Cuentos de este siglo: Treinta narradoras espanolas contemporaneas.
Gerling, David Ross
In 1993 Angeles Encinar and Anthony Percival (see WLT 68:4, p. 788)
edited the short-story collection Cuento espanol contemporaneo.
Encinar's new collection differs in that the story writers
represented span the entire twentieth century and all are women.
The veteran author Rosa Chacel opens the collection with the
prose-poem story "Ofrenda a una virgen loca," about a bag lady
on the mean streets of Buenos Aires. "El viaje," Maria Teresa
Leon's poetic account of exile, has echoes of Aleixandre. Mercedes
Rodoreda superbly utilizes the classical short-story elements of
crescendo and surprise ending in the Kafkaesque tale "El rio y la
barca." A magnificent surprise ending signals Carmen Kurtz's
"Vino de lejos" as one of the jewels of the collection. With a
shock ending in "El engano," Mercedes Salisachs reverses the
traditional victimizer/victim relationship. And a delicate portrayal of
the loss of innocence and life suffuses Elena Soriano's story
"Las bachas."
Carmen Laforet captures the sordid final years of a divorced and
homeless actress in "Rosamunda." Carmen Martin Gaite's
wordplay in "Retirada" produces a devastating satire of the
Franco regime. Wicked humor distinguishes Ana Maria Matute's
"Muy contento" as one of the volume's finest selections.
"El juez" is Josefina Aldecoa's caustic treatment of
divorce from the perspective of a child. "La otra bestia" by
Concha Alos is a crescendo-filled account of a woman going mad, and
"Recuerdo de Safo" by Esther Tusquets is Platero y yo
rewritten by Mel Brooks.
A woman and a gay man's amour impossible becomes "Te sin
azucar" by Ana Maria Navales. Elena Santiago's "Paca,
mujer . . ." is a brooding monologue that ends in suicide. A woman
survives macho culture in Marina Mayoral's epistolary and heartfelt
"Querida amiga." The inexorableness of aging is the subject of
"El inmortal" by Lourdes Ortiz, while we enter the twilight
zone of schizophrenia in "Ausencia" by Cristina Fernandez
Cubas. Montserrat Roig creates an ingenious icthyological-political
parallel in her Spanish Republic memoir "Madre, no entiendo a los
salmones."
Ana Maria Moix's secret narrator explodes the ending of the
neodecadent tale "El color del deseo." "El jardin de la
senora Mussorgsky" is a powerful metaphor of the unfairness of
life, and thinly veiled eroticism permeates Carme Riera's story
"La dame a la licorne." Rosa Montero uncovers the quiet
desperation of 1990s yuppie love in her stellar "Parece tan
dulce." Mercedes Soriano juggles hope lost and regained in her
delightful urban love story "Viernes trafico," while Monty
Python humor fills "Las cosas de palacio" by Pilar Pedraza.
Mysterious Galicia is the setting for Pilar Cibreiro's
impressionistic anecdote "Dias de lluvia." The Narcissus myth
intertwined with carnaval enters into "La fiesta pasa" by
Paloma Diaz Mas. Laura Freixas's expose of our fascination with
death informs the clever tale "El asesino en la muneca." A
hideous climax underscores Mercedes Abad's excellent slasher story
"Una bonita combinacion." Cocaine addiction and unresolved
childhood trauma combine in Beatriz Pottecher's "Vete como se
va mi cuerpo." Closing the collection, "En desierta
playa" is Belen Gopegui's cryptic monologue by a manic
obsessive.
The variety of stories and current bibliography make Cuentos de este
siglo an ideal text for a seminar.
David Ross Gerling Sam Houston State University
