Welcome to March, fellow visceral realists! This week’s reading is up to page 220 in the U.S. edition. For those reading other editions, it is through the end of Part 2, Chapter 5!
The spoiler discussion for this section starts now!
I hope everyone is having a great first weekend of March! I for one am always happy to get January and February behind me! While I am feeling a lot better this weekend than last, I am still playing a bit of catch up. But I will be all caught up soon. Like most of you, I find the pages slip by quickly, so it hasn’t ever felt like a chore to sit down and read. I just wasn’t reading anything for a handful of days!
I’m excited to hear what you all think of this new section!
This is my first time reading Savage Detectives and what I noticed was how much my I reacted to the change in structure from earlier section. I had been acclimating to what Bolano gave us in the first section, ordering my thoughts and expectations on what I read there and then the sudden shift to interviews, multiple perspectives, time jumps, and found myself feeling a big attention alert. One question provoked was why did Bolano give such an extended section in the earlier style and then switch it up? Also, despite the change in structure, there remained many similarities that did not change, like the underlying thread of humor. I have not answered my questions but reaffirm the biggest change for me was in my attention to the novel. All of a sudden the work seemed more important, more worthy of the time investment, of my scrutiny. If nothing more, it proved a great way to get this reader's attention.
I think that first section was there to give us an introduction to several of the themes and many of the characters (but certainly not all of them) in a format that's more "typical" especially for the time ("diary-style" storytelling seems pretty common in older literature, even in Latin America e.g. The Invention of Morel by Adolfo Bioy Casares) before moving onto something much more atypical. Much like how many Fantasy stories used to start you in the real world with an ordinary person before they discover a portal to another world.
It's interesting to think about for sure. Maybe Bolano has talked about it somewhere?
“Drink up, boys, drink up and don’t worry, if we finish this bottle we’ll go down and buy another one. Of course, it won’t be the same as the one we’ve got now, but it’ll still be better than nothing. Ah, what a shame they don’t make Los Suicidas mezcal anymore, what a shame that time pases, don’t you think? what a shame that we die, and get old, and everything good goes galloping away from us.”
I love Amadeo Salvatierra, he so jovial, sentimental, a master of mezcal, and just so fun to read. These sections ground us throughout and I get so excited when I see his name continuing his interview.
That one used to be my favorite quote too, on subsequent readings I ended up preferring one by Lupe near the end which I won't spoil. But it's amazing, I recently published a novel and sneaked in a reference to mezcal Los Suicidas because of that. The Amadeo Salvatierra nights anchor the second part and has this surreal thing where there is no way he can remember verbatim everything said years before on a drunken night, yet he quotes on and on and on.
< I posted the following as a response late in last week's thread, so don't think most people saw it, and it really applies to this week's reading - I'd love to hear if anyone else has thoughts on these two things. >
As I'm going through the next section, I've been wondering who it is interviewing these people - as they do seem like interviews, as they seem to be answering a prompt. And also interesting that we're still being kept at arm's length from Belano and Lima - we have lots of new POV, but none from them - or Garcia Madero for that matter.
I also did peek ahead (at least in the TOC) and notice that the interview snippets move way forward into the future from where we started (into the 1990s) but the last section appears to be GM's diary again, picking up just one day after we left him on New Year's Eve 1975. This makes me curious, but I haven't peeked at the actual text to figure out more - will wait to see how it all comes together!
I’m so curious as to who they’re all talking to. Is it always the same interviewer? Have we met them yet? Why are they so interested in Belano? (It seems to be the main prompt?)
You’re reading it in Spanish aren’t you? I was wondering if all the voices felt distinctive in Spanish? In English, I feel like they’re all melting into each other, apart from a couple, i think it’s the stream of consciousness style that makes me feel like they don’t differ enough. I don’t know if anyone feels the same?
It’s so peculiar that noone mentions GM, it’s like he never existed.
I can hear some distinctive voices in the Spanish, certainly Amadeo and Laura Jáuregui. But I don't notice it as strongly in others. Which ones seem most distinct to you?
Back when I was reading "The Savage Detectives" along with several other bloggers, we had a long and useful discussion of the issue of who was doing the interviewing.
On Week 3, I feel like I turned into that meme with the investigation board and all the red threads. Damn you Bolaño for lulling me into a false sense of security in part 1 -_-
Very interesting, if jarring transition into Part 2! It skips forward, yet we do go back, but not really, and also we're going back and forth and being thrown this way and that in the story of Mexican Poetry, Visceral Realism, and Lima and Belano.
In this new format, I almost picture as I'm reading a documentary. You know, the way that documentaries take multiple interviews from multiple people (sometimes at different times) and cut them up and splice them all together to form some sort of semi-cohesive narrative? Yeah, this strongly reminds me of that. Especially when you have sections like the beginning of chapter 3, when Manuel Maples Arce was talking about his one interaction with Belano and his cohort, being somewhat self-aggrandizing - then cut to Barbara Patterson, chewing him out in the most vulgar way possible. Funny as heck but also cinematic in a very specific way.
And this continues to be both funny and intriguing. Especially when you consider the idea of Bolano writing others "talking" about him(self), presumably. But who are the people interviewing all these folks connected to Bolano and Lima? Is it the titular but (for now?) nameless "Savage/Wild Detectives"? What happened in Sonora? Are we chasing Belano and Lima all the way to Europe? I'm eager to see how the narrative and themes shape. Even if I'm often hopelessly lost when it comes to history and poetry of the region.
Oh one other thing that stood out to me was that many speakers "talk" in a single continuous block, but occasionally we'll get some interviewees whose stories are presented in proper paragraphs. I haven't quite found the rhyme or reason yet but I can tell it's a conscious choice... maybe to impart some kind of distinct feeling of how different people speak (e.g. stream of consciousness type of storyteller vs. someone who's very eloquent and precise).
Always thought of the titular “Savage Detectives” as Belano and Ulises and their investigation and search of Cesarea Tinajero, but as you point it’s also referring to the savage detectives investigating Belano and Ulises.
I agree it’s exactly like that kind of documentary. I love how one person will call Belano a creep and the next will compare him to a Greek god. We get all the different perspectives of Belano and Lima and the events.
I have some translation questions! Did they manage to translate the pun with Auxilio's name, where Belano would call 'Socorro!' up to her window (both Auxilio and Socorro mean 'help')?
And how did they translate 'manicomio' - where poor Quim ends up? I was pondering the options, and was thinking 'sanitarium' was likely best for the shade of meaning that implied, but wondered if they went with 'mental hospital' (more standard/proper) or 'looney bin' (more slang/derogatory) or something else...
What do you think is going on with Quim? When we first were introduced to him, Pancho told GM that he was crazy, but then he didn't really seem crazy when we saw more of him, just kind of quirky/eccentric. But then he ends up in a mental hospital - his first entry still seems fairly lucid, but then in the second he starts going on about Laura Damián, does her death have something to do with his mental state, and if so why did it affect him so much?
Quim may just be highly eccentric but I think he has seemed to always be on the verge of going “crazy”. Maybe something finally tipped him like his Impala not being returned or maybe his wife leaves him. But yes I think a key to his madness is Laura Damian. He has daughters of his own so I can see it really affecting him.
Hm, in the *title* of Quim's parts it's called the Spanish equivalent of Mental Health Clinic (Clínica de Salud Mental), but in the text it's usually manicomio - does the translation not differentiate? Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, 'asylum' might be an even better English equivalent than 'sanitarium' - for some reason I'd blanked on that one.
For example in this line in the most recent of his we've gotten to: 'mi habitación ya no es el rostro de Laura Damián sino una habitación de un manicomio moderno' - roughly - 'my room is no longer the face of Laura Damian but a room in a modern asylum'.
Or when María first talks about having to put him in there 'A mi padre lo tuvimos que internar en un maniciomo (mi madre me corrige y dice: clínca psiquiatrica, pero hay palabras que no necisitan ningún barniz: un manicomo es un manicomio) - roughly - 'We had to put my father in an asylum (my mother corrects me and says: a psychriactric clinic, but there are words that don't need any varnish: an asylum is an asylum)'
The latter example is especially where I was wondering if they might go with 'looney bin' or 'nut house' - or how it was they were translating 'manicomio' as different from the more socially acceptable terms.
Oh yes Quim calls it “a modern asylum”. I also just rediscovered this line “And yet I was mad, driven mad by them, my daughters, by Laura Damian, and so they didn’t listen”.
Here are the weekly reading threads. I'll update this as they go up.
-Preliminary Thread: https://mookse.substack.com/p/the-savage-detectives-preliminary/comments
-Week 1: https://mookse.substack.com/p/week-1-the-savage-detectives-readalong/comments
-Week 2: https://mookse.substack.com/p/week-2-the-savage-detectives-readalong/comments
-Week 3: https://mookse.substack.com/p/week-3-the-savage-detectives-readalong/comments
-Week 4: https://mookse.substack.com/p/week-4-the-savage-detectives-readalong/comments
I hope everyone is having a great first weekend of March! I for one am always happy to get January and February behind me! While I am feeling a lot better this weekend than last, I am still playing a bit of catch up. But I will be all caught up soon. Like most of you, I find the pages slip by quickly, so it hasn’t ever felt like a chore to sit down and read. I just wasn’t reading anything for a handful of days!
I’m excited to hear what you all think of this new section!
This is my first time reading Savage Detectives and what I noticed was how much my I reacted to the change in structure from earlier section. I had been acclimating to what Bolano gave us in the first section, ordering my thoughts and expectations on what I read there and then the sudden shift to interviews, multiple perspectives, time jumps, and found myself feeling a big attention alert. One question provoked was why did Bolano give such an extended section in the earlier style and then switch it up? Also, despite the change in structure, there remained many similarities that did not change, like the underlying thread of humor. I have not answered my questions but reaffirm the biggest change for me was in my attention to the novel. All of a sudden the work seemed more important, more worthy of the time investment, of my scrutiny. If nothing more, it proved a great way to get this reader's attention.
I think that first section was there to give us an introduction to several of the themes and many of the characters (but certainly not all of them) in a format that's more "typical" especially for the time ("diary-style" storytelling seems pretty common in older literature, even in Latin America e.g. The Invention of Morel by Adolfo Bioy Casares) before moving onto something much more atypical. Much like how many Fantasy stories used to start you in the real world with an ordinary person before they discover a portal to another world.
It's interesting to think about for sure. Maybe Bolano has talked about it somewhere?
My favorite quote from this book:
“Drink up, boys, drink up and don’t worry, if we finish this bottle we’ll go down and buy another one. Of course, it won’t be the same as the one we’ve got now, but it’ll still be better than nothing. Ah, what a shame they don’t make Los Suicidas mezcal anymore, what a shame that time pases, don’t you think? what a shame that we die, and get old, and everything good goes galloping away from us.”
I love Amadeo Salvatierra, he so jovial, sentimental, a master of mezcal, and just so fun to read. These sections ground us throughout and I get so excited when I see his name continuing his interview.
That one used to be my favorite quote too, on subsequent readings I ended up preferring one by Lupe near the end which I won't spoil. But it's amazing, I recently published a novel and sneaked in a reference to mezcal Los Suicidas because of that. The Amadeo Salvatierra nights anchor the second part and has this surreal thing where there is no way he can remember verbatim everything said years before on a drunken night, yet he quotes on and on and on.
Haha that’s great, I remember searching online to see if there really ever was a mezcal called Los Suicidas. So true about Amadeo, I love it.
< I posted the following as a response late in last week's thread, so don't think most people saw it, and it really applies to this week's reading - I'd love to hear if anyone else has thoughts on these two things. >
As I'm going through the next section, I've been wondering who it is interviewing these people - as they do seem like interviews, as they seem to be answering a prompt. And also interesting that we're still being kept at arm's length from Belano and Lima - we have lots of new POV, but none from them - or Garcia Madero for that matter.
I also did peek ahead (at least in the TOC) and notice that the interview snippets move way forward into the future from where we started (into the 1990s) but the last section appears to be GM's diary again, picking up just one day after we left him on New Year's Eve 1975. This makes me curious, but I haven't peeked at the actual text to figure out more - will wait to see how it all comes together!
I’m so curious as to who they’re all talking to. Is it always the same interviewer? Have we met them yet? Why are they so interested in Belano? (It seems to be the main prompt?)
You’re reading it in Spanish aren’t you? I was wondering if all the voices felt distinctive in Spanish? In English, I feel like they’re all melting into each other, apart from a couple, i think it’s the stream of consciousness style that makes me feel like they don’t differ enough. I don’t know if anyone feels the same?
It’s so peculiar that noone mentions GM, it’s like he never existed.
I do feel the same about the voices! I found this section harder to read and you've just articulated why for me.
I can hear some distinctive voices in the Spanish, certainly Amadeo and Laura Jáuregui. But I don't notice it as strongly in others. Which ones seem most distinct to you?
Back when I was reading "The Savage Detectives" along with several other bloggers, we had a long and useful discussion of the issue of who was doing the interviewing.
Please see here, especially the comments:
https://wutheringexpectations.blogspot.com/2012/01/still-my-story-wont-be-as-coherent-as.html
That is the first of five posts. Many curious things in those posts, and in the comments.
I think this may need a spoiler alert. Thank you for sharing, will come back to this when i finish the book, sounds like a fascinating discussion.
On Week 3, I feel like I turned into that meme with the investigation board and all the red threads. Damn you Bolaño for lulling me into a false sense of security in part 1 -_-
Very interesting, if jarring transition into Part 2! It skips forward, yet we do go back, but not really, and also we're going back and forth and being thrown this way and that in the story of Mexican Poetry, Visceral Realism, and Lima and Belano.
In this new format, I almost picture as I'm reading a documentary. You know, the way that documentaries take multiple interviews from multiple people (sometimes at different times) and cut them up and splice them all together to form some sort of semi-cohesive narrative? Yeah, this strongly reminds me of that. Especially when you have sections like the beginning of chapter 3, when Manuel Maples Arce was talking about his one interaction with Belano and his cohort, being somewhat self-aggrandizing - then cut to Barbara Patterson, chewing him out in the most vulgar way possible. Funny as heck but also cinematic in a very specific way.
And this continues to be both funny and intriguing. Especially when you consider the idea of Bolano writing others "talking" about him(self), presumably. But who are the people interviewing all these folks connected to Bolano and Lima? Is it the titular but (for now?) nameless "Savage/Wild Detectives"? What happened in Sonora? Are we chasing Belano and Lima all the way to Europe? I'm eager to see how the narrative and themes shape. Even if I'm often hopelessly lost when it comes to history and poetry of the region.
Oh one other thing that stood out to me was that many speakers "talk" in a single continuous block, but occasionally we'll get some interviewees whose stories are presented in proper paragraphs. I haven't quite found the rhyme or reason yet but I can tell it's a conscious choice... maybe to impart some kind of distinct feeling of how different people speak (e.g. stream of consciousness type of storyteller vs. someone who's very eloquent and precise).
Always thought of the titular “Savage Detectives” as Belano and Ulises and their investigation and search of Cesarea Tinajero, but as you point it’s also referring to the savage detectives investigating Belano and Ulises.
I agree it’s exactly like that kind of documentary. I love how one person will call Belano a creep and the next will compare him to a Greek god. We get all the different perspectives of Belano and Lima and the events.
I have some translation questions! Did they manage to translate the pun with Auxilio's name, where Belano would call 'Socorro!' up to her window (both Auxilio and Socorro mean 'help')?
And how did they translate 'manicomio' - where poor Quim ends up? I was pondering the options, and was thinking 'sanitarium' was likely best for the shade of meaning that implied, but wondered if they went with 'mental hospital' (more standard/proper) or 'looney bin' (more slang/derogatory) or something else...
What do you think is going on with Quim? When we first were introduced to him, Pancho told GM that he was crazy, but then he didn't really seem crazy when we saw more of him, just kind of quirky/eccentric. But then he ends up in a mental hospital - his first entry still seems fairly lucid, but then in the second he starts going on about Laura Damián, does her death have something to do with his mental state, and if so why did it affect him so much?
It is translated as a Mental Health Clinic.
Quim may just be highly eccentric but I think he has seemed to always be on the verge of going “crazy”. Maybe something finally tipped him like his Impala not being returned or maybe his wife leaves him. But yes I think a key to his madness is Laura Damian. He has daughters of his own so I can see it really affecting him.
Hm, in the *title* of Quim's parts it's called the Spanish equivalent of Mental Health Clinic (Clínica de Salud Mental), but in the text it's usually manicomio - does the translation not differentiate? Actually, now that I'm thinking about it, 'asylum' might be an even better English equivalent than 'sanitarium' - for some reason I'd blanked on that one.
For example in this line in the most recent of his we've gotten to: 'mi habitación ya no es el rostro de Laura Damián sino una habitación de un manicomio moderno' - roughly - 'my room is no longer the face of Laura Damian but a room in a modern asylum'.
Or when María first talks about having to put him in there 'A mi padre lo tuvimos que internar en un maniciomo (mi madre me corrige y dice: clínca psiquiatrica, pero hay palabras que no necisitan ningún barniz: un manicomo es un manicomio) - roughly - 'We had to put my father in an asylum (my mother corrects me and says: a psychriactric clinic, but there are words that don't need any varnish: an asylum is an asylum)'
The latter example is especially where I was wondering if they might go with 'looney bin' or 'nut house' - or how it was they were translating 'manicomio' as different from the more socially acceptable terms.
Oh yes Quim calls it “a modern asylum”. I also just rediscovered this line “And yet I was mad, driven mad by them, my daughters, by Laura Damian, and so they didn’t listen”.