Javier Marías left without the Nobel: writers remember his literary legacy

A few hours after the news of the death of Javier Marias writer cimbrara on Sunday, September 11 at world literary Spanish Americanwriter and former war reporter Arturo Perez-Reverte wrote in his account Twitter: “That Javier Marias have died without him reward laureate it detracts a lot from the category reward laureate”. Also later in that net Social your colleague and countryman Manuel Vilas posted: “One of the most has died. large writers in Spanish. It is true that he leaves without him laureatebut the problem is laureate and not of Literature with capital letters”.

The significance of literary work of Marias was not up for discussion fall for more than a decade, his name used to appear in the deck of candidates to receive the world’s highest literary award. Marias saw the light in Madrid on September 20 70 years agowas about to turn 71, son of the philosopher Julián Marías and the teacher pains Frank. Two facts defined his profile at the beginning, first his literary precocity that led him at 19 years of age to publish his first novel, The Wolf Domains; and second, as a deference to distinguish him from his father, his friend and teacher Juan Benet called him “the young Marías”.

The philosopher Ferdinand Savateranother of his great friends and who portrayed their friendship in a brief and splendid vignette after the news of his death, recalled that from an early age “Young Marias” I had read everything. The long academic exile of his father, which led him to teach in the United States in those years, turned “young Marías” into a wonderful reader and ultimately a translator. The versions of him Robert Louis Stevenson, William Butler Yeats, W. H. Auden, William Faulkner, Lawrence Sterne (recommendable its splendid Tristram Shandy version) and the hidden gem that every reader with a penchant for the sea should read, El Espejo del Mar, by Joseph Conrad with a prologue by Juan Benet, are examples that will endure.

his first novels Some critics described them as experimental works due to their Anglo-Saxon influence and detachment from the Spanish tradition, which would eventually make him the voice contemporary “more sophisticated, complex and stimulating” of the panorama literary in its country.

Marias for beginners you can have several starts. The sentimental manit could be one, if you have enough curiosity and reading spirit All souls, Heart so white and Tomorrow in battle he thinks of me, they make us look for a pen to underline phrases, stop reading and think about that other thing that we have been, in what we have lost, and in what we will never be.

“I think the questions key code of the books of Javier Marias they are how people become who we are and what price we pay for it / He knew the answers, but he allowed us to discover them for ourselves, reading him, and there is no greater generosity than that /”, wrote on his Twitter account the Argentine novelist Patricio Pron, winner of the Alfaguara award for his novel about love in the times of Tinder.

“We are always late in people’s lives”wrote Marias in This is how bad things begin. I got to know his work reading his soccer columns in the mid-90s, from which Savages and Sentimentales were born. soccer letters. It was thanks to my dear friend and teacher Sergio Gonzalez Rodriguezthat I approached his narrative when he told me about the ups and downs of his time as a Spanish language teacher in Oxford, where he had the opportunity to meet people linked to the British secret services. The last two works of his, Bertha Island Y Thomas Nevinsonshow that concern for espionage, silence and secrecy.

of his years in Oxford All Souls was born where it appears John Gawsworthpilot of the RAF in itto World War IIa character linked to a desert island lost in the Caribbean Come in Ancient Y Montserrat which is known as the kingdom of Redonda. Marias picked up in black back of time some passages of how he was named King of Redonda. jokingly Xavier I of Redonda he established a non-political kingdom based on intellectual nobility with the motto Ride Si Sapis, which the historian Hilari Reguer translated as “Laugh if you understand”.

Paying tribute to cultural personalities and making remarkable works accessible, such as that of Juan Villoro, Duke of New Year’s Eve, also accompanied the founding of the Reino de Redonda publishing house, where Marías showed his exquisite facet as an editor. The urgency of his departure left a deep stupor but his work will last until the end of time.

That Javier Marías has died without the Nobel Prize takes away a lot of category from the Nobel Prize

Arturo Perez-Reverte

One of the greatest writers in Spanish has died. It is true that he leaves without the Nobel Prize, but the problem is with the Nobel Prize and not with Literature in capital letters

Manuel Vilas

“I think that the key questions in Javier Marías’ books are how do we become who we are and what price do we pay for it?

patrick

Javier Marías was considered the Spanish-language novelist of reference.