Read 223 of 2021. Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas by Machado De Assis. Translated from the Portuguese by Margaret Jull Costa and Robin Patterson.

Title: Posthumous Memoirs of Brás Cubas Author: Machado De Assis
Translated from the Portuguese by Margaret Jull Costa and Robin Patterson
Publisher: Liveright
ISBN: 978-1324090502
Genre: Classics, Literary Fiction, Magic Realism
Pages: 256
Source: The Boxwalla
Rating: 5/5

A memoir that is being written from the grave. Quite a plot, I say! Also, the man is deplorable. So, as a reader you are kind of happy that he is dead and long gone. Yet, you have his “memoirs” with you. So, you read them and find them witty, real, ironical, and also giving some clarity to readers on how this sort of led the movement of modernist fiction.

This book is strange. But for those who have read Dozakhnama, it is quite alright to understand how things can be communicated from beyond the grave. Might I also say that this book was originally published in 1881, so yes, it is ground-breaking in that sense.

I loved Assis’s writing. The inequalities of the Brazilian society conveyed through the character of Brás Cubas is understandable and needed, but it does make you uncomfortable as a reader. The character has no self-awareness, he does what he pleases, he has zero regrets, is highly privileged, and to be honest reminded me of some men I know in the twenty-first century.

The writing is hilarious in most parts, and yet the profundity is not lost. The plot isn’t compelling. There is no story as such and yet you cannot help but turn the pages. The translation by Margaret Jull Costa and Robin Patterson is spot on – so much so that all the nuances came through, and yes there were italicized words and footnotes, but they added to the plot.

We learn about the man, the life he has lived, the (mis) adventures, and more, and somehow there were times I wanted to just fling the book across the book but also enjoyed it a lot that I didn’t. Brás Cubas is a simple man with extravagant need for attention and pleasures, and it somehow fits in – all of the nihilism and weird sense of debauchery and depravity.

March 2020 Wrap-Up

March has been a fantastic month. For me, personally. I have struggled with anxiety and calmed it. I have switched off from the news, and trying very hard to keep away from it on social media as well. I’m just made this way. On the reading front, I read 23 very different books and I am on top of the world. I feel ecstatic. Here’s hoping we all get out of this sane. Much love.
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Here are the titles with the ratings:
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1. Death in her Hands by Ottessa Moshfegh (4)
2. Fabulous by Lucy Hughes-Hallett (4)
3. And I do not forgive you: stories and other revenges by Amber Sparks (4)
4. Faces on the tip of my tongue by Emmanuelle Pagano. Translated from the French by Jennifer Higgins and Sophie Lewis (5)
5. The Seep by Chana Porter (5)
6. Fern Road by Angshu Dasgupta (3)
7. Apartment by Teddy Wayne (4)
8. The Enlightenment of the Greengage Tree by Shokoofeh Azar. Translated from the Persian (5)
9. Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line by Deepa Anappara (4)
10. A Thousand Ships by Natalie Haynes (4)
11. The Black Flamingo by Dean Atta (4)
12. Girl by Edna O’Brien (4)
13. A Burning by Megha Majumdar (3)
14. Amnesty by Aravind Adiga (3)
15. Tyll by Daniel Kehlmann. Translated from the German by Ross Benjamin (2)
16. Little Eyes by Samanta Schweblin. Translated from the Spanish by Megan McDowell (4)
17. Red Dog by Willem Anker. Translated from the Afrikaans by Michiel Heyns (2)
18. The Discomfort of Evening by Marieke Lucas Rijneveld. Translated from the Dutch by Michele Hutchinson (4)
19. The Other Name: Septology I-II by Jon Fosse. Translated from the French by Damion Searls (5)
20. The Memory Police by Yōko Ogawa. Translated from the Japanese by Stephen Snyder (5)
21. Hurricane Season by Fernanda Melchor. Translated from the Spanish by Sophie Hughes (4)
22. The Adventures of China Iron by Gabriela Cabezón Cámara. Translated from the Spanish by Fiona Mackintosh and Iona Macintyre (5)
23. Mac’s Problem by Enrique Vila-Matas. Translated from the Spanish by Margaret Jull Costa and Sophie Hughes (4).
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That’s it, folks! What was your reading month of March like? Any favourites?.
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Here’s to April 2020. Can’t wait.

And I Do Not Forgive You: Stories & Other Revenges by Amber Sparks

Title: And I Do Not Forgive You: Stories & Other Revenges
Author: Amber Sparks
Publisher: Liveright, W.W. Norton & Co.
ISBN: 978-1631496202
Genre: Short Stories, Magical Realism
Pages: 192
Source: Publisher
Rating: 4/5

Amber Sparks writes short fiction with such deft and empathy, that it manages to hit all the right spots for me. There is fantasy in her stories, grounded in reality of our lives that make us see lives of others, while always holding a reflection up to ours. This collection of 22 stories is strange, mesmerising, and often tend to go to dark places, which some readers may not be comfortable with. She reimagines myths and legends, folk tales, fairy tales, and sometimes even reimagines the world we inhabit.

Whether she is writing about a teenage girl befriending a ghost in her trailer park or about a princess who wants to run away from her father, the King who wants to marry her, she packs a punch almost most of the time. These stories are about women, for women, and written by a woman. These stories put them to the front and that’s what I loved the most about them. There is no “male perspective” and to me that is always refreshing.

The stories might come across as whimsical sometimes but they are extremely profound (I reread some and loved them even more). For instance, love as sacrifice in We Destroy the Moon – that speaks of  new prophet or demigod or leader at the end, implies that why can’t a woman be at the helm of things? What is then the definition of a woman? Is she a mere follower? Or could be a leader?

The relationships between characters in these stories take their time to develop, some even come to light right at the end and that’s perhaps the beauty of these stories. Nothing is expected. Nothing is the same. From husbands who grow wings, to lion tamers that get eaten, to moments of extraordinary happiness that spurt to life here and there, Spark’s stories are dangerous, on-the-edge, comforting (strangely), and dream of a world that is possible. A world of freedom.