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Christ Versus Arizona
Christ versus Arizona turns on the events in 1881 that surrounded the shootout at the OK Corral, where Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, and Virgil and Morgan Earp fought the Clantons and the McLaurys. Set against a backdrop of an Arizona influenced by the Mexican Revolution and the westward expansion of the United States, the story is a bravura performance by the 1989 Nobel Prize-winning author. A monologue by the naive, unreliable, and uneducated Wendell L. Espana, the book weaves together hundreds of characters and a torrent of interconnected anecdotes, some true, some fabricated. Wendell s story is a document of the vast array of ills that welcomed the dawning of the twentieth century, ills that continue to shape our world in the new millennium."
274 pages, Paperback
First published February 1, 1988
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577 people want to read
About the author
Camilo José Cela
356 books442 followersCamilo José Cela Trulock was a Spaniard writer from Galicia. Prolific author (as a novelist, journalist, essayist, literary magazine editor, lecturer ...), he was a member of the Royal Spanish Academy for 45 years and won, among others, the Prince of Asturias Prize for Literature in 1987, the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1989 ("for a rich and intensive prose, which with restrained compassion forms a challenging vision of man's vulnerability.") and the Cervantes Prize in 1995.
In 1996 King Juan Carlos I granted him, for his literary merits, the title Marquis of Iria Flavia.
His son, Camilo José Cela Conde is also a writer.
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camilo_J...
In 1996 King Juan Carlos I granted him, for his literary merits, the title Marquis of Iria Flavia.
His son, Camilo José Cela Conde is also a writer.
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camilo_J...
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Displaying 1 - 29 of 29 reviews
August 27, 2014
A rollicking Rabelasian invective, rightly furious, hilariously transgressive and ramblingly rant-filled, sustained with unflagging energy through a single two hundred odd page sentence full of cunts and cocks, pussies and putas, asses and abuse, incest and incontinence, violence and violation, bestiality and beating after beating after beating.
Also much pissing on the local Chinaman's door.
Also much pissing on the local Chinaman's door.
August 26, 2014
My introduction to Tombstone, Arizona and wildwest folklore starts and ends with Johnny Cash Sings the Ballads of the True West. Oh . . . and now this novel.
Narrated by Wendell Espana (or Wendell Liverpool Espana or Span or Aspen) in one meandering sentence, the novel is a barbed and horrific account of a senseless and bloodthirsty hellhole where violence and mayhem rules the roost. The sexual account of prostitutes is notably predominant (and drives the novel in its own depraved way) among the stories of murder and lunacy.
Needs to be read to be believed.
Narrated by Wendell Espana (or Wendell Liverpool Espana or Span or Aspen) in one meandering sentence, the novel is a barbed and horrific account of a senseless and bloodthirsty hellhole where violence and mayhem rules the roost. The sexual account of prostitutes is notably predominant (and drives the novel in its own depraved way) among the stories of murder and lunacy.
Needs to be read to be believed.
March 1, 2011
Camilo Jose Cela, the Spanish Nobel laureate, writes formidable novels, 1951's The Hive, perhaps his most famous work, recreates a Madrid street through the conversation of characters mingling in a cafe, my favorite, San Camilo, 1936 tells about the beginning of the Spanish Civil War mostly in huge blocks of unparagraphed prose and, again, with multiple characters, Christ Versus Arizona is a portrait of Tombstone, Arizona and its citizens, especially those living on the cusp of respectability, as told by one Wendell Liverpool Espana, it's a panoramic snapshot of the town and its people in the period of the First World War, the stories and facts Wendell tells about these people--I jotted down a list of 313 characters as I read, even some animals are named, like Jefferson the caiman and Dorothy the rattlesnake--recur over and over again, in this way Cela simmers and stirs a kind of mythic stew made up of many types of characters and social groups, though, as I say, taken all together they form a kind of demimonde, some of the characters are real, the people and events associated with the famous gunfight at the OK Corral appear in the novel at various times until the whole story of that particular quarrel is told, Pancho Villa and Mabel Dodge and other historical figures periodically surface, but Cela is primarily concerned with presenting a vision of hell and the damned who're fated to endure the rigors of life in Tombstone, stones and death are themes bringing to mind grave markers but also are connected to Christ as that stone which was rolled away, as for how Christ is meant to relate to Arizona, a legal action involving Him and the state is referred to as is a journey by Christ to Arizona, which is, I gather, not completed, but the larger meaning, I think, hinted at only once, is that Arizona resists redemption, is too far beyond salvation for even Christ, structurally, this is a clamor of stories folded into the omelette of a 261-page sentence, a single block of prose, or, at least, Cela doesn't use periods or paragraphs, this is an oddity not uncommon in Spanish and Latin American fiction--I'm reminded of Juan Benet's brilliant single-paragraphed 366-page novel A Meditation, and the strained 63-page sentence with which Garcia Marquez ended The Autumn of the Patriarch--but I found myself thinking for the first time in reading Cela that whatever stylistic function he might intend is deflected by Christ Versus Arizona's self-consciously pointing to its lack of paragraphs and that commas are used in place of end stops, it sounds more daunting than it is, the prose is actually rhythmic and flows easily enough, I was thinking as I read that Cela could have made it more difficult by--like Joyce or Beckett, for instance--simply leaving it totally unpunctuated, even the huge number of characters is manageable, they're always mentioned by a full name and usually accompanied by a character trait providing a key to their identity, such as Blonde Marie or Rowdy Joe Lowe, another way in which characters stand out is the novel's focus on their race and ethnicity, most of the characters are Hispanic or black or American Indian or Chinese or many blends in between, and all these characters and their stories whirl around and carom off each other to form a vast portrait of Tombstone, as I say, the picture and atmosphere is that of a wasteland, physical as well as spiritual and emphasized by so much talk of death, indeed these people are already dead, Tombstone the town looms over them and their stories of hangings, violence, incest, illicit sex, and hardship, maybe in some ways Cela is the father of such novelists as David Markson and Gilbert Sorrentino who also wrote novels woven together by short, stabbing items forming a whole, but I also thought all during the reading that Christ Versus Arizona might have been a significant influence on Roberto Bolano's 2666 as well.
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March 1, 2023Christ is not a character in this novel, the title notwithstanding. He's more an allegorical presence, to-wit: Christ doesn't wear spurs but he gives the orders, he says when we die . . .
And there's death aplenty here in Tombstone, Arizona. For instance, there's only one tree, so a line forms for the hangings.
The narrator (mostly) is Wendell Liverpool Lochiel aka Wendell L. Espana or Span or Aspen, or maybe his name is Craig Tiger Brewer or, as he laments, I never really knew for sure because I never saw it written. In any event, Wendell (let's call him) does most of the writing - in my own handwriting little by little observing all the rules of grammar (if not punctuation). I've heard it said that this novel is one long sentence but that's not accurate. It's just run-on sentences, sentence fragments and thoughts, separated only by commas. Wendell calls it a litany, and it has that feel. Which is to say Wendell repeats himself. A lot. From a distance it looks like Saramago (another Nobel winner), but a reader gets the feel of Saramago; this, not so much.
It is said in the blurbs that Wendell is "naïve, unreliable, and uneducated" and I can't argue with any of that. I just know something's not right with Wendell. With cause, perhaps. His mother is a prostitute (like most all of the women in Tombstone). His father . . . well, his father had seven sons by Wendell's mother, and when each boy made it to age six (though Wendell's daddy wasn't always sure), Wendell's daddy would brand each boy on the buttock with a rose design. We're not told why, but Wendell's mother, years later, would always check the buttocks of her clients before she serviced them. She checked Wendell and saw the rose but that didn't stop the service. Wendell also relates that his father had a tame caiman that spoke several languages and that, for fun, he made Wendell's momma service the caiman too. That might be the naïve, unreliable, and uneducated part, I don't know. His father wanted to reprise the act, with a donkey instead of a caiman, but decided the risks outweighed the rewards. Meaning he wasn't all unkind.
So, there was plenty of killing and sex, too, if you don't mind what you say. And masturbation, flatulence, defecation, urination, bigotry and racism, sometimes all mixed together. To say there was too much irreverence and scatology even for me is to say there is too much irreverence and scatology. There I said it. the best whore can let a fart slip out or, it's the same thing, the best cook can sometimes burn the beans,
I learned the seven bad breath smells but I don't see how that's helpful. Learned this too: Zach Dusteen knows how to preserve bodies, first you bathe them with great care, then you wrap them in a linen sheet, then you let them stand for exactly one week from the time of death, and then slather them with King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba's ointment--every day at first, and afterwards on alternate days--the ointment is made by kneading beeswax with sweet almond oil and sperm from a jaguar that's eaten human flesh, this part is difficult so it isn't compulsory, essence of benzoin and rose water, all in proportion, I'll check on Amazon.
There's a host of characters: The crazy Indian, the phlegmatic Norwegian, the tubercular Turk, the one-eyed Mexican, the thieving Frenchman, the black who can play the banjo, the conceited Spaniard, the Irishman who wants to fight everybody, the Polack who kills from behind, the Greek who rouges his cheeks . . . There's also celebrities: the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Sitting Bull. D.H. Lawrence gets a cameo, getting buried with his typewriter. David Duke and the Ku Klux Klan do a drive-by, I suppose to make the work relevant to today.
There's a kind of vignette where a rattlesnake is put in a glass container and then mice are dropped in (once a bird). The rattlesnake won't do anything until it's hungry. Then it kills and eats. Like everything else in this novel - every hanging, every belt-whipping, every fart - the scene gets repeated. Perhaps the scene has allegorical pretensions, I don't know. But that scene kind of sums up my reading experience.
And there's death aplenty here in Tombstone, Arizona. For instance, there's only one tree, so a line forms for the hangings.
The narrator (mostly) is Wendell Liverpool Lochiel aka Wendell L. Espana or Span or Aspen, or maybe his name is Craig Tiger Brewer or, as he laments, I never really knew for sure because I never saw it written. In any event, Wendell (let's call him) does most of the writing - in my own handwriting little by little observing all the rules of grammar (if not punctuation). I've heard it said that this novel is one long sentence but that's not accurate. It's just run-on sentences, sentence fragments and thoughts, separated only by commas. Wendell calls it a litany, and it has that feel. Which is to say Wendell repeats himself. A lot. From a distance it looks like Saramago (another Nobel winner), but a reader gets the feel of Saramago; this, not so much.
It is said in the blurbs that Wendell is "naïve, unreliable, and uneducated" and I can't argue with any of that. I just know something's not right with Wendell. With cause, perhaps. His mother is a prostitute (like most all of the women in Tombstone). His father . . . well, his father had seven sons by Wendell's mother, and when each boy made it to age six (though Wendell's daddy wasn't always sure), Wendell's daddy would brand each boy on the buttock with a rose design. We're not told why, but Wendell's mother, years later, would always check the buttocks of her clients before she serviced them. She checked Wendell and saw the rose but that didn't stop the service. Wendell also relates that his father had a tame caiman that spoke several languages and that, for fun, he made Wendell's momma service the caiman too. That might be the naïve, unreliable, and uneducated part, I don't know. His father wanted to reprise the act, with a donkey instead of a caiman, but decided the risks outweighed the rewards. Meaning he wasn't all unkind.
So, there was plenty of killing and sex, too, if you don't mind what you say. And masturbation, flatulence, defecation, urination, bigotry and racism, sometimes all mixed together. To say there was too much irreverence and scatology even for me is to say there is too much irreverence and scatology. There I said it. the best whore can let a fart slip out or, it's the same thing, the best cook can sometimes burn the beans,
I learned the seven bad breath smells but I don't see how that's helpful. Learned this too: Zach Dusteen knows how to preserve bodies, first you bathe them with great care, then you wrap them in a linen sheet, then you let them stand for exactly one week from the time of death, and then slather them with King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba's ointment--every day at first, and afterwards on alternate days--the ointment is made by kneading beeswax with sweet almond oil and sperm from a jaguar that's eaten human flesh, this part is difficult so it isn't compulsory, essence of benzoin and rose water, all in proportion, I'll check on Amazon.
There's a host of characters: The crazy Indian, the phlegmatic Norwegian, the tubercular Turk, the one-eyed Mexican, the thieving Frenchman, the black who can play the banjo, the conceited Spaniard, the Irishman who wants to fight everybody, the Polack who kills from behind, the Greek who rouges his cheeks . . . There's also celebrities: the Earp brothers and Doc Holliday, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Sitting Bull. D.H. Lawrence gets a cameo, getting buried with his typewriter. David Duke and the Ku Klux Klan do a drive-by, I suppose to make the work relevant to today.
There's a kind of vignette where a rattlesnake is put in a glass container and then mice are dropped in (once a bird). The rattlesnake won't do anything until it's hungry. Then it kills and eats. Like everything else in this novel - every hanging, every belt-whipping, every fart - the scene gets repeated. Perhaps the scene has allegorical pretensions, I don't know. But that scene kind of sums up my reading experience.
October 23, 2018
Aceasta carte a fost o surpriza nemaipomenita, am primit-o de la un foarte bun prieten care si el citeste literatura spaniola sau sud-americana, Camilo Jose Cela am mai citit acum foarte multi ani, parca Stupul se chema cartea, dar Cristo versus Arizona este o experienta uluitoare, cartea se citeste relativ repede, totusi trebuie sa fii foarte concentrat, caci neavand decat virgule, toata cartea este de fapt o singura fraza, singurul punct este la sfarsit asa ca cititul este foarte fluid si daca nu te concentrezi citesti randuri intregi si dupa vreo 10 randuri habar nu ai ce ai citit, Camilo Jose Cela are o imaginatie uluitoare, reusind in 245 de pagini sa creeze o atmosfera de vest salbatic, de western, de foarte multe ori am avut impresia ca in aceasta carte sunt prezentate extrem de fidel imagini demne de Hieronimus Bosch, cred ca traducerea unei astfel de carti este extrem de dificila, in special cu multitudinea de personaje cu nume atat de rezonante si colorate, nu trebuie sa ne lasam pacaliti de desfatarile, placerile sexuale si omorurile prezente la fiecare cateva randuri, cartea cuprinde meditatii asupra dumnezeilor, asupra barbatilor si femeilor, asupra relatiilor dintre acestia, asupra vietii si a mortii, este un roman pe care as vrea sa il recitesc candva si sa extrag toate meditatiile care sunt foarte frumos prezentate, unele mi-au adus aminte de o imagine din cartea Inimi cicatrizate a lui Max Blecher, cand o sa recitesc cartea vreau sa fac o lista cu personajele si diversele legaturi dintre ele, caci sunt foarte multe personaje, precum si multe litanii la care trebuie sa raspunzi cu ora pro nobis, este o carte pe care o recomand cu caldura in vederea unei experiente literare neobisnuite. (PUNCT)
September 18, 2014
Here is my review of this ‘sort of story’ by the Nobel prize winning author Cela, written in 1988 in Spanish is about the life and times of Arizona around the early 1900s via a single sentence monologue running to 260 pages!, and reflects the views and history of Wendel Espana who like many other characters has other names but helpfully keeps the same one during the narrative, through the many, many people that populate the story all with some extremely memorable incidents and events that then may reappear perhaps slightly modified, but nonetheless keeps a thread of continuity, such people include Wendell’s prostitute mother Matilda whom he regularly has sex with (only discovering their true relationship due to the brand on his buttocks left by his errant father, Cecil), there are two of his missing brothers called Bill and Pato both with the brand, a mulatto called Zuro that sleeps with a sex doll and was killed by Cecil, who himself dies when he catches smallpox and is thrown alive from the boat to avoid infection, the sheriff Sam Lindo of the town Tomiston (aka Tombstone) hangs people from the only tree in the area and won’t let the rope be taken because its government property, there’s Andra Abanda who knits a woollen bag to hold Erkine Carlow’s single remaining testicle, Patrica kills children to extract their blood for love potions, now the list goes on including missionaries, more prostitutes, several historical characters like all those at the OK coral, Butch Cassidy, Apache Indians, Jeronimo, a Chinaman who eats dog meat to enlarge his penis, and some various bad and perverted men and women and so on, in deed there is an awful lot of sex and perversion in this story, for example Chamberino likes to deflower girls before their first communion, Matilda being one of his victims but there are others, you can imagine that filling all the pages ends up with groping, exposing, scat play, fellatio, castration, bestiality, incest, masturbation, whippings, also appear, but should you worry?, of course not, this is imaginatively written and doesn’t feel gratuitous, the style of the text is quite amazing really with the incessant pace and never ending gems of the depiction make this one of the better novels I’ve read based on a unique challenging writing style, you couldn’t say it was magical realism because I think there is only really one consistent event that meets this criteria and that’s that Wendel owns a caiman that supposedly speaks English and Spanish, but the style might worry some but I can assure you that after a couple of pages it becomes immensely readable and enjoyable, now some quotes,
“all strangers go around dragging a dirty bloody history that they don’t want to tell anyone, silence ends up making the bones ache”, and
“people went to other places leaving their dead in charge of the memories they left behind”, and
“with a stiff cock nobody believes in God”,
accepting this is a one sentence novel really I did however wonder if the typesetters of the paperback version hadn’t got it slightly wrong on page 62 where a question mark (which I normally assume to be the equivalent of a fullstop) is immediately followed by a capital Y i.e. “slob? Yes” rather than all similar other occasions in the book with a “?,yes” suggesting in my fastidious way two sentences, but anyway, having read two other books by Cela I’d say this novel is strangely like Boxwood which is good but not quite as good,
and so now to conclude, please forgive my attempt at a single sentence review which might put you off but instead try the real thing – read this book, highly recommended, and now at last the .
“all strangers go around dragging a dirty bloody history that they don’t want to tell anyone, silence ends up making the bones ache”, and
“people went to other places leaving their dead in charge of the memories they left behind”, and
“with a stiff cock nobody believes in God”,
accepting this is a one sentence novel really I did however wonder if the typesetters of the paperback version hadn’t got it slightly wrong on page 62 where a question mark (which I normally assume to be the equivalent of a fullstop) is immediately followed by a capital Y i.e. “slob? Yes” rather than all similar other occasions in the book with a “?,yes” suggesting in my fastidious way two sentences, but anyway, having read two other books by Cela I’d say this novel is strangely like Boxwood which is good but not quite as good,
and so now to conclude, please forgive my attempt at a single sentence review which might put you off but instead try the real thing – read this book, highly recommended, and now at last the .
September 13, 2015
Obra maestra del lenguaje duro y poético, la novela es narrada por un wendell liverpool que desconoce su procedencia y que por las pistas que nos da es un ser resignado y arrepentido que recorre impasible las atrocidades cometidas en arizona a principios del siglo XX en un parrafo enorme con un sólo punto. Por el pasan cientos de personajes que padecen la historia. La belleza de este libro es puramente verbal, es un ejercicio de lenguaje duro y eficaz tan radical que lo rechacé en una primera lectura, hoy día adoro el libro y otras obras maestras de cela que van en esta linea como san camilo o madera de boj. El libro es fascinante en su recorrido geográfico con la fascinación de no saber cómo fueron las cosas porque las cuenta un loco, algunas de sus frases permanecen en la memoria como la que antecede a su único punto, el final, tras soltar una desoladora parrafada mística en latin sobre el cordero de la mansedumbre. Nada más se puede pedir de este libro salvo la enumeración caótica y deslumbrante de un maestro literario que nos hizo viajar desde la alcarria hasta arizona.
October 25, 2013
it was one long sentence. but a good one!
July 7, 2021
3 3/4 stars
March 27, 2014
Am citit acest volum pe cand eram librar la librariile Humanitas si eram rapus la pat de niscai boala grea.
Cristos versus Arizona s-a mulat perfect pe starea mea fizica si spirituala de atunci si mi-a placut extrem de mult.
Experimentul lui Jose Cela poate sa para extrem de obositor, probabil ca ar si fi fost si pentru mine daca nu eram intr-o stare de semi-delir.
Romanul este, de fapt, facut dintr-o singura fraza, fara paragraf, fara linii de dialog, cu o serie de cuvinte care se repeta adeseori, parca pentru a te trezi din insiruirea grabnica de evenimente si personaje care se succed cu o viteza ametitoare.
Nu este un roman indicat celor care nu "gusta" astfel de experimente pentru ca pot sa arunce cartea cat-colo dupa nici 10 pagini. Insa e, categoric, un must-read pentru cei care isi doresc o excursie interesanta pe terenul unei imaginatii extraordinare si a unui talent si scriituri de o reala valoare.
Cristos versus Arizona s-a mulat perfect pe starea mea fizica si spirituala de atunci si mi-a placut extrem de mult.
Experimentul lui Jose Cela poate sa para extrem de obositor, probabil ca ar si fi fost si pentru mine daca nu eram intr-o stare de semi-delir.
Romanul este, de fapt, facut dintr-o singura fraza, fara paragraf, fara linii de dialog, cu o serie de cuvinte care se repeta adeseori, parca pentru a te trezi din insiruirea grabnica de evenimente si personaje care se succed cu o viteza ametitoare.
Nu este un roman indicat celor care nu "gusta" astfel de experimente pentru ca pot sa arunce cartea cat-colo dupa nici 10 pagini. Insa e, categoric, un must-read pentru cei care isi doresc o excursie interesanta pe terenul unei imaginatii extraordinare si a unui talent si scriituri de o reala valoare.
December 27, 2021
Con muchos fragmentos he flipado. Es el primer libro que me leo de Cela y no me esperaba esta escritura tan cruda y sucia. He disfrutado muchas partes del libro....PERO, la manera de escribir esta novela sin un solo punto (salvo el punto final) convirtiéndola en un texto corrido de 240 páginas me ha resultado en muchos momentos pesada. Opino que lo de no poner ni un solo punto fue una cabezonería de Cela porque usa muchas comas como si fuesen puntos. Si lo hizo por innovar en la literatura española hay que reconocer que lo consiguió.
May 30, 2023
Camilo Jose Cela swings words like a machete, slicing through dusty tumbleweeds of Western cliches, carving out a story so raw and vivid, it'll leave you tasting dust and blood.
"Christ Versus Arizona" isn't for the faint-hearted. It's a bare-knuckle brawl, a tequila shot of spirituality that burns on the way down and leaves a lingering taste of what it means to fight for survival, to question your beliefs, and to face the relentless mirage of the desert.
"Christ Versus Arizona" isn't for the faint-hearted. It's a bare-knuckle brawl, a tequila shot of spirituality that burns on the way down and leaves a lingering taste of what it means to fight for survival, to question your beliefs, and to face the relentless mirage of the desert.
September 29, 2013
Got to pg 7 out of 269. No chapters, no paragraphs, no periods. Mother a prostitute, child branded on butt at age 5, sexual relationship between mother & son, crocodile that can speak 3 languages & is supposed to have sex with mother. Too much for me! Tore up the book and put it into recycling so as not to inflict it on anybody else. The good thing is that I spent only 50 cents on it.
February 6, 2009
One of the best and most interesting books I've read in a while. The narrator never stops - there are no periods or paragraphs. Many of the phrases are repeated and it creates a litany.
This book was written in 1987 when Cela was in his 70s. He received the Nobel Prize in '89
This book was written in 1987 when Cela was in his 70s. He received the Nobel Prize in '89
August 22, 2021
Me ha gustado mucho la manera tan original en la que está escrito, pero me ha parecido demasiado duro.
October 29, 2024
La primera vez que intenté leer este libro me derrotó como a las diez páginas, igual estaba desvelado. Por puro instinto supe que me estaba perdiendo de algo porque yo al Cela lo estimo mucho como escritor y por eso guardé la novela para después. Ahora que volví a él me voló la cabeza. Primera lección aprendida: descansar antes de leer estos portentos narrativos.
Dejando de lado su corte experimental, de irse de corrido sin poner puntos, esta novela lo que entrega es un lenguaje delirante, rítmico, una oración en todos los sentidos. Lo narra un personaje que no tiene claro ni su nombre, que constantemente lo tiene que repetir, como el de otros tantos personajes que aparecen, y cuenta, y vaya que sabe contar, todo lo que se le ocurre y las cosas que le ocurrieron, o es decir, puras ocurrencias.
Es la violencia encarnizada en una zona del oeste, con sus cowboys y muertes, pero no cede a las representaciones hollywoodescas, Cela transmite la complejidad de esta tierra fronteriza y de mescolanza. Aquí conviven los gringos y los mexicanos, historia de gabacha y de la Revolución, madres que reconoce a su hijo después de tener sexo con él, ingles castellanizado, vocabulario mexicanizado (y sin hacer el ridículo o la mofa), gente que vive y gente que se desvive por no morir.
Al leerlo no podía creer que esto saliera de un viejo español, no le encontraba el tono a Cela. Después me di cuenta que esto solo pudo salir de su hocico majadero pero lleno de poesía, que todo ese conglomerado de personajes era algo así como La colmena, pero a la décima potencia. Es esa misma sensación de estar creando un mundo en ese instante, caracterizando a esos seres con pocas palabras y se quedan muy grabados. Es una bestia Camilo José Cela.
Y pensar que esta novela la publicó un año antes de que le dieran el Nobel. No podía ser de otra forma, aquí hizo y deshizo lo que esperamos de ese género narrativo, es un laboratorio, un hacer lo que se venga en gana y salirse con la suya. Es la explosión de hasta donde puede llegar (y más) la ficción. Es el no va más de un lenguaje que sí, siempre puede ir a más. El que le entre a esta novela, cuidado, te va a cambiar todo lo que crees saber de cómo escribir y cómo leer.
Dejando de lado su corte experimental, de irse de corrido sin poner puntos, esta novela lo que entrega es un lenguaje delirante, rítmico, una oración en todos los sentidos. Lo narra un personaje que no tiene claro ni su nombre, que constantemente lo tiene que repetir, como el de otros tantos personajes que aparecen, y cuenta, y vaya que sabe contar, todo lo que se le ocurre y las cosas que le ocurrieron, o es decir, puras ocurrencias.
Es la violencia encarnizada en una zona del oeste, con sus cowboys y muertes, pero no cede a las representaciones hollywoodescas, Cela transmite la complejidad de esta tierra fronteriza y de mescolanza. Aquí conviven los gringos y los mexicanos, historia de gabacha y de la Revolución, madres que reconoce a su hijo después de tener sexo con él, ingles castellanizado, vocabulario mexicanizado (y sin hacer el ridículo o la mofa), gente que vive y gente que se desvive por no morir.
Al leerlo no podía creer que esto saliera de un viejo español, no le encontraba el tono a Cela. Después me di cuenta que esto solo pudo salir de su hocico majadero pero lleno de poesía, que todo ese conglomerado de personajes era algo así como La colmena, pero a la décima potencia. Es esa misma sensación de estar creando un mundo en ese instante, caracterizando a esos seres con pocas palabras y se quedan muy grabados. Es una bestia Camilo José Cela.
Y pensar que esta novela la publicó un año antes de que le dieran el Nobel. No podía ser de otra forma, aquí hizo y deshizo lo que esperamos de ese género narrativo, es un laboratorio, un hacer lo que se venga en gana y salirse con la suya. Es la explosión de hasta donde puede llegar (y más) la ficción. Es el no va más de un lenguaje que sí, siempre puede ir a más. El que le entre a esta novela, cuidado, te va a cambiar todo lo que crees saber de cómo escribir y cómo leer.
June 26, 2023
Me he vuelto fan de Cela; con "La Catira" me atrapó, y luego de leer tantas recomendaciones y cosas sobre "Cristo versus Arizona", pensaba que me encontraría con una maravilla; por un momento llegué a creer que había encontrado otro "Concierto barroco", pero no fue así. La obra es muy buena, aunque no consiguió convencerme en su totalidad. Eso sí, para mí, tiene cinco estrellas no más por lo experimental, pero no lo sé parece que le jugó mal dicha experimentación.
Abarca dos técnicas: "escritura corrida" (dicho a lo venezolano, ya que no recuerdo el nombre original), y el uso de la coma, nada más, solamente es eso. Es bastante interesante e ingenioso, aunque pensé que me encontraría con otra cosa: no resultó lo que esperaba y el hecho de ser más como un monólogo y todo este narrado en primera persona desde el principio. No lo sé, siento que leo a alguien de Wattpad que aún no sabe desarrollar los personajes y su universo y los pone a hablar todo lo que debería mostrarnos. De resto, pues, como dije: es ingenioso y muy interesante, pero la ejecución no resultó ser apropiada para el estilo que le dio en primera persona. Es no más mi forma de verlo, tan pronto pueda leer por completo "La Catira" hablaré más de Cela, ya que es un escritor que no se puede pasar por alto. Tiene un "noseque" que te atrapa, pero esta obra no me atrapó mucho que digamos...
Abarca dos técnicas: "escritura corrida" (dicho a lo venezolano, ya que no recuerdo el nombre original), y el uso de la coma, nada más, solamente es eso. Es bastante interesante e ingenioso, aunque pensé que me encontraría con otra cosa: no resultó lo que esperaba y el hecho de ser más como un monólogo y todo este narrado en primera persona desde el principio. No lo sé, siento que leo a alguien de Wattpad que aún no sabe desarrollar los personajes y su universo y los pone a hablar todo lo que debería mostrarnos. De resto, pues, como dije: es ingenioso y muy interesante, pero la ejecución no resultó ser apropiada para el estilo que le dio en primera persona. Es no más mi forma de verlo, tan pronto pueda leer por completo "La Catira" hablaré más de Cela, ya que es un escritor que no se puede pasar por alto. Tiene un "noseque" que te atrapa, pero esta obra no me atrapó mucho que digamos...
May 15, 2024
No reconozco aquí al Cela que me gusta, al carpetovetónico, viajero, contemplativo, irónico y un poco socarrón que retrató como nadie las miserias de la posguerra en La Colmena.
Se acerca más a ese otro Cela deslumbrante de estilo, con una energía literaria asombrosa que le hizo capaz de plasmar el habla venezolana en esa joya que es La Catira, o al del mareante sinsentido literario que es La Cruz de San Andres.
Este ha sido para mi un libro confuso, a veces brillante, crudo como la vida misma, hipnótico otras veces, revulsivo la mayor parte del tiempo.
Libros como este no se recomiendan. A esta literatura se tiene que llegar por uno mismo.
Se acerca más a ese otro Cela deslumbrante de estilo, con una energía literaria asombrosa que le hizo capaz de plasmar el habla venezolana en esa joya que es La Catira, o al del mareante sinsentido literario que es La Cruz de San Andres.
Este ha sido para mi un libro confuso, a veces brillante, crudo como la vida misma, hipnótico otras veces, revulsivo la mayor parte del tiempo.
Libros como este no se recomiendan. A esta literatura se tiene que llegar por uno mismo.
June 20, 2024
Um livro menor, muito menor da produção literária de Cela. Este romance só tem importância se enxergado apenas pelo prisma formal, que, por outro lado, mesmo experimental, não apresenta nenhuma novidade. A ausência de pontos, favorecendo a sensação de automatismo deixou de ser novidade no começo do século XX, quanto mais no final.
Alguns momentos são divertidos, anedóticos, a maioria, contudo, repugnantes e que parecem servir a um propósito do autor, que, independentemente qual seja, carece de atrativo estético e narrativo para praticamente qualquer tipo de leitor.
Alguns momentos são divertidos, anedóticos, a maioria, contudo, repugnantes e que parecem servir a um propósito do autor, que, independentemente qual seja, carece de atrativo estético e narrativo para praticamente qualquer tipo de leitor.
June 19, 2020
Liked it for its extreme, multifaceted virtuosity but it's certainly a difficult book to get through with its endless depravity and static structure in the form of a continuously revolving spiral of recurring characters and events.
May 30, 2025
No sé cómo explicar este monólogo sin un sólo punto más que el punto final. La primeras 30-40 páginas no sabía que me iba a deparar este western brutalista luego me he hecho al sexo, violencia y descripción sin igual. Ore pro nobis dos veces
August 5, 2019
I couldn't keep up the reading of one long sentence, which is what this gorgeous, stream of consciousness is. I'd need to do it in a setting, there's no proper place to put the book down ;(
June 7, 2022
Reminded me of a depraved, localized version of Wittgenstein’s Mistress. Hypnotic at its best and impenetrable at its worst.
December 31, 2024
con lo bien que empezó cela su carrera y le rieron demasiado las gracias
January 20, 2025
Repulsiu.
December 8, 2021
This book was such an absolute trip, the entire book is a 262 paged run on sentence, a rant from a man that may or may not be who he says he is, it’s a tell all for the people of Tombstone, Arizona, taking place around the time of the O.K. Corral shootout, the prose is very difficult because it’s actually a litany of stories intertwined, but it’s so good/bad, which surmises my whole feeling of this book, I hated reading it but I loved every second of what I read, so was it good, bad, or both? vice and virtue come and go like the seasons, life just like the seasons has moments of overlap, in Tombstone Arizona sex, violence, life, death, love, hate, or any opposing thought/reality can be interchanged at any given moment and at many times they overlap, like for instance how Wendell Liverpool Espana or Span or Aspan(our dim witted and deep as hell narrator) morally loves his mother and loves to immorally sleep with his mother (this and many other wtf moments casually happen on every single page sometimes in the same breath you read it with), the meaning of things can get lost in how you view and interpret them, don’t believe me? Reread the title Christ Versus (meaning against/opposed) Arizona, Cela is using the Latin version of Versus which means towards, so before you even open the book you’re faced with two dueling perspectives over the exact same thing, god help us if we’ve lost the original meaning for the rules of grammar or life, also the story of what really happened in history becomes garbled in this book, you live as long as someone remembers you and the accuracy of that memory is dependent on the strength of that person’s mind, what might have been true when you did something will be remembered as something entirely different as time goes on (not just for Latin but all of history), and if the storyteller lives long enough then there’s no one left to argue on behalf of what really happened, the truth gets lost in prose, the human tongue can have more venom than a snake and gossip can bring down any fort, take the story of the O.K. Corral shootout, it’s portrayed as good guys versus bad guys, but there are also less popular recordings that say the Earp's robbed stagecoaches and the cowboys never really bothered anyone, so what’s true? Whatever you say, no one is left alive that can argue with you, but if truth is dependent on some ancient text then I feel bad for you because the truth sure as hell have been lost or changed over time.
March 29, 2015
Cela won the Nobel Prize for Literature. I can only assume his other books are better than this one. To be as clear as possible, I hated everything about this book. Its style I might appreciated as innovative – it is one deranged, run-on sentence regarding the people of Tombstone, Arizona – for 274 pages. Edit. Please edit. The book’s style is unreadable. Unfortunately, it is the best thing about the book.
I supposed the point of this book can be summed up in the lines, “Jesusito Huevon Mochila enjoyed the misery of others, what he likes best is seeing the eyes of the animals, the gleam that’s fading out, at first gently and then with distress, and they drool, all of them drool, do you know if it’s true that they instituted proceedings against Christ in Arizona?, no, no I don’t know, nobody can take Christ to court because he’s God and God always wins, God can work miracles and change a woman into a lizard with three eyes and horns, it depends on what he wants, Christ—rather, God—is tougher than Arizona, in another way but still tougher and he has a better memory, Christ—that is, God—never forgets wrongs or good works,…” (31) I’m just guessing that’s sort of the point. The rest of the book deals with pedophiles, scatology, murder, and repeated incest. It is wretched. Apparently this is a book about how to live, kill, die and be killed in Tombstone. Terrible place.
See my other reviews here!
I supposed the point of this book can be summed up in the lines, “Jesusito Huevon Mochila enjoyed the misery of others, what he likes best is seeing the eyes of the animals, the gleam that’s fading out, at first gently and then with distress, and they drool, all of them drool, do you know if it’s true that they instituted proceedings against Christ in Arizona?, no, no I don’t know, nobody can take Christ to court because he’s God and God always wins, God can work miracles and change a woman into a lizard with three eyes and horns, it depends on what he wants, Christ—rather, God—is tougher than Arizona, in another way but still tougher and he has a better memory, Christ—that is, God—never forgets wrongs or good works,…” (31) I’m just guessing that’s sort of the point. The rest of the book deals with pedophiles, scatology, murder, and repeated incest. It is wretched. Apparently this is a book about how to live, kill, die and be killed in Tombstone. Terrible place.
See my other reviews here!
March 2, 2013
today I walked into the library thinking about how my first son will be named after the legendary Wyatt Earp
and then upon reading this, I realized I had just borrowed a book -- previously hinted in no way at all -- of fictitious or part historical characters & events surrounding Tombstone.
my love for the desert pushes me onwards in reading this
but can I pull it off? the drone of the 245-page sentence is ridden with uncensored filth -- is it the collective genius of postmodernity or really simply the dark, slimy walls of one man's soul?
and then upon reading this, I realized I had just borrowed a book -- previously hinted in no way at all -- of fictitious or part historical characters & events surrounding Tombstone.
my love for the desert pushes me onwards in reading this
but can I pull it off? the drone of the 245-page sentence is ridden with uncensored filth -- is it the collective genius of postmodernity or really simply the dark, slimy walls of one man's soul?
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