| Title | : | El llano en llamas |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 9500718030 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9789500718035 |
| Language | : | Spanish; Castilian |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 210 |
| Publication | : | First published September 18, 1953 |
| Awards | : | Republic of Consciousness Prize Longlist (2020) |
El llano en llamas Reviews
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El primer libro que leí en este 2018 es precisamente una relectura. Hacía ya un tiempo que quería volver a surcar las páginas de “El llano en llamas”, el primer libro que escribió Juan Rulfo, ese genio indiscutido que nos dio México y que consta de diecisiete relatos cortos, profundos, vívidos y fuertes.
Rulfo toma para estos relatos como puntos de referencia los lugares que lo vieron nacer así también como otros pueblos mexicanos como Sayula, su pueblo natal San Gabriel y Talpa, entre otros.
Dentro de ese contexto, Rulfo teje historias difíciles que viven personajes cuya vida lo es aún más y naturaleza de todos estos cuentos gira alrededor de los mismos temas: la miseria, la muerte, la violencia, la injusticia y la esperanza trunca.
Con total maestría el gran autor mexicano relata las dificultades en la que nos deja olvido, y el doloroso desarraigo, el sostenido desasosiego de la existencia sufrida de esos personajes tan atormentados y sumidos en la peor de las miserias.
Tan solo poseen su mera existencia y nada más. Todo lo demás es inalcanzable, imposible.
La rudeza de la vida rural se verá reflejada en cuentos como “Nos han dado la tierra”, “La cuesta de las comadres”, “Es que somos muy pobres”, “Talpa”, “Luvina” (para Gabriel García Márquez, quien, hechizado por la escritura de Rulfo dijo que era "uno de los más hermosos cuentos jamás escritos"), “En la madrugada” o “El día del derrumbe”.
Hay otros cuentos que se ubican históricamente durante la época de la revolución mexicana de 1910 como “El llano en llamas”, “El hombre”, “¡Diles que no me maten!”, “Acuérdate” y “Paso del Norte” y en otros casos se narran situaciones desde la óptica ingenua y sencilla del campesino, sin tapujos ni lenguaje enrevesado sino más bien todo lo contrario, como en los cuentos “La noche en que lo dejaron solo”, “La herencia de Matilde Arcángel”, “Anacleto Morones” o “Macario”.
En resumidas cuentas, si algo prevalece en la literatura de Rulfo es esa sencillez que al mismo tiempo es tan humilde como deslumbrante.
No importa si el cuento se narra en primera o tercera persona. En ningún momento el lenguaje desentona ni es difícil de comprender, ni siquiera durante los diálogos, que poseen esa particularidad de los modismos de los campesinos.
“El llano en llamas” es pequeño gran libro, que se lee despacio, como las situaciones que viven los personajes, que se disfruta mucho y, aunque a veces nos dejen un sabor amargo nos quedamos pensando en cómo hizo Rulfo para cautivarnos con un lenguaje tan sencillo y minimalista que a la vez es tan efectivo y convincente. Juan Rulfo sigue siendo uno de los autores que más admiro y quiero.
Me ha hechizado de la misma manera que estos cuentos y es un embrujo del que no quiero salir nunca, por eso, voy a comenzar a leer “El gallo de oro”, esa última novela que escribió antes de dejar de escribir para siempre para pasar a perdurar eternamente entre los escritores más grandes de todos los tiempos, aunque muchos no lo crean así. -
Solo unas pocas palabras para recomendar este ramillete de buenos relatos.
Encontrando mejor su famosa novela “Pedro Páramo”, a los que les gustó esta, disfrutarán también de estos cuentos: mismos temas, mismo paisaje, misma desolación, misma poesía en la descripción y exposición de todo ello y... sorpresa, mucho humor en estos llanos, bien en forma de gotas amargas -como se pueden encontrar también en la novela- bien, como en al menos tres de los cuentos, de una forma absolutamente descarada.
En fin, tanto a los que ya leyeron la novela y todavía no se han acercado a sus cuentos como a los que aun no conocen a Rulfo solo puedo pedirles que lo remedien inmediatamente. -
An outstanding collection of snippets, ever-literary and uniquely blissfully Mexican. These stories are timeless. And it is precisely that quality, that of timelessness, which best describes the setting which pervades throughout these incendiary vignettes. The best are short enough to be parables--"We're Very Poor" (heart-wrenching), "The burning plain" (epic--aka where Cormack McCarthy got his prose) & "Anacleto Morones" (the anti "8 1/2") were my favorites. The leitmotifs are beautiful and meaningful--they are exceptional in many respects. Like strong, strenuous gulps of mescal from different times & areas, each one represents a reality that is harrowing & pinpoint specific to Mexico-- "el llano en llamas"...it still burns!
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El llano en llamas = The Burning Plain and Other Stories, Juan Rulfo
The Burning Plain and Other Stories is a collection of short stories written in Spanish by Mexican author Juan Rulfo and first published in 1953.
Stories:
1 Macario = (Macario)
2 Nos han dado la tierra (They gave us the land)
3 La cuesta de las comadres (The Hill of the Mothers-in-law)
4 Es que somos muy pobres (We're just very poor)
5 El hombre (The man)
6 En la madrugada (At daybreak)
7 Talpa (Talpa)
8 El llano en llamas (The burning Plain)
9 ¡Diles que no me maten! (Tell them not to kill me!)
10 Luvina (Luvina)
11 La noche que lo dejaron solo (The night they left him alone)
12 Acuérdate (Remember)
13 ¿No oyes ladrar los perros? (Can't you hear the dogs barking?)
14 Paso del Norte (North Pass)
15 Anacleto Morones (Anacleto Morones)
16 La herencia de Matilde Arcángel (The Legacy of Matilde Arcángel)
17 El día del derrumbe (The Day of the Collapse)
تاریخ نخستین خوانش روز پانزدهم ماه ژوئن سال 2006میلادی
عنوان: دشت مشوش؛ نویسنده: خوان رولفو؛ مترجم فرشته مولوی؛ تهران، نشر گردون، 1369؛ در 158ص؛ موضوع داستانهای کوتاه از نویسندگان مکزیک - سده 20م
عنوان: دشت سوزان؛ نویسنده: خوان رولفو؛ مترجم فرشته مولوی؛ تهران، نشر ققنوس، 1384؛ در 168ص؛ شابک 9789643116231؛ چاپ دوم 1389؛ چاپ سوم 1396؛ موضوع داستانهای کوتاه از نویسندگان مکزیک - سده 20م
فهرست داستانها: «ماکاریو»؛ «عاقبت زمیندار شدیم»؛ «تپه کومادرس»؛ «بس که آس و پاسیم!»؛ «مرد»؛ «در سپیدهدم»؛ «دشت سوزان»؛ «تالپا»؛ «به آنها بگو من را نکشند»؛ «لووینا»؛ «شبی که تنهایش گذاشتند»؛ «به یاد آر»؛ «سگی پارس نمیکند»؛ «پاسو دل نورته»؛ و «آناکلتو مورونس»؛
نقل از متن داستانِ «شبی که تنهایش گذاشتند»: («فلیثیانو روئلاس» از کسانی که جلوتر از او بودند، پرسید: «چرا اینقدر یواش میروید؟ اینطوری خوابمان میگیرد؛ مگر نباید زود به آنجا برسید؟»؛ گفتند: «فردا کله ی سحر میرسیم آنجا.»؛ این آخرین حرفی بود که از دهان آنها شنید؛ آخرین حرف آنها؛ اما این را فقط روز بعد، به یاد آورد؛ سه تن از آنان جلو میرفتند؛ چشم دوخته بر زمین، همچنان که میکوشیدند تا از خرده روشنایی شبانه بهره گيرند؛ این را هم گفتند؛ کمی زودتر یا شاید شب پیش، که: «چه بهتر که تاریک است؛ اینطوری ما را نمیبینند.»؛ یادش نمیآمد کی گفتند؛ زمین زیر پایش فکرش را پریشان میکرد؛ حالا که بالا میرفت، دوباره زمین را میدید؛ احساس کرد که به سوی او میآید، محاصره اش میکند، میکوشد خسته ترین جای تنش را بیابد، و بالای آن قرار گیرد، روی پشتش همانجا که تفنگهایش را آویخته است؛ آنجا که زمین هموار بود، تند گام برمیداشت؛ به سربالایی که رسیدند، عقب ماند، سرش پایین افتاد، آهستهتر و آهستهتر، همچنان که گامهایش کوتاهتر میشد؛ دیگران از او جلو افتادند؛ حالا دیگر خیلی از او جلوتر بودند؛ با سری منگ از خواب که تکان میخورد؛ در پیشان میرفت؛ کمکم خیلی عقب میافتاد؛ جاده پیش رویش، کم و بیش همسطح چشمهایش بود و سنگینی تفنگها و خواب، در انحنای پشتش، بر او غلبه میکرد.)؛ پایان نقل
تاریخ بهنگام رسانی 25/03/1400هجری خورشیدی؛ ا. شربیانی -
Όταν άρχισε να γράφει ο Χουάν Ρούλφο,
χωρίς αποκλίσεις, χωρίς φιλοσοφίες και θεωρίες
που απαιτούν εκτάσεις και προεκτάσεις
φαντασιακής επική�� θεματολογίας,
ο ήλιος στον τόπο του διχάστηκε,
ανάμεσα στην δική του κόλαση
και στις ικεσίες που κάνουν τα σύννεφα
κάθε ξημέρωμα στην παγωμένη ομίχλη,
μήπως και πάρουν λίγη απο την ανθρώπινη ζεστασιά.
Όταν αγνόησε όλα τα εξαιρετικά, γεμάτα τροπική λαγνεία, μουσικά ακούσματα απο το σύμπαν,
τυλιγμένα με ηδονικό μυστήριο μέθης
με αρώματα και μύθους της Λατινικής Αμερικής,
εκεί όπου πετάνε στον ουρανό, ανάμεσα σε Ελοχίμ
και ανανάδες εξωκοσμικά πλάσματα και κοσμικές αναθεωρήσεις μαγικού ρεαλισμού,
τότε ναι,
κάπως έτσι
γράφτηκε η ιστορική κατάρα, και ο κάμπος τυλίχτηκε στις φλόγες των εμπρηστών της ζωής.
Ο Χουάν Ρούλφο σε μια στεγνή, άνυδρη,
σκληρή, φτωχή, τεράστια, γεμάτη
με ηλιακά εγκαύματα λαογραφίας θλιβερή γη, προσπάθησε να ζωντανέψει τους ανθρώπους.
Διότι οι νεκροί ζυγίζουν πάντα περισσότερο
και δεν μιλάνε ποτέ για τους κόσμους
της ευδαιμονίας που ονειρεύονται
όλα τα πλάσματα μέχρι να χορτάσουν βασανισμένα επιδόρπια μίσους και να κουραστούν απο το βάρος της ταφόπετρας,
την συνηθισμένη μυρωδιά των μνημάτων τους
που καθαρίζουν ανελλιπώς με αίμα, πόνο,
αλκοόλ, έγκλημα, τιμωρία και κομμάτια απο σάρκες ανθρώπινης δυστυχίας.
Ντράπηκε πολύ ο μαγικός ρεαλισμός και υποκλίθηκε με δάκρυα θαυμασμού και δέους μπροστά στον σκληρό, καθαρό, γνήσιο και ανόθευτο ρεαλισμό.
Ανοίγει η πόρτα της παγκόσμιας λογοτεχνίας και
ο «κάμπος στις φλόγες» φωτίζει τις λέξεις,
σε μια πεδιάδα καύσης συνειδήσεων δίνοντας
στον Μεξικανό συγγραφέα την άδεια να
ανασυντάξει ανήσυχα την πεζογραφία
γενικώς και ειδικώς μέχρι να φθάσει στην τελειότητα.
«Ο Κάμπος Στις Φλόγες» είναι η κάθαρση και η τραγωδία στο αγροτικό Μεξικό, κάπου ανάμεσα στις αποτυχημένες και ελπιδοφόρες επαναστάσεις του 1910.
Πρωταγωνιστούν οι ψυχές, οι ζωές, οι θρήνοι και οι απόγονοι των σκλάβων που έγιναν δούλοι, ή αγρότες ή αντάρτες,
σε επαναστάσεις απροσδιόριστες και προδωμένες μέσα σε χρονικές και τοπικές λεπτομέρειες.
Το πλαίσιο είναι καρφωμένο στον τοίχο της Ιστορίας
και φτιαγμένο απο φτώχεια, δολοφονίες, ζοφερές καταστάσεις που απέχουν πολύ για να κριθούν ανθρώπινες, και την πανταχού παρούσα παρουσία της μοιρολατρίας που ταΐζει τον θάνατο.
Η ανάγνωση αυτής της συλλογής είναι σαν περίπατος ανάμεσα απο αριστουργήματα που έχουν θαφτεί σε μια καθολικά ανθρώπινη κατάντια.
Συχνά οι ιστορίες ξεκινούν με σκόπιμη ασάφεια,
με απογοήτευση και συγχώνευση ζωηρών δραμάτων, που οδηγούνται με τεχνικές ζωτικής σημασίας απο τον δημιουργό σε μια εικόνα που αναδύεται απο την ομίχλη, ακατέργαστη και ποιητικά απλή.
Ο Χουάν Ρούλφο αφηγείται με ταυτόχρονα ρεύματα μετάβασης και συνείδησης ώστε ποτέ δεν δημιουργούνται άσκοπα ή αναγκαστικά προαπαιτούμενα για τον αναγνώστη,
μα πάντα αβίαστη και ζωτικής σημασίας τεχνικ�� ενσυναίσθησης στην κάθε ιστορία του.
Το ύφος και η τεχνική γραφής του μεξικανού συγγραφέα είναι τόσο αραιή, άγονη, ξερή και σοβαρή σαν την γη που απεικονίζει.
Κανείς δεν μπορεί να πει τόσα πολλά με ελάχιστα λόγια, όπως ο Ρούλφο.
Οι χαρακτήρες του αδύναμοι σχετικά με το περίγραμμα των ανθρώπων.
Τα σκηνικά του λιτά, γεμάτα σκόνη, καυτό ήλιο, παγωμένα άστρα, βράχια, δέντρα, βρόμικα νερά και απόγνωση.
Όμως, απο αυτά τα ασήμαντα συστατικά
καταφέρνει να δημιουργήσει κομβικά σύνθετες αφηγήσεις καταγράφοντας την υπαρξιακή αδιάφορη εικόνα για την καθολική κατάσταση της ανθρώπινης ράτσας.
💥💫💥💫💫💥💫💫
💥🔥🔥💥🔥🔥💥
Καλή ανάγνωση.
Πολλούς ασπασμούς. -
Estoy feliz de reencontrarme con este libro. Hacía años lo había leído. La prosa seca, directa y austera, algo tosca, es en lo que pienso cuando pienso en la literatura ideal. Es la época de la revolución, o por ahí, pero no es sobre la revolución. Es sobre padres e hijos, sobre mujeres robadas, sobre traiciones, sobre miseria y hambre. Es una belleza, y tiene uno bastante cómico sobre un político dando un discurso, que les juro que es lo mismo que siguen haciendo hasta el día de hoy los políticos mexicanos. Rulfo es sin duda de mis escritores favoritos de la vida, siempre que regreso a el me reencuentro con algo nuevo. Maravilloso.
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“You’ll be seeing that wind that blows over Luvina. It’s dark. They say because it’s full of volcano sand; anyway, it’s a black air. You’ll see it. It takes hold of things in Luvina as if it was going to bite them. And there are lots of days when it takes the roofs off the houses as if they were hats, leaving the bare walls uncovered. Then it scratches like it had nails: you hear it morning and night, hour after hour without stopping, scraping the walls, tearing off strips of earth, digging with its sharp shovel under the doors, until you feel it boiling inside of you as if it was going to remove the hinges of your very bones. You’ll see.”
In these fifteen bleak, savage short stories, “impotence and despair reign, and death rattles in the scorching air, the howling wind, the throttling dust of the plain.” They’re presumably even more powerful in the original Spanish. Though I can hardly see how it would be possible to improve them. -
مجموعة قصصية للكاتب المكسيكي خوان رولفو
قصص قاتمة تُصور قسوة الحياة والأمكنة والبشر
شخصياتها هائمة في أجواء العنف والفقر والبؤس
رولفو يكتب التاريخ ويحكي الواقع ما بعد الثورة المكسيكية
ويرسم صورة مزعجة وحزينة لحال الريف وساكنيه
أسلوب متميز ومختلف في السرد وبناء القصص
يبدو في تعدد الرواة والجانب الزمني وطبيعة الشخصيات -
Me ha impresionado este conjunto de relatos, pocas veces he leído narraciones tan breves e impactantes y de una calidad literaria magnífica.
Ambientada en un México postrevolucionario, el telón de fondo es una naturaleza inmisericorde, que tan pronto arroja un infierno de calor como un diluvio que arrasa con las pocas posesiones de los campesinos.
En este entorno, las relaciones entre las personas son duras, secas, incluso entre padres e hijos. Hay destellos de ternura y de humor, pero también muchos crímenes y violencia.
El lenguaje es también seco, contundente, pero siempre preciso y a veces poético, nos hace entrar de lleno en la escena y visualizar los personajes.
Acabo de empezar con este autor y estoy deseando leer su obra maestra,
Pedro Páramo. -
Μικρές ιστορίες από έναν μεγάλο συγγραφέα... Καθημερινές ιστορίες ανθρώπων που κάλλιστα θα μπορούσαν να είναι ιστορίες των κατοίκων της καταραμένης Κομάλα (Πέδρο Πάραμο).
Ο Ρούλφο γράφει απλά, εμπνευσμένος τα τοπία και τα μέρη του Μεξικού, καθώς και από τα βάσανα και τις ταλαιπωρίες ενός ολόκληρου λαού.
Η πρωτοπρόσωπη αφήγηση του μοιάζει με ένα φάντασμα που ήρθε να ψιθυρίσει στο αυτί του αναγνώστη ιστορίες. Ιστορίες χωρίς διδακτισμό ή εντυπωσιασμούς. Ιστορίες για την φτώχεια, την συγχώρεση, την εκδίκηση και την ερήμωση...
Κάθε διήγημα είναι ένα μικρό προσωπικό δράμα. Χωρίς μελοδραματισμούς αλλά με ποιητικό λόγο ο συγγραφέας μας φέρνει πολλές φορές αντιμέτωπους με την σκληρή πραγματικότητα...
Οι πρωταγωνιστές του Ρούλφο έρχονται και χάνονται μέσα στις άγονες πεδιάδες και τα μικρά χωριά του Μεξικού, όμως οι ιστορίες τους θα μείνουν για πάντα ανεξίτηλες στην μνήμη του αναγνώστη που αγαπάει το μυστήριο που αποπνέει η γραφή αυτού του τόσο ιδιαίτερου συγγραφέα...
5/5! -
Holding the spine of the book in the palm of my hand, having read Rulfo's great novel Pedro Páramo , I felt the sear of my skin before opening the front cover. This short story collection's primal bleakness, savagery, rumbled within. Hazemat gear in toe I pried open the book and stood back. My hand burnt, cracked the pain oozing upward, outward, I stared at the sparse simple prose. A style any writer might be proud of to cover many examples of a staid story line. An aesthetic which yearns to be read out loud. Indeed Rulfo's voice speaks in one's ear, remains unruffled in one's mind.
Bandaging my hand-my wife says there is nothing there. I beg to differ with her. That I didn't take first aid forty years ago for nothing. Asking for some room I pointed out this was first-responder work.
It is. It is Reader First Responder Work. There is no training even though I thought I was well trained. These stories instantaneously jump into the bleakest of environments. The sun is either blazing down with such heat as to rip the stamina of a persons soul or so cold as to freeze internal life in favor of the necessity of survival with little time for endurance to dream of hope. Rulfo has bared the land where almost nothing can grow. Decimated, sheared, it has not been placed to support and propagate human life. So, why not leave. Move elsewhere. Go North where money is to be made by crossing the border into the United States and returning as others have? Return? Yes. You see this is where their dead are. One cannot leave one's dead. The living maybe.
This is a collection of leavings. More important it is a collection of being hunted. From story to story characters are hunted by the unremitting sun, the soil that is no more, one more mountain of jagged rock to be scaled, the last bits of food to be eaten, false religions, government armies, soldiers of rebellion, outlaws, the steaming blood of revenge no matter how many years passed. Time seeped by long enough where the people appear indifferent. Cold blooded, cold calculated. Rulfo with the slenderest of brush strokes crosses these people, we readers, over the line from indifference to acceptance. This is merely the way life is and is expected to be. Laying out on the arid plains he hones us in on a look at the primal savagery of the human heart. A broodingly dark place to live within while reading though Rulfo's aesthetic of the writing of the plains-works well as a geographic location and writing style-is so skilled it underlines, setting fire, to the brutality while providing a sumptuous feast to those who appreciate the temperance of great literature.
Where has he been? He wrote very little. Raising a family and working common jobs he wrote when he could at night producing I believe another collection of short stories and a short novel which all readers have a responsibility to themselves to explore,Pedro Páramo.
This collection is not a series of linked short works building up to a common theme. It is the same theme from the beginning explored in a number of fascinating examples with fascinating characters. Rulfo's ability to focus on details opens worlds in short spaces. The only fault I found but resulting in the loss of a star in the dust of the plains is that, though still enjoyable, a few stories were repetitious. This slim volume is but 147 pages. I think it is possible the editor-publisher needed to fill it out so that…? It would look filled with more presents and therefore more marketable?
This was a great read in understanding these people, myself, others, the static beat of the human heart and the ways surroundings carve the niche.
I give much thanks to Ben Winch for introducing me to Rulfo. I doubt I would have found him otherwise and life would have been that much less. -
Di Juan Rulfo avevo già letto il breve e intenso Pedro Paramo e in La pianura in fiamme ho ritrovato le stesse atmosfere in un tempo immobile, sospeso tra sogno e realtà, in uno spazio indefinito, dove vita e morte si incontrano e si confondono.
I racconti di questo libro ricompongono come tessere di un mosaico persone e luoghi di un Messico che Rulfo riprende sia dai racconti dei suoi compatrioti che dalla propria vita personale. Le vicende narrate rivelano una visione crudele del mondo: disperazione, miseria, grida, preghiere, imprecazioni di uomini braccati e ammazzati, stremati dalla fame e da una natura maligna. Dalla vita stessa.
https://youtu.be/qjmcE4QiBkc -
4.75
En un principio este libro me confundió bastante, el lenguaje me abrumaba y me perdía entre sus letras; pero una vez que le agarré el modo aprendí a disfrutarlo. Entendí que la voz del pueblo es importante y valiosa, aprendí mucho, y amé demasiado.
El llano en llamas es la gran recopilación de cuentos que Rulfo escribió, y aunque algunos no me encantaron, otros sí que lo hicieron, y esos fueron:
Es que somos muy pobres.
Macario.
¡Diles que no me maten!
Luvina.
Paso del norte.
No oyes ladrar a los perros.
Anacleto Morones. -
F**k me this is good! As good as Pedro Paramo! Rulfo is a master, the equal of anyone anywhere anytime. These stories are so elemental they are as if hewn from stone. The opener, 'Macario', is a mini-miracle - a monologue by an idiot child so convincing we forget it is fiction, forget we are reading almost. And so it is with every story here. They don't 'jump off the page' like so many supposedly virtuosic feats of literary ventriloquism; they insinuate themselves quietly, seem to reach us intravenously. Subtlety and humility, the near-utter subjugation of the writer to his text, a sense of place so vivid it consumes. Hail Juan Rulfo! The star that shines brightest burns fastest.
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Είναι κάποιοι συγγραφείς που έρχονται στη ζωή σου και τελειώνοντας τα βιβλία τους αναρωτιέσαι Μα γιατί δεν πρόλαβαν να γράψουν κάτι παραπάνω;;;;;;; Όταν συναντάω κάτι τέτοιο (σπάνια) αισθανόμαι ένα αίσθημα κενού μέσα μου .....
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La primera hostia fue con el cuento El hombre y a partir de allí fue un no parar. ¡Qué cuentos! ¡Qué duros! Sin duda alguna, El llano en llamas pasa a ser uno de mis libros favoritos de relatos. Rulfo inmortaliza, a través de momentos, de soliloquios y recuerdos extraordinariamente narrados de una forma sencilla, cercana y sutil, a personajes tan secos y adustos como el paisaje que habitan y tan miserables y violentos como su pobreza extrema los ha llevado a ser. Como personajes omnipresentes, el despiadado azar del tiempo, la resignación perpetua y el sufrimiento enmudecido. Aún estoy superando la paliza que ha sido leer este libro inolvidable. Los cuentos que me han desgarrado y me han cambiado como lector son El hombre, En la madrugada, Talpa, Macario, ¡Diles que no me maten!, Luvina, La noche que lo dejaron solo, Paso del Norte, No oyes ladrar los perros y Anacleto Morones. Ups, ¿son más de la mitad de los cuentos que conforman El llano en llamas? PUES CON ESTO LO DIGO TODO.
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Cuanta sencillez para contar estas historias y que hermosa voz le ha prestado Rulfo a estos protagonistas, tan capaces de enternecernos unos con su inocencia, como de estremecernos otros con su lado más visceral, a la vez que nos muestran la crudeza de la vida rural o los avatares de la Revolución mexicana; historias de un mundo hostil donde la pobreza, las relaciones familiares y la muerte están siempre muy presentes.
La voz de los personajes se escucha realmente genuina y creo que no hay ni un cuento que no haya logrado conmoverme, pero sin duda me rindo por completo ante cuentos como No oyes ladrar a los perros, Paso del Norte o La herencia de Matilde Arcángel en los que Rulfo pone el foco en las relaciones padre-hijo, con una precisión de palabras formidable
Es un libro muy parejo, muy recomendable, que difícilmente decepcione porque todos los cuentos tienen algo interesante.
En lo personal, El llano en llamas va derecho al rincón de esos favoritos que hay que releer de tanto en tanto.
“… Dicen los de allí que cuando llena la luna, ven de bulto la figura del viento recorriendo las calles de Luvina, llevando a rastras una cobija negra; pero yo siempre lo que llegué a ver, cuando había luna en Luvina, fue la imagen del desconsuelo… siempre.” -
Longlisted for the 2020 Republic of Consciouness Prize
Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo, published in 1955, is hailed by many, most notably Gabriel Garcia Marquez, as a key development in Latin American, and indeed world, literature.
However, I had not read his equally important short story collection El Llano en Llamas, published in 1955, so it was a delight to see it longlisted for my favourite literary prize.
This is actually the third translation to English, although the first published outside of the US:
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The Burning Plain and Other Stories by George D. Schade (1967)
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The Plain in Flames by Ilan Stavans with Harold Augenbram (2012), which added two stories that the author himself added in 1970, "La herencia de Matilde Arcángel" (as “The Legacy of Matilde Arcángel”) and El día del derrumbe (as “The Day of the Collapse”)
- and this by Stephen Beechinor (2019), which also includes all 17 stories.
Beechinor explains how he came to the book and why he re-translated it in this fascinating interview:
https://structomagazine.co.uk/stephen.... On the choice of title for the collection he explains:El Llano or El Llano Grande is the name of the arid, treeless, shrubless, birdless flatland in Jalisco, Mexico, where the stories are set. It’s shown in the relief map on the cover of this translation.
Ivan Stavans' perspective is at these interviews:
In El Llano we have a proper noun, a toponym, a place name that describes the land. And as a general noun, a llano is a dry plain of sometimes great extension, a feature of the northern parts of south America and the south-western US. Like veldt or steppe or glen or bayou, a llano is a geographical particularity and to transpose the particular into the generic would be to traduce it. And finally, typographically, that initial ‘Ll’ digraph holds your eye nicely; it snags in the mind in just the right way.
https://biblioklept.org/2013/05/16/yo... and
https://biblioklept.org/2014/01/22/la.... And his choice of title:The title in Spanish has the alliteration – El Llano en Llamas. Llano. Llamas. In English, the first translation was The Burning Plain, which is so dull, so plain, so uninteresting. I immediately said I’ll do it, but it has to be The Plain in Flames, which plays with the alliteration. The Juan Rulfo Foundation said “we love it.” The publisher said “we can’t do it” – because people have already connected The Burning Plain with Rulfo, and if you change the title, you can lose readers. And I said I’m not doing that. If we don’t have “The Plain in Flames,” I won’t do it. And finally we were able to convince them. So they resisted for marketing reasons. That’s something that translators often have to deal with.
This collection is perhaps less formally inventive than the hallucinatory Pedro Páramo, but is important for giving direct voice to the inhabitants of the llano, its acute psychological realism and the brilliant economy of the writing. The opening story here, 'They gave us The land' / 'Nos han dado la tierra' is one of a number that focus on the disappointing reality of life in post-revolutionary Mexico. The narrator is one of a dwindling group of men travel over the arid llano to the barren territory they've been assigned as part of land reform. As they struggle in the heat, a dark cloud passes overhead, giving them hope, but only a solitary raindrop falls.
The earth sucks at the drop that fell by mistake and swallows it down
Who in hell would make this llano so vast? To serve what purpose, huh?
...
Still as a boy I never saw it rain on the llano, not ever, not in the proper sense of rain.
No, the llano isn’t good for much. Not a rabbit, not a bird to be seen. Not a thing. Other than a few mangy huisache shrubs and the odd scrap of grass and the blades all curled up; other than that, not a thing.
...
Such land and so much of it, and what for?
For translation comparison: Stevens version
And the drop that fell by mistake is devoured by the earth, which makes it disappear into its thirst.
Who the hell would make this plain so big? What’s it good for, eh?
...
All in all, I know that from the time I was a boy, I have never seen rain fall on the plain, what you might call rain.
No, the plain isn’t good for anything. There are neither rabbits nor birds. There is nothing. Except for a few huizache trees and one or two spots of zacate with their leaves curled up; aside from that, there’s nothing.
...
Such vast land for nothing.
The original:
Y a la gota caída por equivocación se la come la tierra y la desaparece en su sed.
...
¿Quién diablos haría este llano tan grande? ¿Para qué sirve, eh?
...
Con todo, yo sé que desde que yo era muchacho, no vi llover nunca sobre el llano, lo que se llama llover.
No, el llano no es cosa que sirva. No hay ni conejos ni pájaros. No hay nada. A no ser unos cuantos huizaches trespeleques y una que otra manchita de zacate con las hojas enroscadas; a no ser eso, no hay nada.
...
Tanta y tamaña tierra para nada.
'The man' / 'El hombre' is striking in form. The narrative style has some similarities to the also-RoC longlisted Love as it switches back and forth between two perspectives, here the man of the title, who is fleeing after performing a revenge killing, and his pursuer, the man he incorrectly believes he killed, now seeking revenge in turn, a scenario the reader has to gradually piece together. A final section is narrated in the form of one half of an interview with the authorities by a shepherd boy who witnessed the denoument of the tale as the man finds himself trapped by the river, just as the two men are trapped in a cycle of revenge. Rulfo had originally titled the story 'Where the river runs in circles'.
The title story narrates a snapshot of the rather chaotic and un-heroic story of the revolution itself.
Other favourites included:
'Remember' which perhaps best captures the nature of oral reminiscence (it reminded me of afternoons with my father and uncles who would refer to people as “him what used to go with her from..”)
And my favourite of all, Luvina, the story that paves the way towards Pedro Páramo. Another translation comparison:
Here:
People in Luvina say dreams well up from those ravines, but the wind’s about all I ever know to rise out of there, clamouring like it was being piped up through reeds from way below. A wind that snuffs our even the woody nightshade - those glum, bitty plants that just about thrive in a scrape of dirt; clinging on for all their worth to upland cliffs.
Stavans:
People in Luvina say dreams rise out of those ravines; but the only thing I ever saw rise up from there was the wind, whirling, as if it had been imprisoned down below in reed pipes. A wind that doesn't even let bittersweet grow: those sad little plants can barely live, holding on for all they're worth to the side of the cliffs in these hills, as if they were smeared onto the earth.
Original:
Dicen los de Luvina que de aquellas barrancas suben los sueños; pero yo lo único que vi subir fue el viento, en tremolina, como si allá abajo lo hubieran encañonado en tubos de carrizo. Un viento que no deja crecer ni a las dulcamaras: esas plantitas tristes que apenas si pueden vivir un poco untadas en la tierra, agarradas con todas sus manos al despeñadero de los montes.
3.5 stars - worthy but I am not 100% convinced a new translation was needed, and I feel Pedro Paramo remains the more important of the author's work. -
ilk kez 2 yıl önce okumuştum Pedro Paramo yu ve Juan Rulfo ya hayran kalmıştım.
gerçekten özlemişim. kendine has dili, ciddi anlatımın arkasında gizli mizah anlayışı gerçekten okurken büyük bir zevk veriyor bana. Kendi topraklarını o kadar canlı anlatıyor ki insan orada hissediyor kendini.
Elimde okunmamış sadece bir Rulfo kitabı kaldığını düşünmekse gerçekten üzücü.. -
El palpitar de un estoico corazón, o los perros que ladran en medio de piedras y viento (Reseña, 2021)
(También disponible en:
https://cuadernosdeunbibliofago.wordp...)
Leer a Rulfo es entrar en un territorio manso y cruel, bello y voraz, callado y susurrante, vibrante e inmóvil. Es habitar la paradoja, el secreto de los desiertos con su vida yerma estallando en cada parcela de vacío, el canto de una luna escarlata frente a los farallones en los que una hierba rala clava los dedos de su ansia en flor. Rulfo es un mundo, y lo que en otro lugar sería un lugar común aquí es una confesión de impotencia ante el lenguaje, es la incapacidad de encontrar cómo nombrar lo que hace, cómo describir el impacto de los cuentos que componen El llano en llamas. Rulfo es un mundo con sus propias leyes, con sus propias contradicciones, con su propia moral y su propia estética. Es un cuadro expresionista donde cada pincelada cuenta la totalidad. Es un privilegio que cada tanto podemos concedernos como lectores.
En esta relectura reafirmé mi amor por algunos viejos conocidos. Sigo temblando al oír el río crecido que arrasa el pueblo en “Es que somos muy pobres”, todavía el monólogo interior de Macario mientras espera las ranas me hace soñar con estrellas de leche, las sombras de las mujeres como murciélagos buscando agua será en mi vida una postal reiterada desde Luvina con amor, y —¡por supuesto!— la luna inmensa radiante redonda que alarga las sombras en el silencio aparente de “No oyes ladrar los perros” es la que alumbró a mi santo el día de mi llegada al mundo, estoy seguro. Volver a los lugares donde fuimos felices es correr el riesgo de sufrir heridas de decepción, el mismo Rulfo nos enseña eso con su Comala, por fortuna volver a él no es uno de esos casos. En buena medida porque no se regresa a Rulfo, se avanza a Rulfo. Sus cuentos, como Tonaya, están siempre delante de nosotres, en la siguiente curva del camino.
Hubo también reencuentros que fueron más intensos en esta ocasión. “El día del derrumbe” me pareció una maravilla, y con “El hombre” vi una luz de peregrinaje oscuro, un dolor de piedras y corriente. Sin embargo, quizás el mayor de todos los cambios estuvo en “La cuesta de las comadres”. No recordaba el cuento de mis lecturas previas, el yo del pasado lo había pasado por alto, seguro disfrutándolo, pero restándole relevancia en la memoria. En esta oportunidad, y quizás porque hubo una jauría que pasaba corriendo en busca de los Torricos, encontré allí todo lo que me encanta de otras de sus narraciones. Esa fuerza y esa belleza, esa resignada esperanza apática de los personajes, esa brusquedad del terreno contrastada con la exuberancia descriptiva del autor (expresionista, insisto). Vi el monte despojarse de casa, vi los animales ocultos en cuevas, vi el costal con el chivo pequeño dentro y la aguja de capote haciendo los remiendos. Vi la sangre, cómo no verla, y vi el amanecer lleno de niebla y el frío y el calor.
Concuerdo con quienes afirman que El llano en llamas es uno de los libros de cuentos más importantes de Latinoamérica. Creo que cada relato encaja en un lenguaje global, que la habilidad de escucha de Rulfo consigue dar a las voces una densidad poética cercana a la vida, que las acciones terminan revelando una forma de estoicismo en la que palpita el corazón de una humanidad agobiada por la desventaja, pero dispuesta a exponer el pellejo para cambiarle a la suerte el peso de la balanza. Aquí hay vida, toda la vida que es capaz de crear la literatura, toda la vida que es capaz de entregarnos a quienes leemos para que la integremos a nuestro corazón.
Y seamos también fuego en el llano, y perros que ladran, confesando el milagro —¡la vida, Lucas, la vida!— entre las piedras y el viento. -
Publicado em 1953, A Planície em Chamas é uma colectânea de dezassete contos, de cunho realista, que têm em comum um cenário inóspito, poeirento e abrasador, e uma humanidade moldada à sua imagem - pobre, impotente, desesperançada, rude, por vezes bárbara.
O conjunto é de uma enorme coerência. Todos os contos são magníficos e agregam-se para compor um retrato mais abrangente - o retrato de um certo México rural, inclemente, em que a tristeza, a solidão, a crueldade e a feiura são contadas de uma forma crua, mas muito bela e pungente. Um retrato físico pintado em tons de ocre, aqui e ali manchado de vermelho de sangue, com sabor a terra poeirenta, ressequida pelo sol e pelo vento; um retrato humano que evoca rostos pardacentos, sulcados e endurecidos pelos elementos e pelas provações.Cai uma gota de água, grande, gorda, fazendo um buraco na terra e deixando um empaste como de uma cuspidela. Cai sozinha. Nós esperamos que continuem a cair mais. Não chove. Agora se olharmos para o céu, vê-se a nuvem aguaceira correndo para bem longe, cheia de pressa. O vento que vem da aldeia arrima-se-lhe empurrando-a contra as sombras azuis dos cerros. E a gota caída por engano é comida pela terra que a faz desaparecer na sua sede.
(p.10 )
Do conjunto destaco Luvina, que me deixou simultaneamente embevecida e destroçada; é talvez o conto que melhor condensa o espírito de todo o livro:San Juan de Luvina. Aquele nome soava-me a nome de Céu. Mas aquilo é o Purgatório. Um lugar moribundo onde até os cães morreram e já não há quem ladre ao silêncio; pois assim que uma pessoa se acostuma ao vendaval que ali sopra, não se ouve senão o silêncio que há em todas as solidões.
(p.95) -
Diciassette racconti che somigliano a visioni, tra il cielo e l’afa del deserto; tra nuvole e pioggia. Un linguaggio essenziale, storie che nascono dal nulla, istantanee, dialoghi scarni perché il caldo asciuga la gola. Terra dura e inospitale, magia, sogno. Da leggere e rileggere per ritrovare, ogni volta, un tempo sospeso, uno spazio indefinito, qualcosa da afferrare e custodire.
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I read this book due to its longlisting for the 2020 Republic of Consciousness Prize for UK small presses.
It is the first full length publication of Structo Press, which is associated with the literary magazine Structo which contains “remarkable new short stories and poetry from all around the world, alongside essays and interviews with authors and others ….on the fiction side we tend towards the slipstream end of things, and encourage submission of works in translation.”. Structo Press has previously published chap books.
The book is a translation of a classic (it may be more accurate to say the classic) Spanish language short-story collection: “El Llano en llamas” by Juan Rulfo; whose only other book was the novel “Pedro Páramo” widely regarded as the most famous 20th Century work in Spanish literature and as a precursor to Magic Realism.
The collection (published in 1953) has had two well-known US English language translations but this translation by Stephen Beechinor represents the first UK translation. By contrast to the previous translation – Ilan Stevens in 2012 – this book has UK-English and also (perhaps in keeping with the much lower penetration of Spanish language in the UK) has retained very few Spanish terms other than proper names (the author regards El Llano as falling into that category).
It certainly read very naturally to a UK-English reader – I cannot recall a single jarring note. I cannot judge the fidelity of the translation, but the translator said he wanted to capture Rulfo’s “stark, spare style” and this seems to work well. I would have preferred (as with all translated books) to have seen a more detailed translator’s note on some of the choices made (both around style and some individual phrases/words) to go with the excellent foreword by Dylan Brennan.
The stories (17 of them over less than 180 pages) fall into a similar pattern – as one of the characters says
“You must think I’m doing here is rehashing the same idea over and again.”.
They are set in a post-war (and more importantly post-Revolution) Mexican countryside, struggling with the failed impact of impractical and likely corrupt land reform whose main result appears to have been to have lead to mass migration from village to town and towns to cities while leaving things in the countryside somewhere between unchanged and even worse – a sense captured particularly strongly in the two opening stories “They gave us the land” (men trekking to their allotted but completely uncultivable land) and “La Cuesta de las Comrades” (a story of murder, justice and revenge).
The countryside left behind is racked with poverty (“Because We’re So Poor” – about a girl likely to follow her sisters into prostitution after the loss of her cow) and prone to natural disasters (“The Day in Ruins” is the closest to a satirical story in the collection – of a voluble but insincere politician visiting a small town destroyed in an earthquake).
But most of all this is a brutal land of violence and retribution which is matched in the terse and brutal nature of the language used – language which is often effectively told in the form of monologues – either internal or oral storytelling.
Many of the stories feature bandits/revolutionaries (“The Man” moves between a fugitive murderer and a pursuer bent on revenge; “At First Light” a peasant on trial for murdering his patron; “El Llano in Flames” – a vicious and retributive series of massacres between Federals and rebels; “Tell them not to kill me” – a man is brought to justice for a murder he committed years ago (by the victim’s son – now an army officer) and pleads unsuccessfully with his indifferent/self-interested son to beg for his life; “The Night They Left Him Alone” – a fugitive and wanted murderer/rebel fleeing with his relatives, is unable to keep pace with his relatives – leading to them falling into an army ambush rather than him)
Others more family or personal related violence (“Talpa” – a man and his sister-in-law take the man’s badly ill brother/girl’s husband on a pilgrimage that they know/hope will likely kill him; “You Don’t Hear The Dog Barking” – a man carries his badly injured son towards a town for assistance, all the time berating him for his pas life; “The legacy of Matilde Arcangel” – a wife’s death blamed on a crying baby causing a horse to bolt leads to life-long enmity between a father and son; “Anacleto Morales” – a group of widows seek to force their ex-lover to assist with the canonisation of someone he actually killed in a thieves falling out).
Two stories that particularly struck me:
“Paso del Norte” – a kind of “American Dirt” of poverty written economic migration and border violence written some 65+ years previously and without a hint of cultural appropriation.
“Luvina” – the only one of the stories I felt which departed from the stark style of the other books and I believe was a step towards the ghost-world and magic realism of the author’s famous novel. “Luvina” is an almost fabled deserted town whose harsh landscape and ghostly inhabitants are described by a drunk ex-schoolteacher to his potential successor – a man travelling to the town for the first time.
It also has some of the most descriptive language – albeit not departing from the general theme of abandonment and despair.From whatever angle you look at it, Luvina is an awful sorry place. You being headed there, you’ll soon realise. I would say its where sorrow makes her nest. Never a smile to be seen, and everyone goes around with a face on them like it got set in a cast. And, should you want, you can see that sorrow any time you please. The wind blowing there gets it stirred up, yet never sweeps it away. It lingers there like it was born there. And you get to know it by taste and by feel, from the way it bears down on you constantly, clutching you tight, like a terrible poultice crushed into the heart’s vital flesh
A worthy addition to the longlist – if perhaps unusual as being by an author dead for more than 30 years. -
Longlisted for the Republic of Consciousness Prize 2020
I finished this a couple of days ago, and I am still not sure how I feel about it. Rulfo's bleak and often violent portraits of hard lives on the Mexican llano or plain, told in simple, stark, spare language are undoubtedly impressively realised, but it is difficult to assess this new translation of a book that is 70 years old without having read the earlier translations aimed more at an American audience, or his more famous novella
Pedro Páramo, let alone to compare it with another 11 recently written books.
I can't say I particularly enjoyed reading it either, but I can see how Rulfo's style influenced later writers. -
Sin artificios en la estructura ni complejidad en las historias. Narración de lo cotidiano en una época y un país en donde lo rural alcanza las cimas de tragedia clásica.. Con un lenguaje directo, local, diverso en lo popular, pegado a la tierra de donde brota. Una tierra de la que emergen unos personajes que pasean sus resecas vidas, sus solitarias muertes por un llano pedregoso, áspero como la vida y amargo como la muerte.
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Later we’ll stop. Afterward. What we have to do for now is to try to go faster behind so many just like us and ahead of many more. That’s what it’s all about. We’ll rest by and by when we’re dead.
Like ants crawling across the scorched earth, the people of the plain [Jalisco?] move from one disaster to the next. And like beasts of burden they carry on their backs the heritage of a merciless landscape, of bloody revolutions, of personal vendettas and of corrupt governments.
And if ever the fiery rays of the sun abate, or the flames from the muzzles of gun grow dim, fierce winds, torrential rains and earthquakes come along to take whatever meager possessions they have left.
“Don’t you hear that wind?” I finally told them. “It’ll be the end of you.”
“You endure what you have to endure. It’s God’s mandate,” they answered me.
A whole people shaped by their harsh land and by their even more brutal heritage. Portrayed as lazy, uncouth and criminals or drug dealers [wetbacks?] by their wealthy neighbours to the north, too tortured and too tired to speak out for themselves. Who is left to do them justice, to make their voices heard?
We don’t say what we are thinking. We lost the will to speak a while back. We lost it because of the heat. You would be happy to talk elsewhere, but it is hard here. You talk here and the words become hot in your mouth from the outside heat, and they dry on your tongue until the breath is gone.
Things are like that here. That’s why no one wants to talk.
Juan Rulfo has only written a thin novel and this single collection of short stories. But his voice has rung out loud across a whole continent. He has said all he has to say in these three hundred pages or so, enough to make people like Marquez and Borges stand up and bow to this man who made poetry out of the suffering of his people.
He speaks loudly and clearly for all those who have been silenced by poverty and strife, by natural disasters and by marching armies. But Rulfo goes one step further in his narrative, offering us not a simple laundry list of grievances, but a pain metamorphosed into beauty in the cauldron of his sensibility, the worm becoming the butterfly in the flames of the plain.
A wind that doesn’t even let bittersweet grow; those sad little plants can barely live, holding on for all the’re worth to the side of the cliffs in these hills, as if they were smeared onto the earth. Only at times, when there’s a little shade, hidden among the rocks, can the chicalote bloom with its white poppies. But the chicalote soon withers. Then one hears it scratching the air with its thorny branches, making a noise like a knife on whetstone.
I will not single out any one story included in this collection, preferring to treat them as a whole emotional landscape, revealed here and there in a short prose poem or in a line of dialogue. Authors much better than me have done analysis and interpretations of particular episodes from the book, and indeed some of them are so powerful, they deserved all the attention they can get.
For my own journey, once I realized how much I admire Rulfo’s particular style, I have chosen to read only one story at a time, leaving then a couple of days for the impressions to settle and even re-reading some passages to see how he’s done it, but once again, I’m not interested in deconstructing his craft but in recording the emotional impact these sketches produced.
She came here to cry, clinging to her mother; to share her grief with her and to let her know she was suffering, sharing her grief with all of us as well, because I, too, felt her sobbing inside me, as if she were wringing out the dishrag of our sins.
Rulfo is unique and to compare him with other writers who have dozens of published works in their luggage is probably just a sorry attempt to appear sophisticated and to brag about your erudition. Yet, simply through the subject of the stories and through the no-frills story-telling that yet manages to include a spiritual angle, the names of Faulkner, Steinbeck and Jack London [in his early short stories] come up as kindred spirits.
Having read last year ‘Pedro Parano’ I can also bear witness that the city of Comala is situated on the same burning plain, peopled by the same tormented villagers and by their numerous ghosts.
Women’s voices sang in the half-dream of nighttime: “Come out, come out, come out, tormented souls,”
The dead weigh more than the living; they crush you.
A crime that took place four decades ago, a crippling illness that the miraculous icon of a saint failed to heal, a foul murder than drives you to madness, a dying son carried on your back through the night, a false prophet that preyed on the credulous womenfolk of the village – these are just a few of the ghosts that still haunt the living through the pages, isolated incidents that yet accumulate and gather together like tiny streams that flow downhill until they form a torrential flood.
I had never felt life to be slower and more violent than when we were walking among such an accumulation of people; as if we were a swarm of worms all balled together under the sun, wriggling through the cloud of dust that imprisoned all of us on the same road and had us all corralled.
Such relentless misfortune and hardship might lead one to believe the collection is too dire, too downbeat and grim in its messaging. Indeed, the temptation to focus only on the pain and suffering is very strong in me, and I could end my remarks with a place that somehow seems to describe the whole plain and its people thus:
No matter how you look at it, Luvina is a very sad place. Now that you’re going there, you’ll see what I mean. I would say it’s the place where sadness nests. Where smiles are unknown, as if everyone’s faces had gone stiff. And, if you want, you can see that sadness at every turn. The wind that blows there stirs it up but never carries it away. It’s there as if it had been born there. You can even taste it and feel it, because it’s always on you, pressed against you, and because it’s oppressive like a great poultice on your heart’s living flesh.
But this is a false conclusion, because despite all these biblical pests visited on the people of the plain, their defining character trait is their endurance: they do what they have to do, push on against all odds, even cherish the earth that betrayed them and still fight for their children to get a chance at life, laying down their own as a stepping stone in the never ending march.
You might sometimes think, in the middle of this edgeless road, that there would be nothing after it; that you would find nothing on the other side, at the end of this plain split with cracks and dried arroyos. But yes, there’s something. There’s a village. You can hear the dogs barking and feel the smoke in the air, and relish the smell of people as if it were a hope.
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His entire life was there in that earth. Sixty years of living on it, of grasping it tightly in his hands, of having tested it the way one tests the flavor of meat. For a long time he had been crumbling it with his eyes, savoring each piece as if it were his last, almost knowing it would be his last.
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It’s safe to say it was his misfortune to have been born at all.
This collection is not political or militant for any particular cause. Yet the political and social commentaries are inevitable when applied to the root causes of the poverty and strife of the people on the plain. Sometimes Rulfo spells it out in clear, unambiguous phrases, as in the cases of land redistribution or immigration. Other times there is little too choose between the participants in the military conflicts, with both the rebels and the government troops prone to massacres and abuses. Venal political leaders who use natural disasters as a stepping stone for their careers and for improvised parties sponsored by the very victims of an earthquake put a bitter and darkly humorous cherry on the tortillas left on the tables of the peasants, in a final story that was only added to the collection in a later edition.
Last week we didn’t find enough to eat and the one before we only ate wild greens. We’re hungry, father, you don’t even smell ‘em because you live good.
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From the ranches the people were coming down to the villages; the people from the villages left for the cities. In the cities the people got lost; they dissolved into the people.
“Do you know where they’ll give me work?”
Instead of picking sides in any of the debates and proposed solutions to the plight, I fall back on the role of the artist as the voice of the people. I see Juan Rulfo’s legacy as the voice of conscience, as the soul and heart of a national identity, one that has endured the test of fire and will continue to be anchored to this scorched earth.
Say, Meliton, what was that song they kept on singing again and again, like a broken record?
It was the one that goes: ‘You don’t know the soul’s hours of mourning.’
Maybe I don’t yet know, but thanks to Juan Rulfo I now have a clearer picture of what he means by a plain in flames. -
Qué barbaridad, que grande Rulfo. Eso sí que es conocer un pueblo, la naturaleza de los más humildes, la brutalidad arraigada y unida irremediablemente a la miseria, condicionado todo ello por lo inhóspito del terreno.
El estilo es preciso, nada adornado, como a mí me gusta (salvo excepciones).
Si una historia es buena, la siguiente lo es más, no resalto ninguna por encima de otra, ya que aquí ocurre lo contrario de norma general en los libros de relatos (siempre te encuentras mayoría de historias que no te gustan) aquí no encontré ninguna que desmereciera del conjunto.
Los diálogos medidos, milimetrados. Como domina el relato corto, no sabes nunca por donde pueden virar esos pequeños relatos. Complicado condesar más en menos espacio.
Leyendo a Rulfo me he acordado irremediablemente de Juan Benet, eso otro día ese territorio tan desapacible como es Región, etc.
Tres apuntes más:
1) Ahora entiendo que Rulfo dejara de publicar tras Pedro Páramo y El llano en llamas, tras esas dos obras maestras, difícilmente se puede superar esa cota, resulta más honesto dejar ese legado, sin más, diciendo “Ahí queda eso”.
2) Tras El llano en llamas, ahora me veo obligado a releer Pedro Páramo, lo leí siendo demasiado joven y creo que no le saqué el provecho que merece. También me ilusiona mucho.
3) Se vuelve a cumplir el viejo dicho mío y propio con ©: “Más vale clásico en mano que cien novedades volando”. -
Vamos a jugar un juego. Agarren una botella de mezcal (no soy tequilero, sorry) y un caballito. Luego agarren todos los libros mexicanos que tengan y ponganlos en una pila al azar. Tomen un libro con los ojos cerrados y tomense un shot cada vez que:
a) El libro tenga la violencia como tema subyacente o principal.
b) En el libro se trate el tema de la muerte.
c) En el libro este ambientado en un pueblo o una rancheria o cualquier lado en el Mexico rural.
d) En el libro se sugiera que la revolucion traiciono sus promesas.
Que tan borrachos terminariamos? -
Miséria , pobreza, morte , revoltas, assassinatos,suicídios, vinganças, pai contra filho, filho contra pai entre outros assuntos, são os temas desse excepcional livro de contos de Juan Rulfo.Em uma linguagem simples, porém arrebatadora, o livro encanta.Com personagens pobres, desdentados , desesperados, famintos etc, o autor retrata as injustiças , pobrezas e a violência das planícies mexicanas. São os elementos da natureza que se rebelam contra o homem; é a poeira que sufoca , as montanhas que tornam lugares inacessíveis, as enchentes que levam os animas é o vento que traz o gemido do oprimido. É o sol escaldante que queima as idéias tal como Meursault , personagem de "O estrangeiro" de Camus que, em um delírio induzido pelo calor e pela luz forte do sol, atira em um árabe causando sua morte e depois dá mais quatro tiros no corpo já morto.Tudo contribui , em um ambiente de pobreza , violência e miséria, para que a maldade do homem apareça. Amei o livro muitíssimo.
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About fifteen stories, almost all gems, bringing the hard, rough life in an extremely dry and barren area in Mexico to life. The language is simple, but the stories are rich and varied. The themes are poverty, revenge, jealousy, betrayal and death. Rulfo brings in his own way a tribute to the small people of the Llano. Read in a French translation, probably most approaching the original Spanish.
