The Scent of Buenos Aires

by Hebe Uhart, Maureen Shaughnessy (Translator)

From one of Argentina's greatest contemporary storytellers, The Scent of Buenos Aires gathers twenty-five of Hebe Uhart's most remarkable and incandescent short stories in English for the first time.

The Scent of Buenos Aires offers the first book-length English translation of Uhart's work, drawing together her best vignettes of quotidian life: moments at the zoo, the hair salon, or a cacophonous homeowners association meeting. She writes in unconventional, understated syntax, constructing a delightfully specific perspective on life in South America. These stories are marked by sharp humor and wit: discreet and subtle, yet filled with eccentric and insightful characters. Uhart's narrators pose endearing questions about their lives and environments - one asks "Bees - do you know how industrious they are?" while another inquires, "Are we perhaps going to hell in a hand basket?"

Genres: Short Stories, Fiction, Literary Fiction, Spanish Literature, Literature

477 pages, Paperback

First published October 15, 2019

About the author

Hebe Uhart was an Argentine author born in 1936. She majored in Philosophy at the University of Buenos Aires and worked both as a teacher and a professor. She also taught in literary workshops.

Uhart published six short novels, among which we find "Camilo asciende" and "Mudanzas", and a number of short stories, collected in the books "Dios, San Pedro y las almas" (1962), "Eli, Eli, lamma sabacthani?" (1963), "La gente de la casa rosa" (1970), "El budín esponjoso" (1977), "La luz de un nuevo día" (1983), "Leonor" (1986), "Guiando la hiedra" (1997), "Del cielo a casa" (2003), "Camilo asciende y otros relatos" (2004), "Turistas" (2008) and "Un día cualquiera" (2013). During her last years she wrote the travelling chronicles "Viajera crónica" (2011), "Visto y oído" (2012), "De la Patagonia a México" (2015), "De aquí para allá" (2017) and "Animales" (2018).

Reviews

[Brendan Monroe · Rating 4 out of 5]

It struck me, at some point while reading this, how many incredible works of literature must go unread because the majority of people can't read them. I'm talking, of course, about international literature, the vast majority of which never gets translated.

Take the author of this collection of short stories, for example. Hebe Uhart is apparently rather well known inside her native Argentina where she's been publishing books for decades. But I, for one, had never even heard of her.

This is, if the write-up on my book jacket is to be believed, only the first collection of Uhart's to be published in English. I'm not sure what inspired this daring publisher to take her work to a wider audience, perhaps it was Uhart's death in 2018 — death does have a history of making a writer's work more popular — but whatever the reason, I just want to take a moment to acknowledge the importance of the independent publishers who take chances on little-known works such as these.

Archipelago, the publisher of this collection, relies heavily on art grants from the State of New York, where it's based. That's why funding for the arts is so important. It really does, as cheesy as it might sound, give voice to the voiceless and teach a wider audience about cultures many of us will never have the good fortune of experiencing first hand.

But I suppose if you're here, reading this, you don't need to be convinced of that.

There are 38 stories in this collection, despite the Goodreads summary listing 25, for whatever reason, and regular readers of short story collections will likely find them quite peculiar in that none of these stories are actually about anything.

This will greatly impact your feelings for these stories. If you like your stories to be about something, in the sense that there is some shared moral or, at least, some basic semblance of plot, you should probably steer clear of this. This collection bears little resemblance to the sitcom "Seinfeld", a personal favorite of mine, except that it, too, is about nothing.

But Uhart is a wonderful writer, and like every wonderful writer, she's a keen and thoughtful observer of human behavior. Take your favorite writer, have them go down to the pub or the cafe on the corner to observe people for an afternoon, and then write about it. That's essentially what these stories are — little slice-of-life moments peopled with compelling characters in inspired settings, written by a woman who really knows how to string a sentence together.

With that in mind, I'd be remiss if I failed to applaud the translator of these stories, Maureen Shaughnessy, who really does a fantastic job here. Translators are too often ignored for the hard, often thankless task of bringing great stories to the rest of us. I don't speak Spanish so I can't say for sure, but the Argentine parables and anecdotes that appear here feel perfectly rendered.

No, this isn't Nobel Prize winning stuff, it's not speaking to serious moments in Argentine history like the military junta or the war over the Falkland/Malvinas islands, but it's soothing in its honest depiction of ordinary people living ordinary lives.

"The Scent of Buenos Aires" gets to the essence of good storytelling by allowing us to glimpse the lives of people living outside of our own.

In a world increasingly divided, to the heightened stress of us all, I can't think of anything lovelier than that.

[Kasa Cotugno · Rating 5 out of 5]

Thanks again the Archipelago publishing house for providing beautiful translations of heretofore unattainable works, in this case, from an Argentine author virtually unknown outside her home country. Hebe Uhart was an award winning author who did not live to see her short stories anthologized in English, a shame. Each story is a small vision into daily life, a jewel. Sometimes showing brilliance of wit and humor. Highly recommended.

[Meggie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Most beautiful, strange, wonderful and mysterious book I’ve ever read. I will most definitely be revisiting this one again. So much magic in it. Every story is so vivid and makes me believe I’m in the same room. Last page a tear dropped from my eye. I hope more of Hebe Uhart’s work can be translated or I will have to ge better at my Spanish.

[Sookie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Perhaps Uhart presents this collection in its most literal sense, by giving the readers a plethora of scents to choose from; its how you would be bombarded with scents and visuals the moment you know you have entered a town/city. the collection gives a similar feeling. its a good expose on what Uhart can deliver in very short bursts. pockets of time tucked into corners of city, alleys and dingy apartments, get penned down.
the collection as a whole was enjoyable but unfortunately for me, quite fleeting in nature. while collections are read over the course of time, i am having trouble remembering few of the early works in this book, and its unfortunate because i do remember enjoying them. perhaps that's the disadvantage here.

[Boris Gregoric · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hebe Urhart's writing: delightfully gauche!
Very whimsical. Not without depth or deep irony.
Every tale with the sudden, unexpected twist in the very last paragraph. Almost a switch-off: turn it back on and there’s an entirely different ‘landscape’.

Refreshingly, nothing 'magical', nor 'surreal' in the light of the Argentine 'big guns' of their notable literary past. (April 10th)

Here and there, the reader's slightly at sea, but soon enough the grand, unified theme draws him in.
In the music lingo of the great Tschaikovsky - the flight of the bumblebees ensues! U-ra! U-ra! U-ra! (April 14th).

[Elba · Rating 4 out of 5]

Collection of short stories that explores life in Buenos Aires and surrounding cities. The author really captures all the trappings of an ordinary day with eccentric and endearing characters.

[EllaHoulihan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Uhart makes the mundane interesting and funny. Not every story hit, but many were spot on.

[Camila · Rating 3 out of 5]

I'm giving maybe a 3.8 to this book, not quite a 4 for me.

The Scent of Buenos Aires is a series of short stories set in Argentina. The first few didn't quite grab my attention and it didn't feel Argentinian (or even Latin American) enough for me. But from about the second quarter, I really got a sense of life in and around Buenos Aires.

There were some touching stories, some funny stories and some that simply showed facets of daily life that I find fascinating. There weren't always twists and plots, but it felt like the stories were windows into specific moments, regardless how mundane they were.

*This book was given to me by the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review – all opinions are my own.*

[Billy · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the best short story collections I’ve read in a long while, The Scent of Buenos Aires is the first collection of Hebe Uhart’s work translated and published in English. Uhart’s stories provide an illuminating look at daily life, and are full of wit and humor aplenty. It truly is a shame Uhart’s work did not get translated during her lifetime, as it definitely deserves a wider audience. I can only hope more of her work makes its way out of Argentina and around the world. Highly recommend.

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

This collection of 38 stories, originally published between 1962 and 2018, is comprised of well described scenes in people’s lives but not developed to the depth of emotion or motivation. The characters and plots were banal and familiar. I got a vivid picture of the events unfolding within the scenes but I wanted more. I would be more interested in some of these vignettes as fleshed out short stories.

[Margo Perin · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a gift to read such unique, beautifully written stories that break the norms of traditional short storytelling and refuse to pander to the patriarchal focus on goal vs. process in human experience and interaction. Thank you to Maureen Shaughnessy for stellar translations and Archipelago Books for publishing.

[Thomas Halloran · Rating 1 out of 5]

Strange and sometimes nonsensical...a bit like dada art. Yet there were also moments of good observation and some beautifully described sensations. It might make sense to edit this collection down to around 200 pages for a wider audience that's looking for a first introduction to this writer as you do have to sift through some weaker writing to get to the good stuff. Glad I read it.

[Johanna Florez]

Ngl, skimmed a few stories. There sure are a lot of them. Hundreds of pages of vignettes of ordinary life.

[Jane · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Scent of Buenos Aires is a beautiful collection of the author’s noteworthy short stories translated in English. The stories are short, witty, and interspersed with humor. It features eccentric and fun characters making this a pleasant read. The stories are a mixture of reflection and observation and the author’s narrators pose questions about life and the surrounds for the reader to ponder.

In the “Guiding the Ivy” the narrator draws a contrast between the personality of plants and humans and notes some similarities. She writes about her plants—a plain green ivy that seems to have gotten smaller, and a desert plant she thinks is ugly. She also makes some mundane observations about her garden: the way her plants sit in their pots, and her flowerpot sizes

“It Was The Cat’s Fault” features Doris, a director of a dance school who lives in a dance studio— the narrator writes, “there was an old house with the door painted purple and green“ with her seven cats 🐱; there’s her ex-husband, Agustín, who stops by once in a while looking for a place to crash.

Her current husband, Miguel doesn’t live with her because the daily hustle would diminish their marital relations. When he does visit, he helps her around the house. He’s supposed to come help mount the practice barre for her students. The upside to this arrangement is that her ex-husband and her husband are good friends.

Her cats have different personalities. Take Ana Poteraika for instance, who’s the most beautiful of all the cats but she’s also anorexic. Doris has tried to feed her liver but with little success. Ana eats only tenderloin steak 🥩 chopped into tiny pieces and fed to her. But even so, she would eat one or two pieces only, leaving the rest for Dagoberto, another cat with an enormous appetite to gobble up.

I admired her uncanny relationship with her ex and sometimes I found their dialogue amusing.

In “The Cake”, the narrator she with the reader her desire to “make a cake that’s light and fluffy”. She adds that she doesn’t want to make cookies because they lack a third dimension quality to them. She notes that when you eat cookies, it feels like there’s something missing, and that’s you can’t stop eating them. The narrator wants to make a fluffy cake that’s reminiscent of a cake she once tasted called “Paradise Cake”.

With her mother’s approval (and her help, of course) she sets off to make a fluffy cake.
But the narrator grows impatient and keeps opening the lid of the pan to see if the cake is done. Her impatience finally gets the better of her and she takes down the cake.

By then, the cake has turned dark brown and shrunken, “like a stubby croissant”. Nobody can eat the cake.

In “Tourists and Travelers”, the narrator recounts her visit to Naples with her husband Aldo and her son, Leo. On her way to the Naples flea market, she observes how the locals live—“the windows of their houses look directly out on the street and one could see everything people are doing inside”. You can see their bed, a refrigerator, a piano and so on. She also notes how her husband goes dumbstruck whenever he comes across normal sightings such as food on display in front of a shop window and a fish at the fishmonger’s. Highly recommend.

Many thanks to Hebe Uhart, NetGalley, and Archipelago for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

[Theediscerning · Rating 1 out of 5]

I came to look at the reviews for this at the 20% stage, having thought of ditching it long before then. It was quite amazing to find people liking this book, and thinking it "witty" (it's not), or at all engaging. Here are my notes, as far as I got:-

First not up to much; second droll goings-on with a dance instructor, her ex, her husband and her cats. Impatient young cake-bakers; a cadre of story-tellers; the fifth work goes nowhere, but does show us a naive child trying to observe adults; the sixth goes to Naples but again leaves us wanting. Trips to the vet and the hairdressers' are much the same.

Now I very rarely give up on collections of short stories, but when I say these stories left me wanting, I really mean it – it seemed to present a nothingness, neither character, event or situation. It was just text on a page, and text designed to remove all the resulting effect those words normally provide. Four hundred pages more of this seemed to promise little – as I say, it's nearly always wrong to dump a compilation, for the chance one piece will be worth it later on. I was really doubting that rule long before abandoning this.