Nest in the Bones: Stories

by Antonio di Benedetto, Martina Broner (Translator)

Antonio Di Benedetto wrote with constant poetic innovation. His genre-defying stories, often dark and unexpectedly moving, explore the space between imagination and reality, tragedy and melodrama, civilization and barbarism. Nest in the Bones attests to Di Benedetto’s mastery of the short form as well as his impressive range across genres and styles. Di Benedetto was a writer’s writer, admired by Julio Cortázar, Roberto Bolaño, and Ricardo Piglia, who counted Di Benedetto, next to Borges, as one of the two great models of Latin American literature.

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Spanish Literature, 20th Century

275 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1953

About the author

Antonio di Benedetto was an Argentine journalist and writer.

Di Benedetto began writing and publishing stories in his teens, inspired by the works of Fyodor Dostoevsky and Luigi Pirandello. Mundo Animal, appearing in 1952, was his first story collection and won prestigious awards. A revised version came out in 1971, but the Xenos Books translation uses the first edition to catch the youthful flavor.

Antonio di Benedetto wrote five novels, the most famous being the existential masterpiece Zama (1956). Los suicidas (The Suicides, 1969) is noteworthy for expressing his intense abhorrence of noise. Critics have compared his works to Alain Robbe-Grillet, Julio Cortázar and Ernesto Sábato.

In mid-sixties or early seventies he caused a diplomatic faux-pas at a NATO meeting when during a ceremonial toast he raised his cup and said "cin cin" to bystanding Japanese diplomats. This caused an international pandemonium, as "chin chin" is a slang term for penis in Japanese. This later led to his prosecution. In 1976, during the military dictatorship of General Videla, di Benedetto was imprisoned and tortured. Released a year later, he went into exile in Spain, then returned home in 1984. He travelled widely and won numerous awards, but never acquired the worldwide fame of other Latin American writers, perhaps because his work was not translated to many languages.

Reviews

[meelad · Rating 4 out of 5]

این البته امتیاز من به قصه‌های خوب کتاب است. معدودی هم بودند که زیاد به مذاقم خوش نیامدند.
کتاب گلچینی است از داستان‌های کوتاه دی بندتو است که تمام مجموعه داستان‌های منتشر شدهٔ او، از دنیای حیوانی (۱۹۵۳) تا قصه‌های تبعید (۱۹۸۳) که پنجاه سال بعد منتشر شده، در بر می‌گیرد. چند یادداشت/نامه/خاطره هم آخرش هست که قاعدتاً از کتاب اتوبیوگرافیش آمده.
از نکات قوت کتاب قدرت داستانسرایی (سبکی، دقت) و رنگ‌آمیزی بدیع و متنوع موقعیت‌های داستانی است. تنوع سبک‌ها از رئالیسم جادویی تا نئورئالیسم ایتالیایی قابل توجه است. چیزی که کمتر به دلم نشست تکرار نوعی چرخش پایانی مبتنی بر تغییر نقش یا انطباق نقش‌های شخصیت‌های اصلی در تعدادی از قصه‌هاست، که البته در آن زمان بسیار رایج بوده.
به‌یادماندنی‌ترین داستان‌های کتاب به نظرم داستان اسب در نمکزار، آلابای (مردی که از اسبش پیاده نشد)، و ایتالو در ایتالیا (ماجرای یک روزهٔ مسافری در یک شهر کوچک ساحلی ایتالیا با ارجاعات دلنشین به قصه‌های ایتالو کالوینو) بودند.

[Jonathan yates · Rating 5 out of 5]

This writer is an overlooked jewel of Argentinian literature, this should be a must read, i hope all of his works are translated to English!

[Mason MB · Rating 5 out of 5]

argentinians are the masters of the short story! do not ask me why. this dude also loves talking about animals, which is fun. i would recommend reading his novel “zama” as well

[Mike · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not up for for a serious review. Did enjoy the read.

[Theediscerning · Rating 4 out of 5]

A person's dream dog that wants more of the dreamer, a character with a head full of figurative birds to such an extent he might welcome being torn apart by dogs – yes, there are some strong images at play here from the get-go. But it's not all weirdness in this survey of the author's collected stories, for we find bruisingly honest misery for a man and his child in boarding houses when the woman of the family dies. A man suffering unrequited love sends letters to the object of his affection, until they can finally meet once more. Unfortunately, though, things change – I assume people rate the more mature di Benedetto, but I found the work that follows the first half-dozen, especially the 'Foolish Love' novella, a tad less interesting. But there's always a modern-day stylite, a penitent refusing to ever get off a horse, to entertain – and a grim situation for an isolated, disabled farmer's wife to find herself in.

The early style was wondrous – rich without ever being showy, quirky perhaps but perfectly within reason. And while nothing falls away too much, the selection here was not a hundred per cent – although having said that it was very enjoyable to experience this author very new to me. My netgalley seemed to leave out the introduction as well as the contents page, so I hope there's enough in the finished book to tell people what they have been missing. The fact that some uncompiled stories – and a return to weird and wonderful tales involving animal metaphors – are included at the end shows this book has done a great service to the author, and has served us well too.

[Tyler Monsein · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite of the stories is 5 pages. A man on a vague quest is struck by lightning, and his masterless horse wanders into the desert with its supply cart still attached. It smells the cart's food, but doesn't know where it's coming from, and some time later it runs into another horse, who (after a brief, almost romantic encounter) is violently carried off by a jaguar. The first horse keeps going, but it's not really going anywhere. The horse is anthropomorphized, but not enough to give it thoughts. It's relatable in that it's another body like yours. Soon the horse meets an unsurprising fate, and we linger on the scene for awhile, looking at the other bodies, before they move on to other things.

Is it funny? Is it profound? Is it just comforting in its sadness? I don't quite know. Every story is an absolute downer. But they aren’t mean-spirited, or cleverly ironic, or knowingly understated, or bleak for the sake of realism. They’re just wonderful, and so plainly poetic, and I wish there were a hundred more.

"Everything is sad, and the music returns, and the music is sad, too."

[Mandy · Rating 2 out of 5]

Acclaimed Argentinian writer Antonio di Benedetto was imprisoned and tortured in Argentina during the military dictatorship and spent some time in exile in Spain. He returned home in the 1980s. The 20 stories included in this volume are a comprehensive introduction to his work, but they didn’t really appeal to me. Some of them are very short and fragmentary, and even the longer ones, although they have a narrative, still felt rather rambling and pointless, and I found it hard to relate to any of the characters. The only story I enjoyed was Huddled, about a bereft widower and his traumatised little boy. Themes of loss and suffering pervade all the stories, with elements of the magical and fantastical thrown into the mix, but I found that mix ultimately unsatisfactory and I didn’t enjoy the collection.

[Teresa · Rating 4 out of 5]

These stories were densely intertwined with loss and grief and that sense of feeling out of step in the world. Benedetto's style became more accessible in a way with time but I adored his earlier work as well when the metaphors were thicker and more aching. His later stories adhere more to standard narrative frames, telling stories of the days of people trying to get by. There is a certain universality to his stories-these people could be anywhere but the prose is beautiful elevating the stories above the standard.

[Mateo R. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Intertextualidad

Menciones directas:
* Mención a los autores:
-Fiódor Dostoyevski (Rusia, s. XIX)

Indirecta:
?

[Dean Jamieson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Better then Borges.