‘ahems and ahahs’

If you’ve been reading the blog the past few weeks, then you are aware of the fact that I have been battling with Roberto Bolano’s posthumously released epic novel 2666. An update, I’m on page 363 of this 898 beast. Still a ways to go but I shall persevere and I am enjoying it immensely.

I thought I would provide a nice introduction into his work, enjoy:

7 short stories by Roberto Bolaño Gómez Palacio, The Insufferable Gaucho, Álvaro Rousselot’s Journey, Phone Calls, Dance Card. From Nazi Literature in the Americas: Edelmira Thompson de Mendiluce, Luz Mendiluce Thompson & Ernesto Pérez Masón and The Fabulous Schiaffino Boys. If you know the fiction of Roberto Bolaño you know what you’re in for. If you don’t, any of these stories is a good place to start, though the first three are perhaps the most natural starting points.

• One more story in audio form: A Literary Adventure [Miette's Bedtime Story Podcast]
• Poems: Self Portrait at Twenty Years and My Life in the Tubes of Survival.
• Interviews with his two main English language translators Chris Andrews and Natasha Wimmer.
• Biographical Essay on Bolaño by Wimmer. [pdf]
• Carmen Boullosa, a friend and contemporary of Bolaño’s, describes the literary scene the young Bolaño participated in during the 70’s.
• Paul Berman explains how Bolaño’s novel The Savage Detectives fits into the literary history of Latin America.