Centroeuropa

by Vicente Luis Mora

Prusia, en algún lugar junto al Oder, en la frontera con Polonia, un invierno en las primeras décadas del siglo XIX. Un hombre, llegado desde lejos con la intención de cultivar la difícil tierra del lugar, descarga de su carreta el ataúd con el cuerpo de su esposa, muerta durante el viaje. Cuando empieza a cavar la sepultura en la tierra helada, topa sorprendentemente con otro cuerpo: un soldado. Varón, prusiano, soldado húsar y congelado: ese fue el primer cadáver. Cuando uno encuentra bajo su tierra, en su propio suelo, un cuerpo enterrado, sospecha que no está solo; de alguna manera, quien halla un cadáver teme o imagina que otros cuerpos aguardan inmóviles a la espera de su turno. Con el descubrimiento del cuerpo del primer soldado comenzó la historia. La de una tierra inhóspita, batida por las guerras, en el corazón de Centroeuropa. Y en paralelo, la del destino trágico de quien nos narra lo acontecido. Con Centroeuropa, novela ganadora del Premio Málaga 2019, Vicente Luis Mora aborda el tema de la identidad, tanto personal como histórica, a través de un personaje que es múltiple, como múltiple es la historia de Europa. Una novela, en palabras del jurado que otorgó el premio, 'que propone una mirada al corazón de Europa y sus heridas.

Genres: Fiction, Spain, Historical Fiction, Germany

184 pages, Hardcover

First published September 2, 2020

About the author

Vicente Luis Mora Suárez-Varela (Córdoba, 26 de septiembre de 1970) es un escritor, poeta, ensayista y crítico literario español.

OBRAS

Narrativa
Centroeuropa (Galaxia Gutenberg, 2020)
Fred Cabeza de Vaca (Sexto Piso, 2017)
Circular 07. Las afueras. Córdoba: Berenice, 2007.
Circular. Córdoba: Plurabelle, 2003.
Subterráneos (Premio Andalucía Joven 2005; Barcelona, DVD, 2006).
Alba Cromm. Barcelona: Seix Barral, 2010.

Ensayo
La escritura a la intemperie (Univ. León, 2021)
Micronesia (Univ. Valladolid, 2021)
Pasadizos. Espacios simbólicos entre arte y literatura (I Premio Málaga de Ensayo, Madrid, Editorial Páginas de Espuma, 2008).
La luz nueva. Singularidades en la narrativa española actual (Córdoba, Editorial Berenice, 2007).
Singularidades: ética y poética de la literatura española actual (Madrid, Bartleby, 2006).
Pangea: Internet, blogs y comunicación en un mundo nuevo (Sevilla, Fundación José Manuel Lara, 2006).
El lectoespectador. Barcelona: Seix Barral, 2012.
El sujeto boscoso (Iberomericana Vervuert, 2016)

Poesía
Mecánica (Hiperión, 2021)
Serie (Pre-Textos, 2016)
Mester de Cibervía (Premio Arcipreste de Hita, Pre-Textos, 2000).
Nova (Pre-Textos, 2003).
Autobiografía (novela de terror) (Premio de Poesía Universidad de Sevilla; 2003).
Construcción (Pre-Textos, 2005).
Tiempo (Pre-Textos, 2009).

AFORISMO
Teoría (Mixtura, 2022)
Nanomoralia (La isla de Siltolá, 2017)

En septiembre de 2010 redactó íntegramente el n.º 322 de la revista Quimera, dedicado al tema «Literatura y falsificación». Para ello, suplantó (con el consentimiento de los autores) a firmas habituales de la publicación, e inventó otros supuestos colaboradores (como Berta Herthaussen o José Jardiel Duque). La revista se publicó sin ninguna indicación de que se trataba de un juego literario y fue la propia dirección de la revista quien lo reveló posteriormente; después, el propio autor lo reconoció en su blog.

Reviews

[Ana Cristina Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Como el título indica, el protagonista principal de la novela es el corazón de Europa, una tierra que ha sido semillero de guerras inacabables pero también ha producido el Romanticismo, la filosofía más profunda y la música más bella. Todo eso está presente en esta breve historia, magníficamente escrita, de una manera sobria y poética.

El protagonista es un campesino – el primero que no es siervo de la comarca – que a principios del siglo XIX llega a un pequeño pueblo prusiano a orillas del Oder, para tomar posesión de la tierra que ha comprado y cultivarla para su propio sustento. Lleva consigo a su esposa muerta, asesinada por un soldado errante, y al intentar enterrarla comienza a encontrar cadáveres de soldados de distintos ejércitos, todos ellos congelados, que ocupan buena parte de su terreno.

A partir de esta premisa, descubrimos la estructura social del pequeño pueblo, con unas autoridades que no saben muy bien cómo tratar a un campesino libre, que viene a ser una nueva especie de ciudadano. También vamos conociendo el pasado de Redo, su nacimiento en un burdel vienés y cómo ha llegado hasta aquí para empezar una nueva vida cultivando remolacha. Nos llegan ecos de la reciente Revolución Francesa y de las convulsiones de una Europa que está alumbrando el futuro.

En conjunto es una historia muy bien trabada, con sorpresas y cierta intriga, así como diferentes niveles de lectura, que se lee en un suspiro. Me ha gustado mucho.
4,5*

[Katia N]

I will start with a lesson that has nothing to do with the content of this book. My trusted GR friend Daniel KML has reviewed this book here and liked it. Our tastes generally overlap and i felt very excited about the book. So i went on-line to see how can i get it straightaway. Fortunately it took me a few minutes to search and in the process i’ve realised that somehow i was aware of this: specifically i was surprised with such an 'awkward' title ‘Centroeuropa’ instead of the term ‘Mitteleuropa’ that is widely known and used. About this - later. But this innocent thought has triggered a memory: I've dashed to my very own shelf and found this exactly book there! Later i’ve remembered buying it as I was (and still is) interested in all ‘Mitteleuropa’ stuff and i admired 'Peninsula Press' that published this book in the UK. But the lesson is to myself is very clear: do not rush buying a new book - you have plenty on the shelves already, especially if you can’t seem to remember anymore what you have! This is something i imagine that might be of a relevance to the broader audience on this site:-)

Now to back to ‘Centroeuropa’. For those who follow the Booker International Prize, this book, if published this year, would seem as an integral part of the longlist:

- ambiguity of gender as in We Are Green and Trembling or She Who Remains;
- a witch as a character and uncanny creatures and somewhat macabre (in this case there is a bunch of dead frozen soldiers) as in The Witch and The Wax Child
-an outsider in a close small community in transition between the old and the new era as in The Duke.

Though when it comes to the shortlist, I doubt it would be so easily connected to rest of the four. There is though one sentence that bears a direct connection with The Director: ‘In any case, this world is in such a bad shape that anyone who does not actively seek ill to others is doing an enormous good.'. In some more remote ways it has also reminded me The Empusium. It is just a side note observation that would be irrelevant very soon I guess.

It is a playful, well executed novella that i’ve read in one sitting. It is set in a small Prussian town somewhere at the beginning of the 19th century. A man called Redo has arrived with a deed on some land in this town to become the one of the first ‘free farmers’. He does not know anyone in this town and wants to keep his past hidden apart from his recent loss of his wife who travels with him in a casket. When he start to dig his land he keeps finding dead frozen soldiers. Their number is doubling each day. He needs to resolve this problem somehow so he consults the authorities. And the story takes off from there. The story is told from his perspective and he is a quirky inquisitive protagonist. He meets with a bunch of well sketched locals. The second half of the story is full of deadpan humour and a bit of absurd.

It is the one of those erudite little texts with a pronounced intertextuality. A lot of names got checked including Liebniz, Humbold and even Rahel Varnhagen. I wish the author would do more with the latter especially if he decides to pick her up. But it is a minor complaint. The one of the characters, a historian called Jasob Motke is probably a nod towards the founder of history as a scientific research Leopold von Ranke.

There are some interesting observations along with the story about the nature of truth, identity etc. There is also a certain philosophical dimension that looks at the reality with a kind of almost geological prism. First, we are privy to all those frozen soldiers that are not melting even under the sun. Then there is a passage like this connecting the development and decay in the natural world and in humans, this idea that all of this comes back to humus and gets recycled in a longer perspective:

I noted how his flesh vibrated from his waist to his arm, quivering with age and fat, proving to me that age operates on beings the way time works on nature, that adiposities are to people what humus is to the earth, covering once-firm skins and rocks, and that both are signals of long, fruitful lives rather than signs of decay; earlobes and nails that grow and drop and drooping breasts are like the branches of old trees, gradually worn down by weight and the passing seasons. Old people are thin and small because they've given all of themselves, like fruit falling to the earth and fertilising it with its substrate.

It seems an interesting way to defamiliarise humanity, but i’ve seen it used before. I’ve just seen something similar in such classics like Sartre Nausea or even The Melancholy of Resistance, for example.

The main message of the book it seems to learn from history, stop fighting wars, stop being greedy with constant desire for growth and enjoy time we have on this earth.

To deliver this message more effectively, the author uses maths. In his case it is a simple geometrical progression: everything is doubling with each iteration. I guess he wants to show how quickly this growth is getting out of control and leads to destruction. He uses his frozen soldiers to help his case. He also shows the examples of sinister ‘doubling’ in history:

Frederick William of Prussia ...had doubled the Prussian army, a detail which interested me, since I saw in it a sort of natural law impelling the powerful to move pieces in geometric progression and keep history moving. Conquering double the number of towns, multiplying legions or regiments, doubling the length of one's reign compared to the previous leader or doubling the country's territory, like the Mughal Aurangzeb or Alfonso IV the Brave of Portugal, who conquered all the land from the Tagus to the Algarve...Humboldt reached the conclusion, after his American journey, that thanks to the conquest of the New World in the 15'th century, 'the works of creation had doubled for the inhabitants of our old Europe!’

The protagonist resists this by installing his frozen soldiers as scarecrows on his land as a warning to everyone:

Universal history as numerical progression. I thought that one way of resisting this mathematical-political madness, this reasoning which is actually unreasoning, was to cut the troops, reduce the size of the hussars. Scare away the birds and reduce the soldiers.

Though the irony does not escape Redo when the authorities built the huge fence around his land hiding this macabre monument out of sigh of the general public.

I personally would expect more creative use of maths for the novel announcing the use of maths as a tool from the first pages (doubling soldiers). Later Jacob the historian quipped about his students days when he has made ‘a new religion with some fellow students, in which God was mathematical exactitude and the saints were prime numbers.’. It sounds they played something akin Pythagorean Brotherhood and anticipated some use for at least triangular numbers in the plot, never-mind the primes. Alas it stayed ‘low tech’ and did not go away from the doubling.

In his blog, the author mentioned that he used the series of constraints in writing this novel. The one i’ve noticed is roughly doubling the size of every consecutive chapter. It has appeared his has exactly doubled the amount of characters. The one i have not noticed was using only the words available in Spanish in the period he wrote about. That might explain why he uses “CetroEuropa” rather than ‘Mitteleuropa’. He's also said he used metric rhythmic style pertinent to Spanish classical novels of the 19th century. I felt unfortunately it has been somewhat lost in translation unlike in The Duke where the language conveyed the fluidity of the 19th century prose. There were other interesting constraints the author has created for himself that more attentive readers might have noticed. The issue of gender and the backstory of the main protagonist is interesting though it is widely used in the literature of the last decade or so.

In general i’ve enjoyed reading this novel. It is a daring thoughtful experiment. However, I wish it went a bit deeper into the concepts and tools it has attempted to deliver. Though it seemed that the language and all creative techniques (metric prose etc) the author used in the original has been at least partially lost to me in translation. Still it is definitely worth spending a morning with.

PS

Here are the links to some relevant articles. Thank you, Daniel!
https://pghrev.com/a-writer-talks-to-...
https://vicenteluismora.blogspot.com/...

[Aletheia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ahora que vamos despacio, vamos a contar mentiras. Eso nos deja claro nuestro protagonista y narrador, Redo Hauptshammer, en la primera página de esta pequeña y densa novela que se disfruta como un pastel de varias capas. Redo llega a Szonden, una aldea prusiana, con el ataúd de su esposa en el carro y la idea de establecerse como el primer campesino libre… y, sin querer, empieza a desenterrar cadáveres.

«Uno desconoce lo que le espera a lo largo del camino. Y además le sorprende la vida que entona dos melodías al mismo tiempo: la de tono grave y la de tono más grave.»

Es una novela impecable, tan trabajada, sutil, ingeniosa… que no he sabido ni como reseñarla hasta ahora, seguro que no le haré justicia. ¿Es una novela histórica? No, pero habla de la Historia ¿Es fantasía? No, pero sí. ¿Es una historia de amor? Pues sí, pero no. No de esas. Nos habla de tantos temas en tan pocas páginas, que deja a la altura del betún a la literatura mayoritaria publicada con prisas, desmigada en una papilla que se entienda sin esfuerzo y vendida al peso. Cuantas más páginas, mejor.

«¿De qué están hechos esos miserables a quienes dejamos llevar las riendas?»

Para mí, aunque creo que habrá una opinión por cada lector, el tema que más pesa en la novela es la identidad, la propia y la colectiva (“¿Y la europea?” M. Rajoy); sobre la responsabilidad de cuestionarnos y reflexionar sobre la identidad, y el derecho de construirla y vivir con ella. Redo juega con la suya propia en este ejercicio de confesión laica que es Centroeuropa, aun cuando esa confesión ya no tenga importancia, y mantiene el misterio y la atención del lector hasta el final.

«He estado a punto de dejarme llevar, sólo para ver esas palabras, las palabras de la verdad, escritas.»

Es un libro que no creo que deje indiferentes a muchos e incluso si nos quedamos en la superficie de la historia por falta de tiempo, concentración o hábito, se disfruta exactamente igual. En mi caso tuvo un valor añadido, pues se eligió como lectura conjunta en el club de lectura del pasado mes, y ver la cantidad de opiniones e interpretaciones que surgieron a partir de las mismas 180 páginas fue refrescante y muy divertido.

Vicente Luis Mora es una caja de sorpresas, porque a pesar de haber leído la sinopsis de este libro, lo empecé con la idea de leer algo escrito con el mismo puño que había firmado “Fred Cabeza de Vaca”, y no tiene nada que ver. Ambas son grandes novelas, pero el único hilo que las une además del nombre que aparece en portada, es el narrador sospechoso. «A partir de la cuarta casualidad no hay magia, sino sistema», dice la bruja de este cuento, y yo seguiré leyendo a VLM para comprobar o refutar esa hipótesis.

[Myriam V · Rating 4 out of 5]

Un extranjero llega a Prusia con el ataúd de su esposa, posee una parcela que lo convierte en el primer agricultor libre de la zona, y cuando se dispone a enterrarlo encuentra cadáveres de soldados.

Nadie sabe cómo tratar a este campesino libre, nadie sabe qué hacer con los cadáveres, nadie sabe que este hombre corrió un velo sobre su identidad.

¿Se puede enterrar el pasado? ¿Por qué una persona oculta su identidad? ¿Y una nación? Nunca descubrí cuál era el secreto, hasta que lo reveló el autor, estuve intrigada todo el tiempo. En esta narración llena de simbolismo la atmósfera de misterio e irrealidad está muy bien lograda. Seguramente se me escaparon muchos símbolos y muchos temas, los sigo pensando.

No es una historia alegre, pero lo siniestro convive con el amor y la amistad.

Quiero destacar el estilo, que fue lo primero que me gustó, es una historia del siglo XIX escrita con el lenguaje de su época sin ser rebuscado. Suena clásico y moderno. El autor dice que utilizó un español que pertenece a la vez a los siglos XIX y XXI.

Muy bueno. Una elección de lenguaje muy acertada para la trama.

[switterbug (Betsey) · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Napoleonic wars have ended, the Prussians have largely possessed Germany. It is the 1820s, and the enigmatic narrator, Redo Hauptshammer, has traveled from Vienna to Szonden, a small Prussian village on the Oder, with his wife, who is sadly now dead. Feudalism may be vanishing, but Redo has come here to accept a small plot of land offered at no price but to farm it. He is surrounded by colorful, quirky neighbors, but now that he is widowed, he will have to maintain an even more stringent life of mystery, keeping a wall up between himself and everyone else. Where he grew up, his mother’s profession. He has secrets that cannot spill.

When Redo starts to dig the land to bury his wife, he is shocked to discover a frozen dead corpse in cavalry uniform, from the past. The bodies pile up, so to speak, they double, double again, and again and again, until there are thirty-two corpses at different layers of the frozen ground. Recognizable are uniforms of the past, but some uniforms have never existed before! The next shocker is that they remain stiff and frozen, regardless of outside temperature.

Spanish author Vicente Luis Mara calls it a “stratigraphic” novel, meaning an archeological novel of layers—lthe bodies as a metaphor. There are strata of culture, the unconscious, and knowledge, all pertinent to Europe and its features. When those bodies are unearthed, their silence screams into the village and beyond, bringing an emotional turmoil far and wide. When Redo asks for direction in what to do with these frozen soldiers, nobody in the higher echelons of power want to help him, instead hiding behind layers of bureaucracy, Kafka-esque answers. The soldiers of the past and future become not only a continuing metaphor for the times, but also an existential dread to those that view them.

The push and pull momentum kept me fully engaged, the prose an open testament to Europe’s wounds and its unconscious, as well as a lingual manifestation of the deepest layers of thought, the buried history of the land.

“It’s lucky I have my faithful lover, History, to remind me that all endeavors are futile and all passions transitory.”

This will surely be one of my favorite books of the year! Literature and/or history lovers, dig in! And I can’t forget to thank Rahul Bery for such a smooth and striking translation.

A big thank you to Bellevue Literary Press for sending me an ARC for review.

[Fernando Garcia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Impecable. Envidia cochina la que tengo por no saber escribir así.

[Vendedor de rápida · Rating 4 out of 5]

Las mentiras grandes y complejas sólo se sostienen si tienes un texto de apoyo inmutable al que regresar de tanto en tanto para recordar los pormenores. Si la memoria es poco fiable, la invención es más dúctil y traicionera todavía”.
.
La última novela de Vicente Luis Mora es el registro escrito de una impostura, una novela histórica que no lo es porque es también fantástica (en todos los sentidos), y a la vez también una profunda reflexión sobre la memoria histórica. Tan profunda como las zanjas que podrían excavarse en casi cualquier lugar de Europa para descubrir a sus muertos en batalla. Mucho más profunda que esas fronteras que tantas veces los justifican. ‘Centroeuropa’ es un goce para la inteligencia del lector que se lee con asombro creciente. Ojalá hubiera más mentiras grandes como ésta y menos de las otras.

[Maral · Rating 3 out of 5]

Creía que seria un libro fácil, ligero, por su extensión y por su argumento no veía complicación. Pues bien... La estructura del libro, sus saltos temporales, esa interacción narrador lector a modo de llamadas de atención, te ralentiza la lectura, que no te la estropea, solo la hace más lenta.
La historia no termina de convencerme. Mezclar historia y surrealismo no es lo mio. Si no me puedo imaginar la escena como parte de una realidad (en un libro que no es cifi, o yo creía que no era cifi...) no me convence. Ninguna de las historias contenidas en el libro me resultan creíbles. Le falta emoción, profundidad, no hay drama cuando debería haberlo, no hay miedo, no hay dolor, en escenas que debería ...
Como metáfora... Pues Pse también... Con lo bien que escribe podría haber bordado la historia. Pero el dejar un cabo suelto estropea toda la historia.

[Álvaro Velasco · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reconozco que me han mantenido enganchado las peripecias en Oderbruck que cuenta este narrador sospechoso de no se sabe qué oscuro pasado.

Novela histórica cuyo subtexto toca un montón de temas en tan solo 180 páginas.

[jeremy · Rating 5 out of 5]

in any case, this world is in such bad shape that anyone who does not actively seek ill to others is doing an enormous good.

the first of spanish author vicente luis mora’s many books to appear in english translation, centroeuropa is a relentlessly intriguing novel transcending easy classification. on its surface a work of historical fiction, centroeuropa isn’t quite that at all, extending as it does beyond its 19th century setting to tell an aftermathematical tale of widowery and warfare — and the entwined enigma that follows both.

redo (not his real name) is reeling following the death of his wife odra (not her real name) and settles in the small town of oderbruch to begin anew. hoping to embark on a simpler life as a sugar beet farmer, redo inexplicably finds the corpse of a soldier frozen in his fields. and then two more. and even more still. flirting with the borderlands of magical realism and oulipo-style constraints both arithmetical and literary (playing out in plot, composition, and more), mora’s english debut is a magnificently multilayered amalgamation of mystery, morality, and metaphor. playful yet philosophical, centroeuropa’s deceptively simple story belies its many intricacies. mora’s novel has a quiet irresistibility about it, wending its way into heart and mind as it reveals ever more about love, war, and what lingers after each.

this is a fantastic work of fiction.

the only good thing about having enjoyed very few happy moments is that their gold maintains its luster over time. and though their memory can be bitter, or bittersweet, they are not diluted through the myopic lens of the passing years. they’re always there, clearly visible in the memory. when you have lived for long enough, you realize that surviving an incident is more relevant than whether the event itself was positive or negative, because the majority of moments in the majority of years in the majority of a life fade with an ease that’s terrible to witness. we are condensed oblivion. those gold coins are the only thing we will take to the other side, once charon’s tax is deducted; the meaning of everything resides in them.

*translated from the spanish by rahul bery (afonso cruz, david trueba, simone campos, et al.)

[Mari Carmen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Primer libro de este año en el club de lectura de mi ciudad y me ha encantado. Desde la primera página me ha enganchado, me ha parecido una buena historia, un buen misterio. Redo es todo un personaje.
Muy recomendable.

[Nuria Castaño monllor · Rating 4 out of 5]

“La tierra es como los libros: una vez abierta, también sabe hablar”.

Exquisitamente escrito, este librito de Vicente Luis Mora, me ha parecido la antítesis de esa literatura profusamente ensalzada por palmeros (y amigotes de toda condición y red social), cuyos autores, (y autoras, que ahora sí hay que darles visibilidad) no parecen haber visto o leído mucho más allá de su ombligo. Las más de las veces acabo un libro con un soberano enfado y siempre pensando “más leer y menos escribir”.

Centroeuropa es justo justito lo contrario, inteligente, sutil, culta, con pasajes que evocan lecturas y sabores de Joseph Roth, Sándor Marai, Goethe, Tolstoi,...
Algo así como estar en casa entre amigos.

No diré que ha supuesto una sorpresa porque ya me lo habían advertido, y porque hablamos de un autor que creo, sostiene una particular forma de enfocar la literatura sin autoconcesiones, pero sí es, sin duda, un bálsamo, una piedra de toque entre tanta publicación grotesca.
No os la perdáis.

[Irene Benito · Rating 5 out of 5]

Me ha gustado muchísimo: el original planteamiento, el tono, todos los personajes y la candidez de sus relaciones, la cantidad de reflexiones inteligentes que nos hablan de cómo se hace y se cuenta la Historia. He disfrutado un montón leyéndolo.

[Paul Fulcher · Rating 5 out of 5]

Centroeuropa is Rahul Bery's translation of the original by Vicente Luis Mora and was published in 2023 in the UK by Peninsula Press, and in 2026 in the US (and in a revised translation) by Bellevue Literary Press.

This is a fascinating 'archeological novel' (in the author's term, disavowing any attempt to write a historical novel), written under Oulipan constraints, as well as an enthralling read.

It rather flew under the prize and critical radar in the UK - the press entered a different book into the Republic of Consciousness Prize in the UK - but seems to be getting more attention in the US, and I wonder if we may set in on the Republic of Consciousness Prize US & Canada or the Cercador Prize.

The novel it set in the 19th century in a small Prussian village, Szonden, in the area of Oderburch on the River Oder. It opens:

Male, Prussian, hussar soldier, frozen.

That was the first body I found while digging in the frozen earth to bury my wife; I say my wife because I never knew her real name, although I will return to that later.

When one finds a buried body under one's own earth, in one's own soil, one suspects it is not alone; in some way, anyone who finds a corpse fears or suspects that other corpses are out there, waiting their turn. The fields of a given place cannot be looked at in the same way once the first body has been found, for now they no longer resemble flower meadows but burial grounds.

The story began with the discovery of that first soldier, but what I wish to write cannot be properly understood unless I go back a few hours to my anguished interview with Mayor Altmayer. Or perhaps I should go further and recall those sad days in Mainz? I ask the potential reader to forgive me for faltering as I expound, for these memories constitute the first long text I have ever put to paper, and the past is so wide, long, and deep, that choosing any single part as a starting point constitutes, in some way, an imposture. Nothing starts at an exact point. Our lives do not start entirely with our births.

Our narrator, who goes by the name Redo Hauptshammer (yes that's Oder spelt backwards), who is telling the events of the novel many years later, has moved to Oderburch to claim a plot of land, gifted to him by a former resident of the town - Redo will become the first free cropper in a town where land reform, inspired by events in France, is being very reluctantly embraced.

En route to the town, however, his wife Odra (except that is also not her real name, which even 'Redo' doesn't know) was accidentally killed in Mainz in a firefight involving an escaped French soldier. Redo's first task on his land was to bury her - but digging in the ground, he discovers the body of a Prussian soldier, but one that is oddly more frozen that the surrounding ground.

The next day (and in the next chapter) he digs in another spot, only to uncover two bodies, of soldiers from a different era; and the next four, the next eight, the next sixteen (and the local seer convinces him another 32 bodies lie hidden in a further unexacvated part of his plot).

Which is the most explicit hint of the doubling underlying the novel's construction. The attentive reader will also realise that each chapter is approximately twice as long as the proceeding one - but would not, without a electronic version and a word-counter, realise that this is not approximate, it is actually precise.

Chapter 1 is (in both the original, and admirably also in Bery's painstaking but highly readable translation) 750 words long, Chapter 2 1500 words, and so on, the last Chapter 6 24,000 words. Which makes for a total of 47,250 words.

Chapter 2 opens: One is unaware of what to expect along the way, and surprised by the way life intones two melodies at once: sombre and even more sombre. These harmonic lines are soon joined by another, making three, and then others, those of the disasters and errors yet to be perpetrated, like voices in a chorus. My wife Odra (not her real name) and I knew this from that fateful 4* of August when we had decided to leave Vienna and put our 'French plan' into action.

and the attentive reader realises that the numbers one to eighteen appear in sequence in the text of the chapter. Why eighteen? Well 4+7+2+5+0 = 18.

The archeological part of the novel comes from the layering of the bloody history of the area, including its future (some of the bodies are from the 20th century), in the bodies. As the seer tells him: ‘I knew that one’s daughter. Those ones are French. Those four are from the New March, when it was still Polish. Those ones aren’t from here, they’re from the past. And those sixteen aren’t from here or the past.’ ‘Where are they from, then? ‘The question is not where, but when'.

The novel's text (in both original and the translation) reads, deliberately, as a modern text, but with the constraint of using no words that didn't exist in the 19th century, in a sense doubly anachronistic.

And the doubling that is the novel's key principle itself links to militaristic expansionism, the source of much of the conflict:

[Frederick William of Prussia] had doubled the Prussian army, a detail which interested me, since I saw in it a sort of natural law impelling the powerful to move pieces in geometric progression and keep history moving. Conquering double the number of towns, multiplying legions or regiments, doubling the length of one's reign compared to the previous leader or doubling the country's territory, like the Mughal Aurangzeb or Alfonso IV the Brave of Portugal, who conquered all the land from the Tagus to the Algarve. Roughly around the time of my arrival in Szonden, Humboldt reached the conclusion, after his American journey, that thanks to the conquest of the New World in the 15th century, 'the works of creation had doubled for the inhabitants of our old Europe.' Universal history as numerical progression.

There is also a very human plot to the novel - 'Redo' has reinvented himself as a respectable citizen as his mother kept a brothel, and Odra was the name she gave to one of her girls, and the presence of the bodies on his property prevents him establishing his plans to be a local pioneer in sugar-beet farming. He's also a digressive (which he admits) and unreliable (which he doesn't) narrator, inconsistencies in his account called out by footnotes from a translator.

And Redo - and Odra - have a particular secret of their own, one which is revealed/hinted at on the last page of his account.

Impressive.

The author's commentary on the novel's constraints: https://vicenteluismora.blogspot.com/...

The translator's comments: https://lithub.com/freedom-through-st...

The author and translator in discussion: https://pghrev.com/a-writer-talks-to-...

[Andy Weston · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a novel about about the death of a loved one, the grief that follows, the horrors of war, and slavery in the early 1800s, and yet, it is a huge amount of fun.

The narrator, a man born in a Viennese brothel, Redo Hauptshammer, is looking back at his life and writing about a time when he first moved to live in the town of Szonden on the banks of the river Oder. He buys an acre of land on which he intends to plat crops. He is constantly revising his text, and that has been translated; there are footnotes from the translator which suggest it has been written after Redo's death.

Redo has recently lost his wife, in a random, almost darkly humorous, accident. In a market in Mainz she gets hit by a bullet from the crossfire of a skirmish. Put simply, the novel is about Redo trying to bury his wife, but all sorts of things get in the way and stop him from doing so. At his first attempt, as he digs his spade hits the frozen body of what turns out to be a soldier, then a second, then a fourth, then it seems a small army of at least thirty two - all frozen, even on a warm day. Even when they are exposed to the warmth of the day and sunlight they remain frozen.

There is a superb cast of local villagers also. Redo consults his historian friend Jakob Moltke, Mayor Altmeyer, his neighbor Hans, and various other administrators to see what he’s discovered, and they are also dumbfounded. Fold in a local witch, a giant, and the amorous daughter of the local baron, and the entertainment value is considerable.

Mora's writing is tremendous. He won the Málaga prize for it. He is the sort of author who toys with his reader, the text full of concealed hints and cunning double-meanings. Combine this with the translation of Rahul Berry, who won the PEN Translates Award for the novel, and this really is a novel to savour.

It will be one of my novel's of the year.

Here is a link to a conversation between Mora and Berry, his translator.. https://pghrev.com/a-writer-talks-to-...

[Jesus de Velasco · Rating 5 out of 5]

“La tierra es como los libros: una vez abierta, también sabe hablar”.

Vicente Luis Mora se sirve de un contexto histórico muy concreto para contarnos una historia de amor pero también nos habla de identidad y memoria. Traza un circulo con sangre en torno al corazón de la Europa que ha vivido tantas guerras y conflictos, y pone sus cadáveres delante de los ojos de la sociedad (y del lector). Asimismo, la narración es sumamente ingeniosa utilizando diversos recursos literarios para hablarnos de presente, pasado y futuro al mismo tiempo.

En resumen, creo que es un libro que brilla por su originalidad, y me ha parecido muy interesante la historia que cuenta, la mezcla de géneros y los detalles históricos que abundan pero no cansan. El misterio del personaje y la tensión narrativa te llevan hasta el final sin darte cuenta en un libro en algo menos de 200 paginas. Magnífico.

[Rachel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ohh I loved this. Playful, layered, and really just a joy to read.

Redo Hauptshammer—or so he calls himself—has just arrived in the small Prussian village of Szonden. It’s a rare time of peace, the Napoleonic wars have ended, feudalism has ended, and just in time as Redo holds the deed to a piece of cultivable land that he intends to claim. Having lost his wife on the journey, Redo’s first order of business is to lay his wife to rest. As he begins digging, he hits a body—the frozen body of a soldier. Again and again, he digs and encounters the multiplying bodies of soldiers, though their uniforms differ, they are all impossibly frozen.

Narrated by a future Redo, it’s clear from the start that all is not as it seems, that Redo has an unknown history and intends to keep his past and true identity hidden. Redo’s storytelling knows no linear bounds, he recalls events at random, jumping years ahead to tell an anecdote before rushing back to the past, but he is self-aware in his scattered retelling as he turns to the reader to explain or justify his diversions. This refusal to adhere to time as a march forward, as a linear progression, is fitting for the themes Mora is exploring here. Though the frozen soldiers all look as if they were laid to rest mere hours ago, closer inspection of their uniforms and weapons indicate they’re the victims of wars that span centuries, of wars which have not yet come to pass. Time circles back on itself, history is repeated, the futility of war is forgotten and new leaders start new wars that kill their sons while they sit back and take a catnap.

I’m not doing this book justice at all with this review. It’s so short, yet Mora has masterfully woven together the factual history from this period of transition, when bureaucracy and leadership within Prussia were shifting, with the fantastical and allegorical nature of the frozen soldiers and their impossible yet undeniable existence.

It’s fun, beautifully crafted and translated by Bery, and full of surprises throughout. Big recommend!

[Carmen Lee_and_Lee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Leído en el Club de Lectura de Churriana. Este es el tipo de libro que nunca hubiera elegido leer, principalmente porque simplemente el título me parece de lo menos atractivo. Y aún me estoy preguntando por qué darle un título tan soso a una obra tan mágica y singular. La he leído con gusto, aunque el relato me atrapó en un principio y aproximadamente a la mitad empezó a parecerme más un ejercicio de virtuosismo, una especie de cuento de hadas en trampantojo cuya alegoría o se me escapa o no es tan profunda como yo misma me he convencido de que es.
Las premisas que me han sorprendido y volcado mis expectativas son las siguientes:
Hay una trágica y truncada historia de amor cuyo final sabemos desde la primera página y tiñe toda la novela de una tristeza ineludible
El tema de los muertos y su inexplicable estado de congelación es un elemento de realismo mágico que no esperaba tampoco encontrar en una novela supuestamente de corte histórico.
La novela empieza dentro del género picaresco y termina siendo un cuento de hadas, algo bastante fuera de lo común.
Lo que menos me ha sorprendido ha sido lo que identifico como tema principal: la presencia inevitable de la guerra en ciertos territorios, la muerte tan ineludible, la manera en que los poderosos manipulan y utilizan a la plebe a su antojo, ya sea como carne de cañón o como sirvientes. Intuyo que otro mensaje sutil es como siempre haya individuos que se las arreglan para soslayar sus circunstancias adversas y llevar la vida que desean, así como el tema de la búsqueda de la propia identidad y(spoiler) el travestismo de la manera en que aparece ya en Shakespeare o Lope, tema muy recurrente en la literatura clásica y que, obviamente, respondía a una realidad.
No sé si me han convencido, aunque me hayan hecho ilusión, descubrir a tanto personaje de cuento pululando por la narración: la bruja buena, el lobo, el gigante, el hada(Johanna), la princesa etc etc.

[Mary Lins · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Centroeuropa”, by Vicente Luis Mora and translated from the Spanish beautifully by Rahul Bery, is a delight! I thoroughly enjoyed every twist and turn this wonderful novel presented.

This magical tale is told from many years in the future, by Redo Hauptshammer, about the year he first came to Szonden, Prussia, in the first part of the 19th century. Upon arrival intending to farm sugar beets, he discovered the frozen body of a Prussian, hussar soldier as he tried to dig a grave for his beloved wife who had died on their journey from Vienna.

More bodies of young soldiers immerge from the earth. Identified by their uniforms they are from various wars recent and ancient past…and maybe from the future?

Redo relates his story as if telling it to a friend over a glass of wine in a pub. It is not a straight forward narrative, as with most storytellers he occasionally meanders off on reclaimed memories, and he hints at secrets without revealing them (though any astute reader will figure them out, as I’m sure the author intends!)

Redo back-tracts to explain his origin story in a brothel in Vienna, and how he and his wife came to possess the farmland so far from home.

Redo’s story is full of wonderful characters such as the Mayor of the town, the local historian, a white witch, and the kind-hearted peasant farmer neighbor who lives next door.

The central question is what can Redo do with the bodies he’s unearthed? The town council wants them buried, but not anywhere where they will get attention. They are symbols of war and death after all. No one wants to be reminded of that.

The authorities drag their feet regarding a solution, so Redo explores some creative ways to reclaim his land from the bodies that I’ll let the reader discover, for these plot points are great fun and full of symbolism and portent.

Through Redo’s wonderful story, and that of the frozen young warriors, we are cautioned to Seize the Day! Go for the life you want, as you only have the one life.

Many thanks yet again to Bellevue Literary Press for this advanced copy of “Centroeuropa” which will be published in March of 2026. You’ll want to put this unique novel on your pre-order list!

[Kip Kyburz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another 2026 book leaves me gobsmacked early in the year. With an interesting structure, partly derived from limitations the author placed on himself, Centroeuropa springs forth as a novel flitting through time and memory as Redo Hauptshammer tells the story of the most important year of their lives and the ways in which it echoed through the decades that follows. With a central conceit of a found manuscript (to the point where footnotes occasionally point out discrepancies within the text), Redo writes on the year he moved to Prussia and found an exponentially growing number of frozen dead soldiers in his ground from disparate armies and, more distressingly, disparate times. As more people flock to his land to see the bodies, friendships form and secrets are threatened to be uncovered; but this book is way more a pastoral than a thriller.

[Mavipo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Me he quedado impresionada con este libro!
Al principio no me sentía del todo cómoda en su lectura pero avanzando y sobretodo intentando ir más allá de la misma lectura , me he quedado impactada .
Muchísimas frases para releer, llenas de sabiduría , mucho que reflexionar. No es sólo una historia más , la historia del Hombre, la historia desde muchos puntos de vista , con la filosofía apoyando muchas de sus ideas y donde si no profundizas no te empaparás .
Os animo a leerla . A mi me ha fascinado.

[David Villar Cembellín · Rating 4 out of 5]

Novela de corte clásico, de estilo finisecular, donde presenciaremos la llegada de un extraño a un pequeño pueblo de la Prusia del siglo XIX. Pronto la obra descubre su parte fantasiosa en un intento —fructífero— de ofrecer desde un pequeño terreno una sinécdoque de los alrededores del río Óder (u Odra).

Pasado, presente y futuro confluyen con maestría de la mano de una prosa fantástica, realmente buena. Además, el final guarda una sorpresa.

Muy grata lectura.

[Éric · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a great book! What a great, great book!
The quality of the writing (and the translation in english of course) is exceptional.
Everything is a mystery and it slowly enfolds as the book goes, delivering misleads and pieces of information.
The book is full of easter eggs, hidden gems, and little treasures and visibly I missed a number of them. I couldn’t help looking for critics and every bit of info I could find in order to grasp everything I could. Yeah, the book is that good and that obsessing !!!



“I will only say that the great king, as you call him, could be reproached with Arideo’s words to Philotas in Lessing’s okay : you will overwhelm your people with Laurie and misery. You will count more victories than happy subjects.”

“This is what no one wants to see. That war puts their sons in the firing line. That, if there is another war against France or Austria, their sons will be the next corpses. That’s why everyone wants to bury them at any cost; no one wants to hear the warning or see the war’s predictable results.”

“Be happy here, Redo, have a prosperous life, take everything that Prussia can freely offer you, and let’s rid the generations of this horrible sight. A nation cannot survive with the truth exposed. And we are going to bury it in the open.”

[Adolfo · Rating 4 out of 5]

?Podemos enterrar la historia? Este corto libro nos recuerda la historia, no solo del Centroeuropa, sino diría que mucho más amplia, la historia del ser humano. La historia esta hecha de guerras y desgracias que poco a poco se van enterrando o aislando, como el en libro, para que el resto de las personas no la perciban. Para recuperar la humanidad, en estos tiempos de incertidumbres, es positivo el desenterrar la historia y hacerla presente. Quizás así pudieramos comprender lo inhumano e irracional que se ha sido. Además nos ahorrariamos muchas desgracias.
Buen libro y muy recomendable.

[Ernest · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sobre una buena idea, Centroeuropa es una novela bastante plana, con un argumento difícil de justificar y demasiado forzado. Lo mejor, la descripción de un tiempo (principios del XIX) y de un lugar, Prusia. El final (a base de extraños epigrafes breves) es tan arbitrario como la propia trama. Interesante por lo que intenta pero completamente fallido

[César Rey]

Vicente Luis Mora (Córdoba, 1970) ha cultivado la novela, la poesía, el ensayo y la crítica y es responsable de un blog imprescindible (donde descubrí, por ejemplo, la maravilla de «El mono gramático» de Octavio Paz). Una obra muy diversa, pero unida por el afán de innovar y la libertad creativa, que no son rasgos muy comunes porque requieren talento y valentía y porque los escritores también tienen que pagar la hipoteca (o el alquiler).

En literatura, libertad se identifica a veces con el genio arrebatado que improvisa guiado por las musas. Basta con leer unas pocas páginas de «Centroeuropa» para saber que esta novela brillante y singular, ganadora del Premio Málaga, se sitúa en unas coordenadas muy alejadas, las de la planificación y la revisión cuidadosa de cada elemento. Como dice uno de los personajes a propósito de las reglas de la métrica: «Es como sembrar árboles en un campo: debes tener muy claro el resultado final antes de plantar cualquiera de ellos».

El rigor no significa solo que las piezas del argumento encajen o que la ambientación —la historia se inicia en la Prusia de las primeras décadas del siglo XIX— sea impecable, sino que hay una coherencia total entre trama, punto de vista, lenguaje, estilo y estructura (que en los textos de Vicente Luis Mora es siempre indisociable del sentido). Así, la narración, recorrida por cuestiones como la identidad, la Historia y la verdad, se presenta como la traducción de un relato autobiográfico donde el protagonista va revelando su intimidad a través de confesiones a medias, digresiones, saltos temporales, recuerdos adornados y el retrato de una época que le exige fingir para convertirse en quien ha imaginado ser.

No es la única forma válida de afrontar la escritura, pero a Vicente Luis Mora le funciona de maravilla, en especial porque elude el peligro de resultar artificioso gracias a la naturalidad de la voz del narrador, la galería de personajes, el uso del humor, una imaginación muy vívida y, sobre todo, la habilidad para subvertir las expectativas del lector y los límites del género para contar en menos de 200 paginas un amor, un destino y un continente.

[Dan Trefethen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Redo Haupsthammer shows up in a small Prussian town with a deed to land, the first free landholder in the area since land reforms happened. Everybody is startled but welcoming, but Redo has a secret.

Secrets are common in fiction. The difference here is that as a first-person narrator, Redo is keeping it from us as well - or thinks he is. In reality, the reader can figure it out quickly. And the interesting part is that it becomes apparent that the author expects us to, and that Redo has an inflated sense of his ability to keep the secret - and excessive fear of what would happen if it was revealed. Probably.

That 'probably' is important. The question raised is how much do people in small towns really care about the secrets of their townspeople, if those secrets aren't considered threatening to the social order and everybody likes the person otherwise? How corrosive is it to keep a secret and not live an authentic life?

I haven't even mentioned the frozen corpses of soldiers from many wars (including future wars) and Redo digs up on his land. Most people would zero in on the corpses as an allegory and the main point of the story. I'm not so sure. I think the book is more subtle than that, the soldiers in support of the main point of the story, and consequently the book has a larger goal. I may have to keep an eye out for other translated books by this author.

[Daniel KML · Rating 5 out of 5]

Upon a first glimpse, looking only at its earthen surface, Centroeuropa is a delightful novel with likable characters and a satisfying story.

If the reader is even slightly curious about what lies beneath that fertile soil, they will perceive a terrain populated by references to a European history fraught with tragedies and political upheavals. The pleasant and whimsical actually hide darker undertones.

But if one ultimately decides to excavate the text to analyze the narrative and its structure, what Centroeuropa reveals is an intricate and architectural œuvre, full of mathematical obsession and compositional labor. It is an experimental novel that one reads without actually perceiving the ingenuity of the experiment - and I consider that a work of genius.

Assuming the English translator did a decent job (and mirrored the author’s own mathematical obsession), this would deserve an immediate International Booker Prize. The novel has just been published in the US, but it was released in the UK two years ago.

P.S. The interview and the author's notes below definitely added to my enjoyment of the novel.

https://pghrev.com/a-writer-talks-to-...
https://vicenteluismora.blogspot.com/...

[Miquel Rovira · Rating 5 out of 5]

A Szonden, un poblet de la vella Prússia, un immigrant de Viena i de misteriosa identitat, Redo Haupsthammer, troba el cadàver d’un soldat al terreny que, com a primer camperol lliure de l’Estat, ha de començar a llaurar. Tant de bo hagués estat només un,
el cadàver que hagués trobat, ja que, excavant i excavant, descobreix que aquells individus morts, alguns de desconeguda procedència, congelats, i permanentment ben conservats superen el número seixanta.
A partir de llavors, l’intel·ligent Redo, que no es desenganxa de la tomba de la seva estimada Odra, haurà de lidiar amb la burocràcia i la incertesa per saber si es podrà guanyar la vida plantant remolatxa i convivint amb els diferents habitants de la localitat.

Tal com defineix el mateix autor, novel·la arqueològica, antirrealista (en el sentit que el món fantàstic que proposa és destruït per elements realistes) que contraposa l’home amb la seva pròpia història, i que defensa, sota el meu punt de vista, la necessitat, tot i que a voltes sigui inaccessible, de defensar el coneixement sobre la nostra cultura, sobre allò que hem viscut com a espècie.

Amb nombrosos canvis temporals, l’aritmètica i els escacs aplicats a la literatura (per a més informació, busqueu a Internet), i un llenguatge, tot i que lèxicament senzill, d’aparença barroca i adaptat a l’època, no és un llibre per a tots els públics, en el sentit que és d’aquells que demana adaptació per part del lector en els mencionats aspectes.

Premi Màlaga 2019, planteja dubtes que podrien ser els de l’essència de la humanitat: qui som? Què venim a fer a la Terra? Quin sentit té la nostra existència?

De misteri irresolt, jo l’he trobat molt interessant.

I vosaltres, heu llegit “Centroeuropa”? Què us ha semblat? Coneixeu l’autor?

[Diogo Rocha da Silva · Rating 4 out of 5]

Centroeuropa ha sido mi primer acercamiento a la obra de Vicente Luis Mora, y sin duda ha sido una grata sorpresa. Su narrativa me atrapó desde las primeras páginas, con ese algo que recuerda a la literatura rusa. Quizás tenga que ver con la ambientación, con esos paisajes que parecen suspendidos entre la historia y el vacío, entre el frío exterior y la agitación interior del narrador.

Hay pasajes que impactan no solo por lo que dicen, sino por lo que te obligan a pensar después. Me hizo reflexionar sobre la forma en la que vemos los cadáveres humanos, el temor que les tenemos o lo que representan dentro de una sociedad que a menudo esquiva la muerte como si al ignorarla pudiera evitarla.

El libro es una especie de compendio de grandes cuestiones: el peso de la guerra, el deseo de huir de ella, la necesidad de paz, la lucha por poder ser uno mismo. No es solo una historia situada en un lugar y tiempo concreto, sino también una meditación sobre lo que significa habitar un cuerpo, un espacio, una época.