La palabra bonita

by Elisa Gabbert, Esther Cruz (Translator)

Me encanta la palabra «bonito». Y «bonita». Una teoría: «bonito/a» ha caído en desgracia porque somos gente codiciosa y queremos que lo meramente bonito sea precioso, así que vamos por ahí diciendo que las cosas son preciosas cuando son bonitas.

La fascinación por la palabra es el germen de esta colección de ensayos autobiográficos en los que Elisa Gabbert entrelaza historias personales con observaciones y hallazgos acerca de los aforismos, el arte del párrafo, el poder de los títulos, la diferencia entre poesía y prosa, el universo de la traducción, la autoimagen o la mirada.

La palabra bonita es una exploración amplia de la cultura contemporánea y una invitación a la lectura por parte de una autora cuya mente descubrimos en tensión casi constante consigo misma.

En no ficción, estoy obsesionada con lo que he llegado a ver como la transición invisible, en la que no hay una conexión clara y necesaria entre dos párrafos y, aun así, algo pasa. Esta yuxtaposición no es tan discordante como un non sequitur, pero podría no haber sido así. De hecho, afirmaría que lo «lírico» en los llamados ensayos líricos son en gran medida esas transiciones, esos saltos, más que cierta cualidad inherentemente «poética» del lenguaje.

Genres: Essays, Nonfiction, Memoir, Poetry, Books About Books, Writing, Criticism

224 pages, Paperback

First published November 15, 2018

About the author

Elisa Gabbert writes the On Poetry column for the New York Times and is the author of six collections of poetry, essays, and criticism, including Normal Distance; The Unreality of Memory & Other Essays; The Word Pretty; L'Heure Bleue, or the Judy Poems; The Self Unstable; and The French Exit.

Reviews

[Frellin Portastro · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a good book for snacktime. Get some red grapes and some pretzels and eat them while you read one of the essays. The only problem is that none of the essays are about the band Def Leppard.
A second problem is that red grapes are expensive. Another problem might be that this review is unhelpful, but if you are a person who understands what a snacktime book is, just know that this is a destined to be a classic of the genre. Thnaks

[julieta · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really like Elisa Gabbert, and the way her mind works. This collection I found a little bit irregular, but with some great moments just the same. The first part, on notebooks, crying, I loved, and in the second part, where she talks about paragraphs, poetry, aphorisms, are wonderful. The third part I did not connect with too much. I am waiting for her new book, and I will look for her poetry, since I have only read her essays for now. If you haven´t read her, I would recommend to start witn The unreality of memory.

[Heather · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lately I have been a total insomniac with strange electrical currents keeping me up in the dark. But oh it’s sweet to have tiny essays about Anne of Green Gables, the violence of cuteness and the pornographic impulse behind being viewed as pretty to keep me company.

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

Elisa Gabbert's recent essay in The Paris Review—"On Writerly Jealousy"—made me very glad not to be a nonfiction writer, because Gabbert's essays collected here are exactly the sort that would drive me batty with jealousy. "Reading writers I admire writing about things I want to write about, obsessions I’m protective of, makes me feel unspecial," Gabbert admits there, and while I'm familiar with this sensation with fiction (or more usually, bitterness not just that someone has approached an idea first but has done so little—or worse, something bad—with it), here, I mostly just find the fact that Gabbert's obsessions (translators' notes, front matter, keeping notebooks, fantasizing in the third-person, punctuation, aphorism, &c.) so neatly coincide with my own as to be thrilling.

Sometimes, identification with, or even appreciation of, an essay is mostly limited to realizing that someone else has noticed the same things you have, and perhaps even worded theses shared thoughts nicely, but Gabbert produces not just a recognition of similar feeling but goes on to elaborate on what were merely idle thoughts of mine in far greater detail, and to make me realize why I'd felt a certain way, not just flatter me for having thought it at all. (And, in a number of cases, goes beyond this level and proposes various ideas that I had never thought of before and never would have (even when the subject at hand is one I've contemplated) but are so obviously correct.)

"Honesty" is a word used over much, and typically incorrectly to boot, when describing most types of writing, but these essays actually do feel honest, full of admissions and questions and suspicions and wonderfully emotive hedges, and precise in tracing thought processes in a way such that even digressions don't seem digressive, even in a good way, merely necessary. Certainly, the word is far more applicable to this book than to ones that seem crafted solely to seem "honest" with how overtly personal or revealing they ostensibly are; Gabbert's essays are revealing, but the revelations seem inextricably tied to the crafting of the essays, her personality revealed in her concern with form, structure, technique, and semantics, both explicitly in the text of her essays and implicitly in the delivery of that text.

The details that repeat across essays originally published in various sources speak to the endurance of her obsessions, her patterns of thinking, her modes and manner of thought. Peripheral thoughts and details in one essay move closer to or farther from center-stage in subsequent ones, wonderfully complementing the way that Gabbert blends the presumptive "main" subject of her pieces with tangential thoughts that are just as essential to the whole, and which she paradoxically highlights as if to call attention to them, to not let them be buried in the flow of the rest of her thoughts that the essay is comprised of. Other wonderful ways in which she blurs the boundaries between primary and peripheral include, for example, her mentioning of her marginal notes in books and her valuing of an artwork's title but not the art itself.

In an essay, very relevant to these points, entitled "The Points of Tangency—On digression," she notes that she sometimes, while editing, removes the parentheses from digressions, worried that they imply something lesser about the contents, to readers or editors. But there's nothing lesser about any part of the essays in The Word Pretty. Gabbert's prose style is often delightful and never lacking, but also rarely stellar in a traditional sense, but that only made me realize that I appreciate the strengths of her writing equally, if not more so. Her musings occasionally don't seem entirely novel or valuable, and even more rarely an argument is expressed in a convoluted way, but the overall effect never feels like mere noodling. Rather, it feels like a privilege to get to watch her mind at work, formulating her thoughts around something that matters deeply to her. Which I only now realize is what the best essays ought to do—another thing that I probably always should have known, but Gabbert was able to make seem obvious, as well as the reasons why.

[erin · Rating 3 out of 5]

since elisa gabbert no longer reads her goodreads reviews i can say how much it annoyed me that she mentioned her husband in almost every essay without feeling like i might hurt her feelings

[Celina · Rating 2 out of 5]

I picked this book up about a year ago based on a strong review or two. I thought I'd be interested in the author's thoughts, but it turned out I wasn't.

[Abby · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was not good! I wanted it to be good! The book design is so cool!

Calling these “essays” is a bit highfalutin. They’re more like emails from a friend, who is having Some Thoughts about writing and other sundry topics.

[ra · Rating 5 out of 5]

made me feel like i don't know anything. amazing

[Kevin · Rating 5 out of 5]

These essays on books, writing, and reading are wonderful in the way they break down various minutiae of how our mind and heart process books and language in our day-to-day. I adore Gabbert's voice and the way she makes topics that could be pretentious into fun and accessible delights. The personal touch she displays throughout is generous and friendly. An enthusiastic and thoughtful reminder of why we read books.

[Chad · Rating 4 out of 5]

Elisa Gabbert has such a smart, cool and engaging tone that is present in all these essays. The range of topics is vast, nearly always insightful or enjoyable. There are a couple analyses and mentions of books I’ve either read recently or knew enough about that was a particular highlight. I’m glad I dipped in and out of reading this instead of consuming it all in one go; my brain needed more space to process and find time to engage with what I was reading. I’m so glad I have discovered Gabbert this year; she’s a special writer and I look forward to her future writing. 4/5

[Dr. Bower · Rating 5 out of 5]

I think Holden said it best:
“What really knocks me out is a book that, when you're all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call [her] up on the phone whenever you felt like it.”

[Rebecca H. · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m in a rereading mood, so I picked this up again. More of you need to read it — you will like it, I promise.

[Liina · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is such a smart little book. The essays are almost bite-size but packed to the brim with wisdom, witty observations and interesting facts. After reading Gabbert’s The Unreality of Memory a short while ago she is fast becoming my favourite sane voice in the era of information overload and modern anxieties.

In this collection she talks about (among other subjects) how we visualize the places when reading and how we “adapt” or own homes or houses we’ve lived in for setting in a novel we’re reading; reoccurring dreams: the importance of commas, especially in James Salter’s work, gender issues; why the word pretty differs from the word beautiful and why should care; why cuteness has an underlying current of violence and just a ton of other small things you never think about but are delighted to discover that someone does and you enjoy being carried away with her stream of thoughts.

I am always amused by 1-star amazon reviews and about The Word Pretty on reader said: “If you enjoy overeducated people droning on and on about NOTHING, you will LOVE this book.” Yes I do and yes I did love it. Maybe not as much as The Unreality of Memory, which went more in-depth cos the essays were longer and were less literary criticism-y and more about impending doom. But that’s just my preference that I find the threat of disasters more interesting a topic than dissecting novels and language.
Recommending this book to all my smart girlfriends.

[Lucinda Garza Zamarripa · Rating 3 out of 5]

Pues ni fu ni fa.

Una colección de ensayos hilados con más o menos los temas de lectura y las palabras. Muchas observaciones que están tal vez más en el lado de lo superficial; de nuevo... yo esperando profundidad de un libro de no-ficción que terminó siendo un poco flojo.

No puedo decir que no me gustó, pero tampoco que me encantó. It was fine. Tal vez no soy el demográfico (mujeres blancas estadounidenses de mediana edad), y por eso las perspectivas me parecieron hasta cierto punto planas. No hay duda de que la autora es una mujer inteligente que ha leído muchísimo, pero tenía la expectativa de más análisis y/o agudeza.

[Nate · Rating 5 out of 5]

5 enthusiastic stars -- can't think of a better way to start my 2022 in reading with.

This is a collection of short, cerebral, and witty essays; mostly on topics of literature and language, but sometimes other things as well (a prison cell in Alcatraz, for example).

In 2020, I read her newer, heavier collection "The Unreality of Memory". It impressed me enough to stay with me, though perhaps the timing of reading essays themed around disaster, during a pandemic, was a bit much for, and maybe didn't quite "wow" me like my favorite essays do. Which I think might be due to the timing.

Then in 2021 she had a new piece in Harper's, about isolation and covid, which I completely loved, which floored me really. It seemed to speak of things I had been thinking and which no one else had talked about. The timing was prescient as well -- the month it came out was the same month I got my vaccine. There was hope in the air (we didn't know about new variants yet), as we thought we were turning a large corner leading to an open plain , rather than a small one leading to more alleyways...

A few days ago I was in the mood for essay writing and thought of the Gabbert pieces I read. By coincidence, my neighborhood library happened to have this on the shelves.

Though "The Word Pretty" is significantly shorter, less talked about, and less thematically glued together as "Unreality of Memory" -- I enjoyed it more.

Maybe its just my timing in reading it, but to me, there's something very fun and playful about these essays. Or perhaps "exploratory" is the right word for it. It reminds me of when rock musicians first start hitting cool ideas in the studio, but before they solidify their new ideas as formula (see: The Beatles Revolver, or Talking Heads Fear of Music).

This is my favorite period in any artist's career, and perhaps its one of my favorite glimpses into writers as well. (In music, it normally happens around album number 4, give or take.)

Reading these essays felt like having an intimate dinner with a good friend. There is something very conversational about each piece, casual even, while still thoughtful, anchored, and often "mind blowing" (I use that term too much, I'm aware... But each piece in here did sincerely blow my mind at least once.)

I unfortunately lent Unreality to a friend last year, which means I'll probably never see it again. But I'm going to order and re-read that, now that I've devoured this one. I'm sure re-reading Unreality will be better, now that I'm less panicked about the apocalypse we are all in. In any case, this book excites me about essays the way Didion does. High, high recommendation. And a very short read, so there's really no excuses.

P.S. Upon nerd-ing out, I found out Gabbert's mainly a poet (how did I not know this?) and has a new book of poems out later this year (with a killer design). Also, she posts annual reading lists of micro reviews, not unlike Goodreads. I read 2021 and 2020's, which are quite fun to look through. Especially since she's just discovered WG Sebald -- one of my favorites -- yet still hasn't read "Austerlitz" which is his masterpiece in my opinion. (Sorry -- I have to throw recommendations to Austerlitz whenever I can).

[Beatriz · Rating 3 out of 5]

ahora que estos días compagino la lectura de #elinfinitoenunjunco con otros libros, llego a la rotunda conclusión de que no podríamos estar hablando de literatura tal y como la conocemos si no hubiese sido porque alguien inventó el alfabeto.... a, b, C, d.... 28 signos que infinitamente mezclados, separados, unidos dan a la luz a la palabra escrita que reunida en un cúmulo de hojas crean el libro que ahora tenemos en casa, en la librería, en la biblioteca....
.
Y es en la palabra escrita, esa palabra bonita, en la que se recrea #elisagabbert evaluandola en sus diferentes etapas... la palabra como parte de un poema, la palabra entre comas, la palabra en cursiva, los huecos que dejan las palabras, las cientos de ellas que se transforman en novela, la palabra que crea al personaje.... Y a partir de ese punto de apoyo la escritora va dando una vuelta de tuerca, con ágiles divagaciones, sobre la poesía y la prosa y el libre albedrío que puede gobernarlas, de cómo hay ciertos escritores que establecen su propia dialéctica a la hora de gestar sus obras o, por el contrario, hacerlo desde la praxis más absoluta. De cómo hay una escritura que se sabe escritura y otra tan genuina y espontánea que parece salida de algún lugar aún no conocido.
Con una gran cantidad de ejemplos, libros y escritores en el ojo de mira, #elisagabbert propone un recorrido literario, artístico y visual del uso de la palabra en el siglo XXI.

[Gina Freyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection is smart AF! The more I read, the more I related, and the more I wanted more. It’s like she’s your cool friend and you’re holding the most intellectually satisfying conversation (albeit one sided, but still!). Each next essay became my new favorite though the ones towards the end literally reverberated within me. The connection was quite intense. Obviously, I highly recommend.

[Matt Walker · Rating 5 out of 5]

For some years now, there have been occasions in my life when, coming upon an especially eye-catching view or a particularly impressive athletic maneuver, I've said to myself, "That's pretty." What's more, I've felt a smidgen of indecent pride at doing so. "Now that's a word most guys wouldn't use," I think, feeling good to be different, more sensitive, as I see it, than most men.

Then, this week, I open up the new collection of essays by Elisa Gabbert, and what do I find in the title essay, "Meditation on the Word Pretty"?

I love especially when men, or straight men, say the word pretty. Women, or straight women, are trained to recognize prettiness, and admit freely when they do. So there's something endearing about a man calling an object—a bit of music, a tennis shot—pretty; it's a moment of vulnerability. I also love a straight man in a pink shirt.

It's the shortest piece in the collection, but I point to this excerpt as one of many moments of recognition—abstract ideas expressed with such clarity and reasonableness, they seem to put into words something you feel you've known all along, even if you didn't, really—that appear on every page. (I've even owned a few pink shirts in my time.) As she writes in another essay: "What I want when I write—even in email, even on Twitter—is clarity." It's a quality too rarely found, but Gabbert finds it without trouble, even in discussions of esoteric topics like the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, or the subtleties of literary translation.

Because it's a collection of pieces on various subjects written at different times, there's the pleasurable mini-surprise effect when going from one essay to the next (insert chocolate-box cliché here). But there are also linkages; the pieces seem carefully arranged to highlight these. So, even though it's a book you can read piecemeal, it does no harm to read it in one go, letting your attention be drawn to the connections—and making new connections of your own.

[Jen · Rating 2 out of 5]

I just happened upon this during a time when I felt I needed to add more essay-reading in my life and bought it based on 1) the topics that the essays cover and, honestly, 2) the design and feel of this cute little blue book.

On the back cover, I've got a number of things here that made me want to read this: lyrical essays on writing, reading, and living; translation; unreliable memory; "... [Gabbert's] concerns are lonely pleasures-taking notes, crying, dreaming, and lots of reading..."

Yes, ok, you've got my attention. Tell me more about all of these things! Show me details I haven't considered. Make me think, make me argue with you, satisfy me with clear, well-worded ideas, make me look at something differently.

... These were my expectations and I can't really say that I felt that they were met. I wouldn't say I disliked these essays, but I didn't feel like I'd read anything in this collection that I couldn't have easily done without. It seemed as if Gabbert and I had a lot of interests in common, but I didn't care for the journey as we went along. Gabbert was taking all kinds of roads I would have rather passed up to find more interesting paths that maybe dug a little deeper. Instead of giving me what I wanted, these essays handed me some half-baked thoughts that sometimes seemed like the kind of thing you might write down when you have an idea to flesh out later.

At no point, while reading, did I doubt that Elisa Gabbert is an intelligent person with interesting enough ideas, but these essays didn't have the reach I was looking for.

[Jessica Klahr · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best way I can think of to describe this book is as nourishment for a brain that I didn’t realize was starving. Clearly I need more literary criticism in my life. Gabbert deftly articulated numerous instances and phenomenas that I’d never acknowledged that I’d never been able to put into words for myself. She brought to light so many things I’ve been through as a reader and writer and also just as a human being that some of the essays were almost surreal to read. Some of these included: the sensation of, when reading as much as I do, not really picturing main characters faces, just seeing them as human blobs with hair, picturing a large percentage of stories in the same couple houses from childhood, the fact that I also flip to the last page of whatever section of a thing I’m reading to see how long it is, and the sensation of needing to be in a sea of strangers every once in a while to feel fully alive. I read a few essays a day so I could spread them out and have the proper time to think about them and I became kind of obsessed. She brought up so many things to think about books and culture and Twitter and so many other things I consider myself interested in in such solid and smart ways. I already ordered one of her earlier books and I cannot wait to find more writers that are creating content in this same vein.

[Stacey Gilbert · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first read Gabbert's perfume writing for the blog Bois de Jasmin and happily picked up this book of essays from my local bookstore, Elliott Bay Books, to check out her non-perfume writing. I'm so glad I did. At times, Gabbert puts to paper thoughts and situations I've either had myself or could very well have had myself. It felt like she was inside my head especially in her essays on the various times and reasons she may find herself crying, her active dream life and musings on lucid dreaming, the Anne of Green Gables 80s tv series, and the circular problem of buying a bigger bed vs. moving into a bigger apartment so that neither ever occurs. Ordering her latest essay collection in my next book buying binge.

[Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this when it came out, plucked it off the shelf recently to remember a passage and was surprised to find myself continuing to read. Short essays (as opposed to takes), some just barely more than feuilletons. Gabbert is a great at anatomizing how writing dissolves into the brain and the means by which it does so, and the second section here, focused on literature, is the best. Found myself really impressed by her tone; she resists many of the pitfalls of contemporary critics--never pulls a long face, never plays up a forced quirkiness, knows when to get personal and when it's not about her. A casual touch reminiscent of Lamb or some of the great pre-WW2 magazine critics. The sudden endings are something to imitate.

[Karla Deniss · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5. Some essays are very good, some I found boring and repetitive, as often happens with collections of essays previously published individually elsewhere. I also found annoying that Gabbert mentions twitter and her husband in basically every essay and the fact that she talks about a Spanish author I dislike (sorry, I can’t help myself).

It’s not a bad book (perhaps I didn’t connect with it because it feels like I wasn’t the *right* reader, since I don’t have a particular interest in the US’ cultural and political current state) but it feels more like a column or a blog, so I don’t recommend reading it in one sitting as I did.

[Printable Tire · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is an aloofness on display here that I find grating, a lightness, a "so, what's your point?". Sometimes things get personal without a needed degree of self-consciousness (or point to it), and the author is that worst kind of snob, the snob who thinks they're not a snob (yes, I'm probably that kind of snob).

Also, the repetitious phrases/anecdotes/research, I guess due to the various original publication/publication dates of the essays: these couldn't have been edited out for the essay collection, or reworked, re-tweaked?

But the delving into particulars, particularly the particulars of syntax, is absorbing, and it's short so there are worst books you could re-read.

[Adrianne Mathiowetz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every essay in this book is lovely/funny/sad and makes me wonder if I'm not quite thoughtful enough about the world I live in.

[Brandon Amico · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant, intriguing essays. Funny, insightful, and far-ranging. Other adjectives, too, surely.

[Natalie · Rating 3 out of 5]

- i thought this was okay. many of the topics were interesting, and i learnt about new terms and things and literary stuff, but the essays felt a bit incomplete. it feels like reading someone's notes. she's a cool thinker, and i enjoy how she pulls many different examples and ideas together, and i think the format is interesting (the brevity almost feels like a response to a prompt in your journal or school assignment), but the writing itself is just fine.
- after reading and enjoying her newest essay collection last year (any person is the only self), and seeing multiple references to this book from substack people i follow, i had been on the lookout for this book, but didnt see it available from the library on libby. went to a secondhand book between bars on a first date and FOUND THIS ON THE SHELVES, immediate cop.

[Kiely · Rating 4 out of 5]

“When I was seven or eight, I confessed to my mother that I couldn't stop narrating my life back to myself; I thought it meant I was crazy. No, she said, it means you're a writer.”

Finally finished this one! I love Elisa Gabbert and her work endlessly, but this book… just wasn’t it. Many of the essays are repetitive and mention the same topics/ pieces of media and not in a fun way, and it seemed like it wasn’t a cohesive collection; it was just articles she wrote for different publications put together. Anyway, I liked her take on writing but not so much her take on reading / attempt at literary analysis. Elisa Gabbert thinks & writes on a higher plane that I can’t even access and kind of don’t really want to access, but it still amazes me every time I read her work. Still a huge fan of her & her work & excited for her new essay collection next year; let’s hope it’s cohesive though lol
(3.5 stars)

[SLT · Rating 5 out of 5]

I adored and devoured this brilliant collection. Elisa Gabbert is a writer's writer, and every single one of her essays was thought-provoking and timely and brilliant and delightful. The current Goodreads star system is not adequate to express my runaway excitement for this brilliant collection. Writers writing about writing is a favorite niche, and Gabbert blows all others out of the water. Get it, read it, love it. For a more thorough analysis of her genius, check out my book blog post: http://dunceacademy.com/4098/the-word...

[C.R. · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was expecting something profound or poetic, but this is more like a collection of blog posts about social observations. I did enjoy it, though. It's shed new light on a few things for me, such as the use of blank space in paragraph layouts, the differences between poetry and prose, and the uses of aphorisms. Other essays didn't land so well, but that's ok. The paperback design is great - a lovely book to hold!