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Dejarás la tierra
Un silencio antiguo selló durante doscientos años el misterio de una familia demasiado parecida a las tragedias y ambiciones del Perú. Patriarcas decolorados, mujeres sacudiéndose el peso de su tiempo; personas, al fin y al cabo, que han sido rescatadas en este libro para tantear un correlato de individuos que redimensionan nuestra historia republicana.
Esta novela nos recuerda que las familias están hechas de todo lo que se ocultan y que solo una prosa capaz de atravesar lo visible y lo soterrado puede rastrear el cauce de eso que llamamos identidad. Si la voluntad de forjarse una estrella propia llevó a Renato Cisneros a escribir La distancia que nos separa, lo que nos entrega en Dejarás la tierra es, al mismo tiempo, el cierre de aquella historia y la confirmación de un narrador capaz de ver el precipicio y dar un paso más.
Esta novela nos recuerda que las familias están hechas de todo lo que se ocultan y que solo una prosa capaz de atravesar lo visible y lo soterrado puede rastrear el cauce de eso que llamamos identidad. Si la voluntad de forjarse una estrella propia llevó a Renato Cisneros a escribir La distancia que nos separa, lo que nos entrega en Dejarás la tierra es, al mismo tiempo, el cierre de aquella historia y la confirmación de un narrador capaz de ver el precipicio y dar un paso más.
338 pages, Paperback
First published July 1, 2017
36 people are currently reading
749 people want to read
About the author
Renato Cisneros
19 books258 followersNació en Lima en 1976. Es periodista y escritor. Son suyos los poemarios: Ritual de los prójimos (1998), Máquina fantasma (2001) y Nuevos poemas italianos (2007). Ha publicado además las novelas Nunca confíes en mí (Alfaguara, 2011), Raro (Alfaguara, 2012), que contó con ilustraciones de Alfonso Vargas; y muy recientemente La distancia que nos separa (Ed.Planeta), que se convirtió en el título más vendido de la Feria Internacional del Libro de Lima 2015 Entre 2007 y 2010 administró el conocido blog «Busco Novia». Por once años escribió crónicas para el diario El Comercio. Actualmente (setiembre 2015) firma columnas semanales en La República y colabora con programas en el Grupo RPP. Desde agosto de este año radica en Madrid.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 76 reviews
January 24, 2018
Lo he dicho antes y lo sigo diciendo: leer a Renato Cisneros es leer un ejemplo absoluto de honestidad al escribir. Honestidad al punto de lo que a muchos nos daría vergüenza, tal vez, pero es eso a lo que debemos aspirar quienes escribimos. Si en “La distancia que nos separa” nos llevó a conocer el mundo de su padre y, de alguna manera, a comprender esa inmensa y dolorosa figura paterna, ahora nos lleva dos siglos atrás al origen de su familia y a la onda expansiva de un secreto que ha marcado el destino de toda su familia.
April 6, 2023
I loved Renato Cisneros' memoir about his father (The Distance Between Us) and also greatly enjoyed joining him digging into his family's deeper history in this book, looking for the truth behind the many family rumours and secrets (and learning about Peru's history in the process).
The story starts around 1830 with the mater familias Nicolasa Cisneros and her secret lover for many decades, the priest Gregorio Cartagenas. I found the text dense at this point but it got a lot better as the novel progressed. I kept wondering how much was invented and how much true though (ok, the author insists this is a novel, but I still like to know).
Once great-grandfather Luis Benjamin, 'The Poet', appeared on stage it started flowing and I was equally intrigued by the story of grandfather Fernan. The men in the family all have their way with words (including Renato obviously) but have used the ability for very different purposes.
It is a good mix of the personal and the historical. The author clearly likes to show off the research done, not afraid to digress and there is some namedropping going on, but it never gets boring or slow. Towards the end, much more is documented and so there is less need for fictional elements - which I preferred over the more speculative first chapters.
The quality of the translation is very high.
The story starts around 1830 with the mater familias Nicolasa Cisneros and her secret lover for many decades, the priest Gregorio Cartagenas. I found the text dense at this point but it got a lot better as the novel progressed. I kept wondering how much was invented and how much true though (ok, the author insists this is a novel, but I still like to know).
Once great-grandfather Luis Benjamin, 'The Poet', appeared on stage it started flowing and I was equally intrigued by the story of grandfather Fernan. The men in the family all have their way with words (including Renato obviously) but have used the ability for very different purposes.
It is a good mix of the personal and the historical. The author clearly likes to show off the research done, not afraid to digress and there is some namedropping going on, but it never gets boring or slow. Towards the end, much more is documented and so there is less need for fictional elements - which I preferred over the more speculative first chapters.
The quality of the translation is very high.
January 15, 2023
Later, at those family reunions, when my uncles would tell stories about his literary adventures, I found it hard to disguise my yawns.The merits he achieved during his lifetime sounded as tedious as the notable figures he had the chance to meet.
You Shall Leave Your Land (2023) is Fionn Petch's translation (with assistance from Robin Myers on poems quoted in the novel) of Renato Cisneros 2017 novel Dejarás la tierra.
This is a prequel, although not directly connected, to The Distance Between Us by the same author/translator, which was based around the author's relationship with his father, Luis Federico Cisneros Visquerra, was a leading figure in both the Peruvian military and the Peruvian government in the 1970s and 1980s, and a reconstruction of the latter's biography.
My review of The Distance Between Us concluded: "Cisneros's singular achievement is to build on this tradition [of the great Latin American novelists of the 1960s onwards], to write a novel-without-fiction, and to effectively blend the political with the personal to give us a deeper understanding of the literature and the history of the period."
In You Shall Leave Your Land, the author delves more into his family history, starting with his great-great-grandmother, Nicolasa Cisneros, who was rumoured to have had her seven children by a clandestine relationship with a Catholic priest, the father named on their birth certificates, who was apparently always 'travelling', purely fictitious, although her children believed in his existence and many of her relatives found it expeditious to do so. The story takes us also to his grandfather, although the pivotal figure is his great-grandfather, the poet Luis Benjamín Cisneros. The novel is told with chapter of his present-day research into the family history mixed with a novelistic take on his ancestors’ pasts.
Although in many respects this is a very Peru-centred story it is also one of exile, as the title suggests (although exile within a very privileged setting):
I think now of the many exiles in this story and try to see them as episodes brought together by chance: the exile of the name of my great-great-grandfather Gregorio Cartagena, erased from the map by his descendants (and who had once been exiled to the high puny by Pedro Cisneros); the emotional exile of my great-grandfather Luis Benjamin, who left Peru at the urging of his mother to reinvent himself in Paris; the political exile of my grandfather Fernan, who spent thirty years between Panama, Ecuador,Argentina, Uruguay, Mexico and Brazil, countries where he discovered himself as a diplomat, established himself as a journalist and became diluted as a poet; the ethical exile of my father, the Gaucho, the soldier and former minister, who at twenty-one had to leave Argentina, the country of his birth, for Peru, without wanting or needing to. And finally, my own voluntary exile, here in Madrid, where I shut myself every day in a room with a large window, through which I watch the shapes of men and women pass, people with whom I share no connection nor specific feeling save the heartfelt sensation of being in the right place. The only possible place where I can sit and write these words.
Unfortunately, this book just didn't work for me, indeed I found it at times as tedious as the younger Renato Cisneros found it at family gatherings when everyone told stories of Luis Benjamin (see the opening quote), or actually more so, as I have no connection with the story.
Part of the issue is my taste for family histories. Discussing the rumours about Nicolasa and the Priest, with his Uncle the latter concludes: Instead of world history, schools should teach the person history of each pupil, whereas I have relatively (pun intended) little interest in even my own genealogy. I really struggle with the narrator/author’s reaction, on discovering that his great-grandfather was actually a priest, that this genetic but entirely unconscious legacy explains his own attraction to the priesthood in his youth.
Delving back 4 generations also has the issue that whereas I've describes Nicolasa as 'his great-great-grandmother',as does he, she is of course only one of 8 - people tend to pursue the most illustrious of their line.
Further, given the more distant nature of the history, this becomes closer to purely historical fiction, or rather historical family drama, than the more personal, but then powerful, The Distance Between Us. The historical backdrop of Peruvian history, particularly the independence movement, is interesting but it remains only a backdrop and similarly while the story features, as the blurb on the back tells us, Victor Hugo, Simón Bolívar, Édouard Manet, the Queen Consort of Spain and the man who would be Trotsky's assassin, these are rather walk-on parts, and as they walk of this reader would have rather followed them than the scions of the Cisneros family.
I'll be interested to see other's takes but I'm afraid this was a 2-3 star review for me and rounded down at present, as I came close to quitting/skim-reading.
You Shall Leave Your Land (2023) is Fionn Petch's translation (with assistance from Robin Myers on poems quoted in the novel) of Renato Cisneros 2017 novel Dejarás la tierra.
This is a prequel, although not directly connected, to The Distance Between Us by the same author/translator, which was based around the author's relationship with his father, Luis Federico Cisneros Visquerra, was a leading figure in both the Peruvian military and the Peruvian government in the 1970s and 1980s, and a reconstruction of the latter's biography.
My review of The Distance Between Us concluded: "Cisneros's singular achievement is to build on this tradition [of the great Latin American novelists of the 1960s onwards], to write a novel-without-fiction, and to effectively blend the political with the personal to give us a deeper understanding of the literature and the history of the period."
In You Shall Leave Your Land, the author delves more into his family history, starting with his great-great-grandmother, Nicolasa Cisneros, who was rumoured to have had her seven children by a clandestine relationship with a Catholic priest, the father named on their birth certificates, who was apparently always 'travelling', purely fictitious, although her children believed in his existence and many of her relatives found it expeditious to do so. The story takes us also to his grandfather, although the pivotal figure is his great-grandfather, the poet Luis Benjamín Cisneros. The novel is told with chapter of his present-day research into the family history mixed with a novelistic take on his ancestors’ pasts.
Although in many respects this is a very Peru-centred story it is also one of exile, as the title suggests (although exile within a very privileged setting):
I think now of the many exiles in this story and try to see them as episodes brought together by chance: the exile of the name of my great-great-grandfather Gregorio Cartagena, erased from the map by his descendants (and who had once been exiled to the high puny by Pedro Cisneros); the emotional exile of my great-grandfather Luis Benjamin, who left Peru at the urging of his mother to reinvent himself in Paris; the political exile of my grandfather Fernan, who spent thirty years between Panama, Ecuador,Argentina, Uruguay, Mexico and Brazil, countries where he discovered himself as a diplomat, established himself as a journalist and became diluted as a poet; the ethical exile of my father, the Gaucho, the soldier and former minister, who at twenty-one had to leave Argentina, the country of his birth, for Peru, without wanting or needing to. And finally, my own voluntary exile, here in Madrid, where I shut myself every day in a room with a large window, through which I watch the shapes of men and women pass, people with whom I share no connection nor specific feeling save the heartfelt sensation of being in the right place. The only possible place where I can sit and write these words.
Unfortunately, this book just didn't work for me, indeed I found it at times as tedious as the younger Renato Cisneros found it at family gatherings when everyone told stories of Luis Benjamin (see the opening quote), or actually more so, as I have no connection with the story.
Part of the issue is my taste for family histories. Discussing the rumours about Nicolasa and the Priest, with his Uncle the latter concludes: Instead of world history, schools should teach the person history of each pupil, whereas I have relatively (pun intended) little interest in even my own genealogy. I really struggle with the narrator/author’s reaction, on discovering that his great-grandfather was actually a priest, that this genetic but entirely unconscious legacy explains his own attraction to the priesthood in his youth.
Delving back 4 generations also has the issue that whereas I've describes Nicolasa as 'his great-great-grandmother',as does he, she is of course only one of 8 - people tend to pursue the most illustrious of their line.
Further, given the more distant nature of the history, this becomes closer to purely historical fiction, or rather historical family drama, than the more personal, but then powerful, The Distance Between Us. The historical backdrop of Peruvian history, particularly the independence movement, is interesting but it remains only a backdrop and similarly while the story features, as the blurb on the back tells us, Victor Hugo, Simón Bolívar, Édouard Manet, the Queen Consort of Spain and the man who would be Trotsky's assassin, these are rather walk-on parts, and as they walk of this reader would have rather followed them than the scions of the Cisneros family.
I'll be interested to see other's takes but I'm afraid this was a 2-3 star review for me and rounded down at present, as I came close to quitting/skim-reading.
February 26, 2019
A minha estreia nas letras deste autor peruano foi auspiciosa!
Percebam porquê na opinião escrita que deixei no blogue e em vídeo no canal:
No blogue:
https://osabordosmeuslivros.blogspot....
Em vídeo, a partir do minuto 11:14:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mJy5...
Percebam porquê na opinião escrita que deixei no blogue e em vídeo no canal:
No blogue:
https://osabordosmeuslivros.blogspot....
Em vídeo, a partir do minuto 11:14:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mJy5...
February 4, 2023
Lately I have been reading a lot of family sagas and they were disappointing. This left me wondering that if any exist which, you know, are actually executed properly.
Enter Renato Cisneros.
You Shall Leave your Land is a family saga, spanning quite a few generations, but it’s quite unconventional: the book starts off with Renato’s uncle checking if the tomb of Renato’s great-great grandmother and a priest are side by side. from there a century long family history consisting of illegitimate children, non existent husbands, murders and famous political figures and writers all crop up. Although most of the characters fall in and out of love, I never got bored. maybe it was the lively translation, Cisneros humour or maybe I was in the right mood. Anyway, to use an oxymoron, this is a minimally epic book.
I saw two main themes emerge. One is about identity. Since Cisneros family line is through an affair then Renato Cisneros argues that he should adopt the Priest’s surname and this is a point of debate throughout the book. Does a surname really attest to our bloodline? or is it fluid and should not be thought about?
The other is displacement. A lot of characters lead nomadic lives, some out of the author’s homeland of Peru and some are exiled out of South America as a chunk of the book takes place in France. This ties up with the theme of identity. If one’s country and surname are subject to change, what does that make someone.
Always interesting and full of surprises, You Shall Leave Your Land is another winner from Charco Press.
Enter Renato Cisneros.
You Shall Leave your Land is a family saga, spanning quite a few generations, but it’s quite unconventional: the book starts off with Renato’s uncle checking if the tomb of Renato’s great-great grandmother and a priest are side by side. from there a century long family history consisting of illegitimate children, non existent husbands, murders and famous political figures and writers all crop up. Although most of the characters fall in and out of love, I never got bored. maybe it was the lively translation, Cisneros humour or maybe I was in the right mood. Anyway, to use an oxymoron, this is a minimally epic book.
I saw two main themes emerge. One is about identity. Since Cisneros family line is through an affair then Renato Cisneros argues that he should adopt the Priest’s surname and this is a point of debate throughout the book. Does a surname really attest to our bloodline? or is it fluid and should not be thought about?
The other is displacement. A lot of characters lead nomadic lives, some out of the author’s homeland of Peru and some are exiled out of South America as a chunk of the book takes place in France. This ties up with the theme of identity. If one’s country and surname are subject to change, what does that make someone.
Always interesting and full of surprises, You Shall Leave Your Land is another winner from Charco Press.
February 27, 2023
"Who has not,
at one point or another,
played with thoughts of his ancestors,
with the prehistory of his flesh and blood?"
Jorge Luis Borges, I, A Jew
Two centuries ago in Peru, Nicolasa Cisneros gave birth to seven children and raised them fatherless, responding to anyone who asked after her husband that he was travelling. This woman gave her name 'Cisneros' to these children. A maternal name that carried down another four generations via her youngest son Luis the Poet, to Fernán to Groucho to Renato, the author.
This work of autofiction opens when the author with his elderly uncle is taken to a cemetery where the tomb of his great-great-grandmother lies, where he is shown proof of her close association with Gregorio Cartagena, a priest, the man who fathered all her children, whom she was never married to, a man who denied his children both his name and a relationship with their father.
Renato Cisneros struggles with the idea of having been denied this name and heritage, having embraced another that he had been proud of, but that now became a source of confusion and a questioning of much that he had assumed.
The upright and irreproachable men I had admired for as long as I could remember, the flesh of my flesh, abruptly became blurred, reduced to timid, vulgar and inconsequential individuals. My former clarity became turbid. Clay became crust. The tight weave became unstitched, revealing its threads.
This novel is his way of exploring all that, of seeing how this new information informs him, how it makes apparent the patterns and threads of a lineage.
The custom of the double life has been repeated in each generation. If this is not a habit, a custom, a trend, I don't know what it is. An enduring coincidence? A hereditary gene? A vice, an illness, an infection? An echo? How to escape it? Can atavistic viruses be eliminated? Can contagion be avoided? Can this intangible, genetically transmittable part of us ever be decontaminated, or does it become intrinsic from the start and all we can do is bear it? How can we be sure what is ours, our own, and what is passed on if everything comes to us melted down and mixed up at birth? Were the men of my family aware of obeying an established mould? Did they ever set to correct that that tradition, or were they simply carried along by it? Am I yet another such man?Will I repeat the story I am writing? Or am I writing it down in order not to repeat it?
The narrative switches between a near present day Lima 2013/14 when he is searching and discussing his thoughts with his aged Uncle Gustavo, who has not only opened his eyes to the presence of the twin graves, but has been willing to engage him in an open conversation, as he tries to understand
what occurred, how it is affecting him and his right to document the secrets and lies perpetuated since then.
The story unearths the life of Nicolasa and each of the author's grandfathers, moving from Peru to La Havre, to Paris, to Argentina and back to Peru, as these men's careers rise and fall and move in parallel with Peruvian history and as they cross paths with a number of historical figures and events.
It reminded me in places of a similar journey taken by Maud Newton, in her equally riveting Ancestor Trouble: A Reckoning and a Reconciliation, estranged from her father, she too explores the concept of inter-generational inheritance, something she fears, but wishes to come to terms with.
Although one might think a family history is personal and it is, You Shall Leave Your Land is universally interesting for the questions it poses and for the cultural expose of an interesting period in Peruvian history.
If I have one criticism, it would be the way the women in the story have been depicted, they are made to be responsible and given agency in a way that might raise the eyebrows of some readers. In times gone by, when a woman fell pregnant, there were few options open to them and very little choice.
For example, when Luis Benjamin is given an ultimatum by the mother of his children to legitimize their relationship, he takes the children and disappears and yet when she reverts to the life she had previously, he judges it and views this as an erasure of their bond and time together - whereas it is more likely that without the support of her children's father, she had little choice but to use her talent and beauty to survive. Clearly there is much imaginative licence used, however, I found myself querying some of those authorial decisions.
Overall, I thought it was an excellent and thought provoking novel, another gem from Charco Press. It reads as a standalone novel, though said to a prequel - his earlier novel focuses on the life of his father, who is barely mentioned in this book.
March 5, 2020
4.5 🌟. Renato Cisneros se ha convertido en mi autor favorito! Este libro es maravilloso aunque no llega a superar la distancia que nos separa que sigue siendo mi favorito.
December 12, 2024
Con una narrativa íntima y fluida, Dejarás la tierra de Renato Cisneros se consolida como una obra que trasciende lo personal para dialogar con lo colectivo. A través de una estructura que combina saltos temporales perfectamente hilados y un estilo cercano, casi confesional, el autor nos sumerge en la historia de su linaje familiar, conectándola con episodios cruciales de la historia del Perú, desde el siglo XIX hasta mediados del siglo XX.
El libro no es solo una crónica de una familia, sino también una búsqueda profunda de identidad y raíces. Cisneros examina la "semilla" de su linaje, explorando las tensiones y las conexiones entre las decisiones individuales de sus antepasados y los momentos clave de la historia nacional. En este sentido, Dejarás la tierra no solo es una obra autobiográfica, sino también un reflejo de las complejidades y contradicciones de la idea de nación y de familia en el Perú.
Lo más fascinante es cómo el autor logra despertar en el lector un deseo inevitable de mirar hacia su propio pasado familiar. La obra nos invita a pensar en el rol de nuestras historias personales dentro del tejido más amplio de la sociedad. Es imposible no verse reflejado en las preguntas que plantea Cisneros: ¿Qué legado dejamos? ¿Cómo nuestras acciones, por pequeñas que parezcan, contribuyen a la construcción de un país y a la perpetuación de ciertos mitos familiares?
Además, la prosa de Cisneros es tan envolvente que resulta difícil soltar el libro. Su tono logra equilibrar la profundidad emocional con un ritmo ágil, generando una experiencia de lectura tan cautivadora como introspectiva. Es una obra que, sin duda, resuena en quienes buscan comprender mejor no solo el pasado, sino también las raíces de sus propias familias.
Dejarás la tierra es mucho más que una biografía familiar; es una invitación a reflexionar sobre nuestra conexión con la historia y la herencia que nos define. Un libro imprescindible para quienes desean explorar el vínculo entre lo íntimo y lo colectivo, lo familiar y lo nacional.
#DejarásLaTierra #RenatoCisneros #HistoriaFamiliar #IdentidadPeruana #HerenciaYMemoria #LiteraturaLatinoamericana
El libro no es solo una crónica de una familia, sino también una búsqueda profunda de identidad y raíces. Cisneros examina la "semilla" de su linaje, explorando las tensiones y las conexiones entre las decisiones individuales de sus antepasados y los momentos clave de la historia nacional. En este sentido, Dejarás la tierra no solo es una obra autobiográfica, sino también un reflejo de las complejidades y contradicciones de la idea de nación y de familia en el Perú.
Lo más fascinante es cómo el autor logra despertar en el lector un deseo inevitable de mirar hacia su propio pasado familiar. La obra nos invita a pensar en el rol de nuestras historias personales dentro del tejido más amplio de la sociedad. Es imposible no verse reflejado en las preguntas que plantea Cisneros: ¿Qué legado dejamos? ¿Cómo nuestras acciones, por pequeñas que parezcan, contribuyen a la construcción de un país y a la perpetuación de ciertos mitos familiares?
Además, la prosa de Cisneros es tan envolvente que resulta difícil soltar el libro. Su tono logra equilibrar la profundidad emocional con un ritmo ágil, generando una experiencia de lectura tan cautivadora como introspectiva. Es una obra que, sin duda, resuena en quienes buscan comprender mejor no solo el pasado, sino también las raíces de sus propias familias.
Dejarás la tierra es mucho más que una biografía familiar; es una invitación a reflexionar sobre nuestra conexión con la historia y la herencia que nos define. Un libro imprescindible para quienes desean explorar el vínculo entre lo íntimo y lo colectivo, lo familiar y lo nacional.
#DejarásLaTierra #RenatoCisneros #HistoriaFamiliar #IdentidadPeruana #HerenciaYMemoria #LiteraturaLatinoamericana
June 27, 2023
Lo primero que quiero decir es que me encanta la pluma de Renato, sus descripciones y narrativa son diferentes y se inclinan hacia lo poético. En este libro no fue distinto. Al mismo tiempo, no me enganchó la historia, de inicio me pareció súper interesante y después me fui perdiendo. Me costó un poco terminarlo. Leí anteriormente "La distancia que nos separa" y me encantó y con este sentí que era más de lo mismo. Admito que soy yo y el momenton en que lo leí. Tengo muchas ganas de leer " Algún día te mostraré el desierto"
May 12, 2020
Me gusta mucho como escribe Renato, además de la sinceridad con que lo hace.
No le doy 5 estrellas solo porque no supera a La distancia que nos separa.
No le doy 5 estrellas solo porque no supera a La distancia que nos separa.
August 14, 2017
La novela es una búsqueda incansable para expiar las cargas que pueden llevarse de generación en generación. Es un trabajo elocuente de arqueología familiar. Te provoca preguntarte sobre tu propio árbol genealógico, los secretos familiares lo que te hace quien eres antes que seas.
Su narración es fluida y te atrapa no para saber el final sino para reconocer que resuelve el autor contando esta historia.
Es verdad que muchas veces tomamos estos viajes sin saber cuando se acabara. Es verdad que el autor lo encontró pero su frase final me dejo desmotivada y preferiría que lo mejore.
Igual una buena lectura y una buena "secuela" de La distancia que nos separa.
Su narración es fluida y te atrapa no para saber el final sino para reconocer que resuelve el autor contando esta historia.
Es verdad que muchas veces tomamos estos viajes sin saber cuando se acabara. Es verdad que el autor lo encontró pero su frase final me dejo desmotivada y preferiría que lo mejore.
Igual una buena lectura y una buena "secuela" de La distancia que nos separa.
July 27, 2017
Somos el resultado de lo que sabemos y no sabemos de nuestra historia familiar. Para entender quién eres tú el día de hoy, debes entender de dónde viene tu familia. Renato Cisneros plasma magistralmente en esta novela, que tiene mucho de verdad a pesar de ser ficción, el resultado de muchos años de investigación sobre su pasado familiar.
October 3, 2017
pronto video reseña completa
March 12, 2023
This was a very interesting book, I really liked the concept behind it, a journey into the author's family history, not written as a typical memoir but as a novel. Just imagine being able to go back four generations and finding enough material to create a story of epic proportions, love, war, more love, poetry, world travel and many many secrets, too many secrets to count. Renato has merged his family's history with his own story of trying to squeeze the information out of his still living relatives, it is some of these conversations that I found most intriguing: If you were to reveal to the world your family's deepest darkest secrets how will the family take it and should you in fact do it?
Renato's history is tightly woven with the development of modern day Peru, his ancestors haven't been scared to stand up for their beliefs, especially his Grandfather, who battled against dictators and became a very busy ambassador and still had time to create his own family secrets of epic proportions. Throughout each generation it is the women who stand out for me, the focus is on the paternal line but it is the grandmothers that I ended up adoring, the craziness they had to put up with and standing up so proud, would have you cheering them on. I didn't know much about Peru's past but by experiencing Cisneros's past I have gained a lot more knowledge.
There was one almost throw-away comment in this book that has stuck with me, Renato mentions that family history should be taught at school, imagine how cool that be, finding out about your ancestors and seeing who had the darkest past! This would have been so much more fun than drama or recorder lessons (my worst lessons at school).
I have really enjoyed this book, a great way to share this piece of history with the world.
Blog review: https://felcherman.wordpress.com/2023...
Renato's history is tightly woven with the development of modern day Peru, his ancestors haven't been scared to stand up for their beliefs, especially his Grandfather, who battled against dictators and became a very busy ambassador and still had time to create his own family secrets of epic proportions. Throughout each generation it is the women who stand out for me, the focus is on the paternal line but it is the grandmothers that I ended up adoring, the craziness they had to put up with and standing up so proud, would have you cheering them on. I didn't know much about Peru's past but by experiencing Cisneros's past I have gained a lot more knowledge.
There was one almost throw-away comment in this book that has stuck with me, Renato mentions that family history should be taught at school, imagine how cool that be, finding out about your ancestors and seeing who had the darkest past! This would have been so much more fun than drama or recorder lessons (my worst lessons at school).
I have really enjoyed this book, a great way to share this piece of history with the world.
Blog review: https://felcherman.wordpress.com/2023...
August 25, 2018
Con cada generación puede haber un cambio, una mejora. Y con cada libro también. Esta crónica familiar, muy interesante y bien escrita, es mejor que La distancia que nos separa. Al igual que esta, es ágil y se lee en un día. Pero me ha conmovido más y me ha dejado pensando en mis visitas a la casa de La Paz y como el "tío Juvenal" (creo saber quien se esconde detrás de ese alias), una vez que le pregunté por el escudo de armas de la familia, que se encontraba en una parte su biblioteca, me respondió con un gesto entre extraño y desdeñoso. Creo que leeré el próximo libro de Renato Cartagena.
February 1, 2018
La novela presenta diferentes historias, la más interesante a mi parecer es la del narrador descubriendo su pasado. Los elementos hacen de la narración más fluidas. El autor presenta muchas imágenes a lo largo de su narración, pero al final la historia se vuelve lenta. Me gustó mucho más "La distancia que nos separa"
May 28, 2018
Era la primera obra de Renato Cisneros, que leo y puedo decir que me he quedado fascinada con su narrativa.
February 2, 2023
This is a serious do not judge a book by its cover book! I devoured just over 100 pages of this in one sitting. It's a story of finding out about a families past. So it does flick from the past to the future, but it is a beautiful family discovery of past secrets, relationships, and deciet in the past when such things were not accepted. A large family. A happy outcome. A brilliant search into history. Discovering where she came from. We get to learn all her distant relatives' stories back in the day. Beautifully translated. A well-deserved four stars. I enjoy this one which actually shocked me.
August 9, 2021
4.5 🌟 No esperaba nada de este libro pero recibí mucho, me gustó de principio al final, como narra el origen de su apellido, como inicio todo de un amor clandestino es genial, la narrativa, los hechos, me fascinó
Me declaró fans de Renato Cisneros
Me declaró fans de Renato Cisneros
February 1, 2023
La descendencia secreta de un sacerdote en Perú da pie a indagar sobre la vida de 3 generaciones de la familia del autor, empapada de muchos hechos históricos en Perú, París y Argentina.
March 18, 2024
daddy issues but make it literary fiction
July 31, 2017
Una vez más, Cisneros toca un tema sensible para muchos, en donde los lectores se pueden sentir identificados en uno o varios párrafos.
Más allá de los secretos familiares, de la curiosidad natural por saber acerca del pasado de sus ancestros, de "incomodar" a gente cercana y/o lejana en la búsqueda de la identidad, se plantea la idea de "la costumbre de proteger con el silencio", misma que aplica a muchos aspectos de la vida.
Eso es lo que hace de "Dejarás la tierra", un libro cautivante.
En esta oportunidad, me quedo con la frase del tío Gustavo: "Tal vez lo mejor sea no saber".
Más allá de los secretos familiares, de la curiosidad natural por saber acerca del pasado de sus ancestros, de "incomodar" a gente cercana y/o lejana en la búsqueda de la identidad, se plantea la idea de "la costumbre de proteger con el silencio", misma que aplica a muchos aspectos de la vida.
Eso es lo que hace de "Dejarás la tierra", un libro cautivante.
En esta oportunidad, me quedo con la frase del tío Gustavo: "Tal vez lo mejor sea no saber".
September 6, 2023
Si en La distancia que nos separa, Renato nos contó la historia de su relación con su padre “El Gaucho” Cisneros (Luis Federico Cisneros Vizquerra), dando algunas pinceladas de su abuela Doña Nicolasa Cisneros, su tatarabuelo el sacerdote Gregorio Cartagena, su bisabuelo Luis Benjamín Cisneros y su abuelo Fernán Cisneros, en Dejarás la tierra, Renato aborda con amplitud la biografía de estos últimos ascendientes.
La obra es fruto de un trabajo concienzudo de investigación, visita a los lugares donde vivieron sus ancestros, búsqueda de archivos públicos y cartas personales, entrevistas a parientes vivos y a personas que de una u otra manera se vincularon con los personajes.
Renato nos relata con mucho cariño y detalle las peripecias de cada uno de estos familiares para sobrevivir en algunos casos con necesidades económicas, entre otras razones por la prole numerosa (también hubo momentos de mayor comodidad) y en otras situaciones sostener falsedades o esconder secretos de vida, en el caso de doña Nicolasa el ocultamiento de su relación con el cura Cartagena, y en su reemplazo la invención de un supuesto esposo don Roberto Benjamín, al que jamás conocieron sus hijos, solamente recibían las visitas del “tío” Gregorio.
En el caso de Luis Benjamín y Fernán, ocurrió lo que parece la marca de fábrica de la familia Cisneros, el establecimiento de dos hogares paralelos, una vida con hijos de mujeres distintas, hermanastros que por diversos motivos no llegan a conocerse hasta una edad adulta. Caso similar ocurrió con el Gaucho Cisneros, que tuvo dos compromisos matrimoniales, Renato fue producto del segundo.
El relato está acompañado de la descripción de parte de la historia del Perú, la guerra de independencia y los sucesivos gobiernos republicanos que de alguna manera tocaron las vidas de los personajes.
En conclusión, es una narración pausada y apasionante que lleva finalmente a que Renato descubra el secreto mejor guardado de la familia Cisneros, el origen oculto del tatarabuelo, el cura Gregorio Cartagena, es una suerte de proceso de sanación para Renato, quien al ver la verdad revelada siente que viejas heridas familiares son cicatrizadas.
La obra es fruto de un trabajo concienzudo de investigación, visita a los lugares donde vivieron sus ancestros, búsqueda de archivos públicos y cartas personales, entrevistas a parientes vivos y a personas que de una u otra manera se vincularon con los personajes.
Renato nos relata con mucho cariño y detalle las peripecias de cada uno de estos familiares para sobrevivir en algunos casos con necesidades económicas, entre otras razones por la prole numerosa (también hubo momentos de mayor comodidad) y en otras situaciones sostener falsedades o esconder secretos de vida, en el caso de doña Nicolasa el ocultamiento de su relación con el cura Cartagena, y en su reemplazo la invención de un supuesto esposo don Roberto Benjamín, al que jamás conocieron sus hijos, solamente recibían las visitas del “tío” Gregorio.
En el caso de Luis Benjamín y Fernán, ocurrió lo que parece la marca de fábrica de la familia Cisneros, el establecimiento de dos hogares paralelos, una vida con hijos de mujeres distintas, hermanastros que por diversos motivos no llegan a conocerse hasta una edad adulta. Caso similar ocurrió con el Gaucho Cisneros, que tuvo dos compromisos matrimoniales, Renato fue producto del segundo.
El relato está acompañado de la descripción de parte de la historia del Perú, la guerra de independencia y los sucesivos gobiernos republicanos que de alguna manera tocaron las vidas de los personajes.
En conclusión, es una narración pausada y apasionante que lleva finalmente a que Renato descubra el secreto mejor guardado de la familia Cisneros, el origen oculto del tatarabuelo, el cura Gregorio Cartagena, es una suerte de proceso de sanación para Renato, quien al ver la verdad revelada siente que viejas heridas familiares son cicatrizadas.
October 10, 2024
My friend Renato. I found this book under extremely fated circumstances and it represented an extremely good omen to me. For obvious reasons the genre of autofiction genealogical family history epic memoir is one of crucial interest to me. Also funny to read the "prequel" in a duology when the prequel was written after the sequel but that is what I did. I will say once my excitement at the elicit affairs with priests and cycles of families with 7 illegitimate children wore off a bit, I did get a bit bogged down. I think this book would've really benefitted from a good old fashioned family tree but I guess I could've drawn my own and I didn't. The metanalysis of the search through the disparate family archive alongside the conversations with Uncle Gustavo were so necessary but did become a bit heavy handed for me at a certain point. I'm all for bringing authorial process into the texts but the central questions of the book and Cisnero's journey were presented so explicitly again and again: How does generational trauma manifest? What is the cost of family secrets? He beat the shit out of the dead horse with that one a little. Sometimes as he transcribed their conversations, there would be multiple lines of dialogue that consisted of the following: '...' '...' I appreciated this notation of silence and pause. Most of all, I appreciated the central theme so much and have been spouting it to people left and right: There is risk, and there is luck, and sometimes when we look back, we get to call it fate, to make it sound grander. I oscillate between free will and predeterminism every few minutes and it makes me giggle. The translator's note for this one was disappointing but there's interviews between them online so.... can't really be mad. Charco Press I love you. Also cool to see it all situated so clearly in the arc of Peru's independence
June 11, 2020
Libro inquietante y revelador. Cisneros va definiendo su identidad a partir de los hilos que vinculan a su familia con un hombre "prohibido" proveniente de un pueblo de Huánuco. El orden seguido por el autor permite entender de manera clara el devenir de cada uno de los personajes que siguieron en la línea genealógica. Sus decisiones, errores y aciertos se sienten próximos como si esas personas fueran conocidas y pudieras acercarte a cada uno de ellos. El trabajo de investigación es arduo, sin descuidar el contexto histórico, movilizado por una fuerza que el propio Cisneros no puede ni quiere detener. Muy recomendado.
January 15, 2019
Muy buen libro. La manera que tiene el autor de llenar los espacios imposibles de saber. Deducir, interpretar, imaginar y lograr transmitir esas elucubraciones de espacios en blanco, pensamientos, ímpetus de personas reales que ya no están pero que no solo marcaron la historia del personaje sino también la del Perú, es admirable. Qué secretos, aventuras, desamores, traiciones, represiones y rebeldías tuvieron que suceder a lo largo de 200 años para que este libro se haya engendrado y qué relación directa tiene con el autor es avasallador.
Muy recomendado.
Muy recomendado.
February 4, 2020
Es un libro muy bien escrito pero no es lo mío. El autor cuenta la historia de su familia y no estoy segura de entender por qué eso es de interés general. Sí hay algunos pasajes que permiten hurgar en la época (contexto político y social), pero no me atrapó. Tampoco comprendo el peso que se le da al linaje y los apellidos porque en mi país (o en mi familia) esto no existe, así que nunca logré crear empatía. Volvería al autor pero no volvería a leer un libro que sea tan personal y más bien sea una memoria familiar.
January 11, 2019
Buen libro, buen escritor.
Un testimonio sincero sobre la necesidad de buscar respuestas a las preguntas universales: Quiénes somos? y de dónde venimos?.
-"Querría, necesitaría saberlo todo", escribió Fernán, dejando entrever la desesperación que turba a los hijos, o a ciertos hijos, en ese punto de la vida en que, desconcertados, advertimos que no sabemos nada real sobre nuestros padres y que saberlo es decisivo para atisbar el sentido de nuestra propia existencia. -
Un testimonio sincero sobre la necesidad de buscar respuestas a las preguntas universales: Quiénes somos? y de dónde venimos?.
-"Querría, necesitaría saberlo todo", escribió Fernán, dejando entrever la desesperación que turba a los hijos, o a ciertos hijos, en ese punto de la vida en que, desconcertados, advertimos que no sabemos nada real sobre nuestros padres y que saberlo es decisivo para atisbar el sentido de nuestra propia existencia. -
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