The Quarterly Conversation, Issue 10, Winter 2008

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HISPANIC LITERATURE SPECIAL

The Fruits
of Parasitism
Essay by
Scott Esposito

Novelist Enrique Vila-Matas might just think literature is a disease and himself a parasite of it. Scott Esposito discusses why this has let him write some of the most innovative fiction published today. [more]

The Literary Alchemy of César Aira
Essay by
Marcelo Ballvé

César Aira tosses absurd ideas into his novels by the handful and never bothers to revise or even edit. Marcelo Ballvé argues this method has pushed him to the forefront of the Argentine literary scene. [more]

My Own Private Mexico
Essay by
Javier Moreno

It's a shame Rodrigo Fresán's Mantra hasn't been translated into English, argues Javier Moreno. The book has mutated with each of its four translations, and a fifth would add new readings to the preceding four. Not to mention, English readers should know about Fresán's continuously expanding inventory of all things we thought were Mexican but aren't and his ethological study of sea monkeys in captivity (their natural habitat). [more]

Story, History, or Historia?
Essay by
Elizabeth Wadell

In Mexico, José Emilio Pacheco's The Battles in the Desert is read by everyone from rock stars to high school students. In it, they find such typically Mexican concerns as memory, history, and national identity in a multicultural society. Elizabeth Wadell discusses how, for American readers, these matters don't sound very foreign after all. [more]

Bond, In Mexico
Essay by
Matt Bowman

The Mexican Revolution is a solemn touchstone of Mexican letters. Matt Bowman shows why Mexican author Jorge Ibargüengoitia has satirized and subverted it, and why he wishes more authors would follow in his steps. [more]

Autonauts of the Cosmoroute by Julio Cortazar
review by Chad Post

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
review by John Isaac Lingan

INTERVIEWS

Charles D'Ambrosio
interview by Barrett Hathcock

Barrett Hathcock interviews short story writer and essayist Charles D'Ambrosio about moving around, the Olivetti Lettera 32, feeling at home out West, and why you can't remember the names of the characters in your favorite short stories.

Pascale Ferran
interview by Anne Cammon

Anne Cammon talks to the renowned filmmaker about how he translated D.H.'s Lawrence's image of love in Lady Chatterley's Lover to the silver screen and why the movie requires 168 minutes.

FEATURE

Life is Freedom:
The Art of Vasily Grossman
essay by Sam Sacks

Though Life and Fate wasn't iced for 250 years, as Russian novelist Vasily Grossman was told it would be in 1961, Sam Sacks argues that this masterpiece of Russian literature is still too neglected.

REVIEWS

Vibrator by Mari Akasaka
review by Elizabeth Wadell

The Maias
by Jose Maria Eça de Queirós
review by E.J. Van Lanen

God Is Dead by Ron Currie, Jr.
review by Ryan Call

The Meat and Spirit Plan
by Selah Saterstrom
review by Scott Bryan Wilson

Partial List of People to
Bleach by Gary Lutz
review by Daniel Whatley

Sons and Other Flammable Objects
by Porochista Khakpour
review by Callie Miller

How to Read a Novel
by John Sutherland
review by John Harrison

Two books on the brain today:

The Body Has a Mind of Its Own
by Sandra and Matthew Blakeslee
review by Dave Munger

Everything is Miscelleanous
by David Weinberger
review by Megan Keane