically-charged lifestyle on a holiday in Acapulco. The pleasures of the flesh do not offer the relief he seeks, and he finds consolation in the work of a surrealist poet who died during the Nazi regime, possibly at his own hand. Many of the Bolanã's favourite themes are brilliantly worked out here, in prose that leaps off the page. The other stories glitter with same coruscating brilliance – and despite the recurrence of such dark themes as suicide – this is not at all depressing fare: in fact, reading Last Evenings on Earth is a positively life-enhancing experience.

There should be a warning on the jacket of the book, however, reading Roberto Bolanã has a curious side-effect: you will find yourself proselytising on his behalf to anyone who will listen (and to some who won't). Bolanã's writing is addictive – and it has that effect on the reader. --Barry Forshaw

Observer
`a remarkable melancholy pleasure... elegant, unornamented writing'

The Daily Mail
`these are near-perfect short stories that reminded me why this form can be such a pure, clever, sly and unexpected delight'

Customer Reviews

Unusual, subtle, ultimately rewarding collection
One of those books, I suspect, which you either abandon in the first four pages, or add to your personal list of special books. Very different to the tradition of English story-writing, these accounts manage a strange mixture of distance and intimacy. The characters are often identified only by letters, 'A' or 'B', the narrator often seems a detatched observer, even when recounting their own past life, yet the details of events and emotions recounted draw one in and allow you to engage with and care about the characters. There is generally no plot twist at the end, in fact, often no very obvious plot at all, but I found this collection engaging, interesting and memorable. I'd recommend giving it a try to see if it works for you. I'm now going to try something else by Roberto Bolano.

Spellbinding
You are probably like me and came to reading the late Roberto Bolano through the fantastic The Savage Detectives (now in paperback). I hadn't read this book before until the local reading group had it down to read. Firstly, I must admit that once I had finished it I started it all over again, it is that good.

This book contains 14 short stories, which are all haunting in their own ways. Bolano seems to specialise in what can only be termed as the dispossessed. All the stories deal with people on the fringes of normal society. With stories like the first one, Sensini where two writers enter short story competitions to try to make some money Bolano has also provided us with tales that are semi-autobiographical. The Grub looks at how we see the same people day to day, for instance if you commute into work and stand next to the same person at the station; what would you find out about them if you struck up a friendship with them?

My two favourite tales are Anne Moore's Life in which our narrator tells us about Anne Moore from what he has heard from her; this tale and Mauricio 'The Eye' Silva are both absolutely mesmerising. The latter tale is about a photographer on assignment in India, which should only last a week or so. Silva instead spends about eighteen months in the country after he finds out about a religious sect where young boys are castrated, in the end leaving them only fit to become gay prostitutes. Silva helps two of these boys escape and starts up a life with them. Indeed this tale is reminiscent of Conrad and you could imagine him writing something like it. There are definite shades of Conrad and the great Russian short story writers throughout this collection which makes me wonder if he had read any of them (he was a prolific reader). All in all then this is a great collection of short stories by the leading writer of his generation and is a real feast for those who love to read.

Last Evenings on Earth
Tough going to start with, however no-one could dispute that each story is beautifully crafted. Mediocrity and benality leave you with an uncomfortable sense of futility.