{"id":294946,"date":"2013-08-28T16:58:19","date_gmt":"2013-08-28T16:58:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wdev.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent-dev\/2013\/08\/28\/feliz-cumpleanos-julio-cortazar\/"},"modified":"2018-04-16T15:56:34","modified_gmt":"2018-04-16T15:56:34","slug":"feliz-cumpleanos-julio-cortazar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/2013\/08\/28\/feliz-cumpleanos-julio-cortazar\/","title":{"rendered":"\u00a1Feliz cumplea\u00f1os, Julio Cort\u00e1zar!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Julio Cort\u00e1zar, one of the greatest writers ever,1<\/a><\/sup> was born on August 26, 1914, and to celebrate the week of his birthday, Archipelago Books, one of the greatest presses ever, is offering a 25% discount on all three of the Cort\u00e1zar books that they publish.<\/a> Just insert “HOPSCOTCH13,” a code based on one of the greatest books ever written, at the checkout to get the discount. <\/p>\n

Here’s a bit more info about the three Cort\u00e1zar titles that Archipelago publishes:<\/p>\n

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Autonauts of the Cosmoroute<\/em><\/b><\/center><\/p>\n
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The concept behind Autonauts of the Cosmoroute<\/em> is so perfectly Cortazarian in its gamelike setup: Julio Cortazar and his companion Carol Dunlop decide to spend an entire month in 1982 living on the freeway between Paris and Marseille (the \u201cSouthern Thruway,\u201d which was the name and topic of an earlier Cortazar story), stopping at two rest stops each day and staying overnight at the second. With only 490 miles separating Paris and Marseilles, they don\u2019t actually drive for very long on any given day. Using words and pictures, they create a scientific account of their journey, their thoughts, their experiences, of living life in a Volkswagen bus at a snail\u2019s pace, discovering the secret pathway right next to this modern creation designed to be experienced at a blur.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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It\u2019s a mad idea, but not without it\u2019s charm. [. . .]<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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Autonauts of the Cosmoroute<\/em> is a strange book\u2014not just in terms of Cortazar\u2019s oeuvre, but in general. It\u2019s a book to be cherished over a series of days, read leisurely, without trying to tease out any big themes, or gain any great insights. It\u2019s a book shot through with nostalgia, conveying a longing for a simpler time, for a month in the \u201ccountry\u201d experimenting with a new way to live and truly creating a special experience for these two people. There is an undercurrent of sadness running throughout, and for good reason: in the prologue, Cortazar\u2019s \u201cillness\u201d is mentioned (he reportedly died of leukemia in 1984), and at the very end, Dunlop has passed away and Cortazar is editing the book by himself. This is a special book, definitely worth reading, one that will alter your view of highways forever.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

(From the review I wrote for Quarterly Conversation.<\/a>)<\/p>\n

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From the Observatory<\/em><\/b><\/center><\/p>\n
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In my opinion, From the Observatory<\/em> is the most challenging of all his books that I\u2019ve read. In part, this is due to my own blindspot when it comes to poetry and poetic writing; in part, this is due to the elusive mingling of images and ideas present in this short, dense text.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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In the interview I conducted earlier this week with Anne McLean [no longer available online] we talked a bit about the “Julio Cortazar” that Archipelago has been constructing through the publication of From the Observatory<\/em>, The Diary of Andres Fava<\/em>, and Autonauts of the Cosmoroute<\/em>. In contrast to the Big Ideas and novelistic pyrotechnics found in the “classic” novels, these three books are quieter, and more personal. And in a way, they seem more focused on producing beautiful individual lines, than wowing the world with grand philosophical ideas.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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That\u2019s not to say that From the Observatory<\/em> isn\u2019t philosophical or removed from Cortazar\u2019s earlier interests. Science and scientific metaphors run throughout Cortazar\u2019s work, and are foregrounded in this piece, which intertwines information about the life cycle of eels from an article by Claude Lamotte that appeared in Le Monde with photographs and information about Jai Singh\u2019s observatories.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

(From this Three Percent review.<\/a>)<\/p>\n

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The Diary of Andres Fava<\/em><\/b><\/center><\/p>\n

The jacket copy:<\/p>\n

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Andr\u00e9s Fava is a character from Cort\u00e1zar\u2019s Final Exam<\/em>, and his diary originally formed part of that novel, written in 1950 but not published (for political reasons) until after the author\u2019s death. At some point, Cort\u00e1zar decided Fava\u2019s diary should stand on its own as an independent work.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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While Final Exam<\/em> is mostly dialogue, Diary of Andr\u00e9s Fava<\/em> is all reflection: on his reading, dreams, conversations and writing. This unpredictable collection is peppered with quotes from French poets and American jazzmen. Bemused and melancholy, erudite and searching, this first-time English translation of Diario de Andr\u00e9s Fava<\/em> is full of autobiographical winks at the reader. Cort\u00e1zar\u2019s brilliance and irreverence are in full flower.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

So head here now<\/a> and buy them all . . . <\/p>\n

1<\/sup> After I get my hyphellipses tattoo—which I’ve been talking about for literally ever—I want a “62” somewhere in honor of Cort\u00e1zar’s 62: A Model Kit<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Julio Cort\u00e1zar, one of the greatest writers ever,1 was born on August 26, 1914, and to celebrate the week of his birthday, Archipelago Books, one of the greatest presses ever, is offering a 25% discount on all three of the Cort\u00e1zar books that they publish. Just insert “HOPSCOTCH13,” a code based on one of the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":292,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[67486],"tags":[2176,13826,1646],"class_list":["post-294946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","tag-archipelago-books","tag-julio-cortazar","tag-review"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/292"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=294946"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294946\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":318126,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294946\/revisions\/318126"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=294946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=294946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rochester.edu\/College\/translation\/threepercent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=294946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}