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**pavilionnotebook** · 04-17-2009, 09:25 AM

Cousin Basilio is a worthy choice for his next novel. But anything by E?a is really good. My favorites, for their humour and uncompromising satire, would be The Relic and To The Capital; this one is similar to The Maias, but for literature lovers it has the additional pleasure of seeing E?a write about a pretentious writer who think he's great.

I am unfamiliar with how to add or change the font when I post to suit the language thus my englishing of his name ...

I was so impressed with this book. I had just within the last few months read some giants of 19th century continental fiction (Stendhal, Balzac, Flaubert, Turgenev etc), Eca's prose style in The Maias is so nuanced, lyrical yet economical and a perfectly calibrated authorial distance. I find I am more easily apprehending his text more readily than those I mentioned. Turgenev's I liked as well as Eca's based on Sketches only...and not to construe I don't appreciate the others immensely, it just that Eca's style is closer to a more 'modern' register. With him, I am not listening to myself think in the narrative interlocutions, as in Balzac and Stendahl, 'ok, this is where my implied author reading/buddy is putting his arm on my shoulder and offering comments on his story or making generalizations based on it.

A brief example of his stlye, the 'frame' of Carlos and Cruges riding in a caliche on their way to Sintra:

"On either side, as far as the eye could see, the land was dark and sad, and high above them, in all that solitude the endless blue sky seemed equally sad. The horses hooves kept up a steady trot, beating monotonously on the road. There was no other sound; occasionally a bird would cut through the air, flying fast, fleeing the bleak wasteland. Cruges, heavy with eggs and sausage, was staring vaguely and glumly at the horses' lustrous rumps"

The Margaret Costa english translation was awesome BTW.

Do you recommend The Mandarin? Borges likes it, most other critics don't treat it as being on par with his best...

04-17-2009, 09:25 AM	#3
pavilionnotebook Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 527 Senior Member	Cousin Basilio is a worthy choice for his next novel. But anything by E?a is really good. My favorites, for their humour and uncompromising satire, would be The Relic and To The Capital; this one is similar to The Maias, but for literature lovers it has the additional pleasure of seeing E?a write about a pretentious writer who think he's great. I am unfamiliar with how to add or change the font when I post to suit the language thus my englishing of his name ... I was so impressed with this book. I had just within the last few months read some giants of 19th century continental fiction (Stendhal, Balzac, Flaubert, Turgenev etc), Eca's prose style in The Maias is so nuanced, lyrical yet economical and a perfectly calibrated authorial distance. I find I am more easily apprehending his text more readily than those I mentioned. Turgenev's I liked as well as Eca's based on Sketches only...and not to construe I don't appreciate the others immensely, it just that Eca's style is closer to a more 'modern' register. With him, I am not listening to myself think in the narrative interlocutions, as in Balzac and Stendahl, 'ok, this is where my implied author reading/buddy is putting his arm on my shoulder and offering comments on his story or making generalizations based on it. A brief example of his stlye, the 'frame' of Carlos and Cruges riding in a caliche on their way to Sintra: "On either side, as far as the eye could see, the land was dark and sad, and high above them, in all that solitude the endless blue sky seemed equally sad. The horses hooves kept up a steady trot, beating monotonously on the road. There was no other sound; occasionally a bird would cut through the air, flying fast, fleeing the bleak wasteland. Cruges, heavy with eggs and sausage, was staring vaguely and glumly at the horses' lustrous rumps" The Margaret Costa english translation was awesome BTW. Do you recommend The Mandarin? Borges likes it, most other critics don't treat it as being on par with his best...
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