Never to Return

by Esther Tusquets, Barbara F. Ichiishi (Translator)

Never to Return is a witty, penetrating account of a woman’s inner journey to understanding through her encounter with Freudian psychoanalysis. On the brink of turning fifty, Elena suddenly falls into a deep depression. Her husband has gone off to New York to celebrate the triumph of his cinematic career, accompanied not by his wife but by a lover half her age. Meanwhile her grown sons have left home to pursue their own lives and relationships. Fearing aging, loneliness, a failed love, and a failed life, she begins sessions with a reputable Argentine psychoanalyst. Elena’s experience of analysis provides the occasion for an intense scrutiny of self and world, while it raises basic questions about the psychoanalytic method and its implications for female emotional development. Complex and ambivalent, her narration offers both a sharply satiric view of analysis and a consideration of its possible power and effectiveness.

 

Esther Tusquets is a leading figure on the Spanish literary scene. Since the early sixties she has directed the distinguished Barcelona publishing house Editorial Lumen. Never to Return is the fourth in a series of critically acclaimed novels characterized by a winding, associative style that captures the vibrant ebb and flow of a woman’s inner life.

194 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1985

About the author

Born into Barcelona's upper middle class on August 30, 1936, Tusquets grew up during Francisco Franco's right-wing dictatorship (in power from 1937 to 1975). She spent several years teaching literature and history at the Carillo Academy. She was the director of the publishing house "Lumen" in Barcelona. She published her first novel at age 42. Distinguished by a syntactically convoluted and multi-layered prose style, her works employ a relentless stream-of-consciousness reminiscent of Proust and Woolf.

She brought a highly eroticized woman's voice to Spain's post-Civil War literature. Her metafictional approach often employed emblematic lesbian characters to delineate the limits and possibilities of female sexual autonomy. Her work was a precursor in that it dealt openly with lesbianism for the first time in the history of Spanish narrative.

Reviews

[Zaira Zepahua · Rating 3 out of 5]

Cuando prestamos mucha atención a nuestros pensamientos y vamos transitando por los diversos recovecos de nuestra mente es difícil seguirnos el paso, algo así ocurre en esta novela, la lectura es difícil porque la protagonista todo el tiempo está dentro de su mente con sus sentimientos, inseguridades, dudas y también algunas certezas; yendo y viniendo para retomar lo que le inquieta. Los libros que hablan sobre condiciones humanas a las que inevitablemente todos plantaremos cara algún día me gustan mucho.
Yo se los recomendaría a psicólogos y psiquiatras, y personas que se están analizando, pero es que mi imaginación no da para tanto, y yo lo he disfrutado pese a no entrar en ninguna de esas categorías.
Quiero seguir leyendo a Tusquets, pero no por una temporada.
A veces siento que yo coloco la etiqueta, a todo lo que no sea machista, de feminista, y no sé si sea correcto, pero aquí vi puntos muy reivindicativos. Creo que vale mucho el esfuerzo, al final terminas acostumbrándote a la narrativa.

[Manchester · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lo empecé a leer hace unos meses. Lo dejé en stand by, me había entusiasmado pero no tenía disponible el tiempo que quería darle para poder seguir la lectura, para no interrumpirla. Ahora lo pude disfrutar. La escritura no es fácil, nada fácil, pero vale la pena. Hay carillas y carillas sin puntos, ni seguidos, ni aparte, paréntesis e intervenciones larguísimas. La protagonista deja fluir su narración, yendo y viniendo, de aquí a allá y viceversa, pero hay, indudablemente, un trabajo exquisito de escritura.
Es el primer libro de Tusquets que leo. Volveré a leerla, definitivamente.