Alejandro Zambra

"Sublime . . . true and beautiful and moving." --The New York Times Book Review The landmark first novel of one of the greatest living Latin American writers--now in a sparkling new translation by his longtime collaborator When it was first published in 2006, then-literary critic and poet Alejandro Zambra's first novel, Bonsai, caused a sensation. "It was said," according to Chile's newspaper of record, El Mercurio, "that it represented the end of an era, or the beginning of another, in the nation's letters." Zambra would go on to become a writer of international renown, winning prizes in Chile and around the world for his funny, tender, sly fictions. Here, in a brilliant new translation from four-time International Booker Prize nominee Megan McDowell, is the little book that started it all: The story of Julio and Emilia, two Chilean university students who, seeking truth in great literature, find one another instead. As they fall together and drift apart over the course of young adulthood, Zambra spins an emotionally engrossing, expertly distilled, formally inventive tale of love, art, and memory.

Språklig stramt, humoristisk og nyskapende - i «Valgfritt tema» utforsker Alejandro Zambra sin favorittdestinasjon: grenselandet mellom litteratur og virkelighet. Mens noen av de 12 tekstene faller inn under essaysjangeren, kan andre leses som skjønnlitteratur. Andre igjen grenser mot poesi. Zambra inviterer oss til å ta del i sine tanker om å lese, skrive og oversette, men også om kjærligheten og fortiden. Temaet er med andre ord valgfritt, og tittelen på boken reflekterer måten Zambra skriver på: med åpenhet til både sjanger og tematikk. ALEJANDRO ZAMBRA (født 1975 i Santiago de Chile) regnes som en av de mest markante stemmene i den nye generasjonen latin- amerikanske for fattere. Han har mottatt en rekke priser for sine bøker, inkludert den chilenske kritikerprisen. Kortromanene «Bonsai» og «Trærnes privatliv», novellesamlingen «Mine dokumenter» og «Delprøve i språklige ferdigheter» er tidligere utgitt på Solum Bokvennen.

A NEW YORKER BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR A WALL STREET JOURNAL TOP 10 BOOK OF THE YEAR ONE OF NPR'S "BOOKS WE LOVE" "A tender and funny story about love, family and the peculiar position of being a stepparent... Chilean Poet] broadens the author's scope and quite likely his international reputation." --Los Angeles Times "Zambra is] one of the most brilliant Latin American writers of his generation." --The New York Review of Books "Zambra's books have long shown him to be a writer who, at the sentence level, is in a world all his own." --Juan Vidal, NPR.org A writer of "startling talent" (The New York Times Book Review), Alejandro Zambra returns with his most substantial work yet: a story of fathers and sons, ambition and failure, and what it means to make a family After a chance encounter at a Santiago nightclub, aspiring poet Gonzalo reunites with his first love, Carla. Though their desire for each other is still intact, much has changed: among other things, Carla now has a six-year-old son, Vicente. Soon the three form a happy sort-of family--a stepfamily, though no such word exists in their language. Eventually, their ambitions pull the lovers in different directions--in Gonzalo's case, all the way to New York. Though Gonzalo takes his books when he goes, still, Vicente inherits his ex-stepfather's love of poetry. When, at eighteen, Vicente meets Pru, an American journalist literally and figuratively lost in Santiago, he encourages her to write about Chilean poets--not the famous, dead kind, your Nerudas or Mistrals or Bola os, but rather the living, striving, everyday ones. Pru's research leads her into this eccentric community--another kind of family, dysfunctional but ultimately loving. Will it also lead Vicente and Gonzalo back to each other? In Chilean Poet, Alejandro Zambra chronicles with enormous tenderness and insight the small moments--sexy, absurd, painful, sweet, profound--that make up our personal histories. Exploring how we choose our families and how we betray them, and what it means to be a man in relationships--a partner, father, stepfather, teacher, lover, writer, and friend--it is a bold and brilliant new work by one of the most important writers of our time.

«Trærnes privatliv» er historien om én lang natt, natten Julián passer stedatteren mens de venter på at moren skal komme hjem fra tegnekurs. Julián bestemmer seg for å fortelle nattahistorie helt til moren kommer hjem, for å berolige stedatteren. Det tar imidlertid ikke lang tid før Julián selv begynner å bli urolig, og nattahistorien blir like mye et tidsfordriv for å stagge egen bekymring. «Trærnes privatliv» er en flytende fortelling i klassisk Zambra-stil, hvor forfatteren reflekterer over forholdet mellom livet, kunsten og kjærligheten, og hvor assosiasjonene driver fortellingen fremover. «Trærnes privatliv» ble nominert til Prix du Marais i 2010 og International Dublin Literary Award i 2012. ALEJANDRO ZAMBRA (født 1975 i Santiago de Chile) regnes som en av de mest markante stemmene i den nye generasjonen latin- amerikanske for fattere. Han har mottatt en rekke priser for sine bøker, inkludert den chilenske kritikerprisen. Kortromanen «Bonsai», novellesamlingen «Mine dokumenter» og «Delprøve i språklige ferdigheter» er tidligere utgitt på Solum Bokvennen.

Med et borende blik og en afdæmpet ironisk distance til selv den alvorligste sag har Zambra spundet elleve meget forskellige og samtidig tæt forbundne noveller over livet i en chilensk forstad fra begyndelsen af 80'erne og frem. Mine dokumenter er fortællingen om at huske tilbage, om at kortlægge hukommelsen på en gammel Olympia, om at vokse op under Pinochets diktatur i et middelklassekvarter i Santiago de Chile. Om at få sin første computer og opdage, at skriften pludselig bliver en anden. Om menneskeskæbner og om relationer eller ikkerelationer mellem slægtninge, venner, par, voksne og børn.

In Not to Read, Alejandro Zambra outlines his own particular theory of reading that also offers a kind of blurry self-portrait, or literary autobiography. Whether writing about Natalia Ginzburg, typewriters and computers, Paul Léautaud, or how to be silent in German, his essays function as a laboratory for his novels, a testing ground for ideas, readings and style. Not to Read also presents an alternative pantheon of Latin American literature – Zambra would rather talk about Nicanor Parra than Pablo Neruda, Mario Levrero than Gabriel García Márquez. His voice is that of a trusted friend telling you about a book or an author he’s excited about, how he reads, and why he writes. A standard-bearer of his generation in Chile, with Not to Read Alejandro Zambra confirms he is one of the most engaging writers of our time.

Delprøve i språklige ferdigheter er bygget opp etter modell av opptaksprøven til chilenske universiteter. Boken er en leken og tankevekkende kommentar til samfunnet under og etter Pinochet og tar for seg forholdet mellom mennesker, diktatur og litteratur. Oversatt av Øyunn Rishøi . Hedemann.

"De lærte kjapt å lese det samme, tenke likt, skjule forskjellene. Snart opparbeidet de en forfengelig fortrolighet. På den tiden lyktes det Julio og Emilia, inntil videre, å smelte sammen til en slags klump. De var kort sagt lykkelige. Det er det ingen tvil om." En ung mann. En ung kvinne. En bonsai. Alejandro Zambras lille perle av en debut ga ham både den chilenske kritikerprisen og det chilenske kulturrådets pris for beste roman. Bonsai er en stram og usedvanlig historie .- kort, original og humoristisk

Reader, your life is full of choices. Some will bring you joy and others will bring you heartache. Will you choose to cheat (in life, the examination that follows) or will you choose to copy? Will you fall in love? If so, will you remember her name and the number of freckles on her back? Will you marry, divorce, annul? Will you leave your run-down neighbourhood, your long-suffering country and your family? Will you honour your dead, those you loved and those you didn't? Will you have a child, will you regret it? Will you tell them you regret it? Will you, when all's said and done, deserve a kick in the balls? Will you find, here, in this slender book, fictions that entertain and puzzle you? Fictions that reflect yourself back to you? Will you find yourself? Relax, concentrate, dispel any anxious thoughts. Let the world around you settle and fade. Are you ready? Now turn over your papers, and begin.

"De lærte kjapt å lese det samme, tenke likt, skjule forskjellene. Snart opparbeidet de en forfengelig fortrolighet. På den tiden lyktes det Julio og Emilia, inntil videre, å smelte sammen til en slags klump. De var kort sagt lykkelige. Det er det ingen tvil om." En ung mann. En ung kvinne. En bonsai. Alejandro Zambras lille perle av en debut ga ham både den chilenske kritikerprisen og det chilenske kulturrådets pris for beste roman. Bonsai er en stram og usedvanlig historie .- kort, original og humoristisk.

Vuoden 1985 maanjäristyksessä kokonainen chileläissukupolvi oppii, että maa jalkojen alla voi pettää hetkenä minä hyvänsä. Pinochetin diktatuurin aikana lapset seuraavat vierestä, kuinka heidän vanhempansa muuttuvat joko uhreiksi tai syyllisiksi. Kun ikuisista sivuhenkilöistä lopulta tulee oman tarinansa sankareita, he joutuvat päättämään, millaista tarinaa he itsestään kertovat ja millaisen roolin he suostuvat vanhemmilleen antamaan. Alejandro Zambra on Chilen uuden kirjailijasukupolven keulahahmo ja hänen pienoisromaaninsa Kotiinpaluun tapoja (2011) melankolinen tutkielma Chilen historiasta ja nykyhetkestä sekä kirjailijan oikeuksista, velvollisuuksista ja vapauksista.

Fotball og kjærlighet, gudsfornektelse og ran. Aggresjon, presisjon og metafiksjon. I novellesamlingen Mine dokumenter perfeksjonerer chilenske Alejandro Zambra den konsentrerte formen som preger hans romankunst. Med et stilsikkert og humoristisk språk skildrer Zambra over.gangen fra gutt til mann, fra diktatur til demokrati, fra tom side til bok.

A "brilliant, innovative, beautiful" (The Guardian) book from the acclaimed author of Chilean Poet "Dazzling . . . a work of parody, but also of poetry." --The New York Times Book Review NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY NPR, THE GUARDIAN, AND THE IRISH TIMES "Latin America's new literary star" (The New Yorker), Alejandro Zambra is celebrated around the world for his strikingly original, slyly funny, daringly unconventional fiction. Now, at the height of his powers, Zambra returns with his most audaciously brilliant book yet. Written in the form of a standardized test, Multiple Choice invites the reader to respond to virtuoso language exercises and short narrative passages through multiple-choice questions that are thought-provoking, usually unanswerable, and often absurd. It offers a new kind of reading experience, one in which the reader participates directly in the creation of meaning, and the nature of storytelling itself is called into question. At once funny, poignant, and political, Multiple Choice is about love and family, authoritarianism and its legacies, and the conviction that, rather than learning to think for ourselves, we are trained to obey and repeat. Serious in its literary ambition and playful in its execution, it confirms Alejandro Zambra as one of the most important writers working in any language. NAMED A BEST BOOK OF THE SUMMER BY THE WALL STREET JOURNAL, ELLE, THE HUFFINGTON POST, THE MILLIONS, VOX, LIT HUB, THE BBC, THE GUARDIAN AND PUREWOW

Fotball og kjærlighet, gudsfornektelse og ran. Aggresjon, presisjon og metafiksjon. I novellesamlingen Mine dokumenter perfeksjonerer chilenske Alejandro Zambra den konsentrerte formen som preger hans romankunst. I et stilsikkert og humoristisk språk skildrer Zambra overgangen fra gutt til mann, fra diktatur til demokrati, fra tom side til bok. Alejandro Zambra (f. 1975) har mottatt en rekke priser for sine arbeider, inkludert den chilenske kritikerprisen. Tidsskriftet Granta har utropt ham til en av dagens 22 beste unge spanskspråklige forfattere, og bøkene hans er oversatt til 18 språk. Med Mine dokumenter befester Zambra sin posisjon som fanebærer for den nye generasjonen latinamerikanske forfattere.

Named a best book of 2015 by NPR, The Boston Globe, and Electric Literature. My Documents is the latest work from Alejandro Zambra, the award-winning Chilean writer whose first novel was heralded as the dawn of a new era in Chilean literature, and described by Junot Diaz as "a total knockout." Now, in his first short story collection, Zambra gives us eleven stories of liars and ghosts, armed bandits and young lovers brilliant portraits of life in Chile before and after Pinochet. The cumulative effect is that of a novel or of eleven brief novels, intimate and uncanny, archived until now in a desktop folder innocuously called "My Documents." Zambra's remarkable vision and erudition is on full display here; this book offers clear evidence of a sublimely talented writer working at the height of his powers.

My Documents is the latest work from Alejandro Zambra, the award-winning Chilean writer whose first novel was heralded as the dawn of a new era in Chilean literature. Whether chronicling the attempts of a migraine-afflicted writer to quit smoking or the loneliness of the call-centre worker, the life of a personal computer or the return of a mercurial godson, this collection of stories evokes the disenchantments of youth and the disillusions of maturity in a Chilean society still troubled by its recent past. Written with the author's trademark irony and precision, humour and melancholy, My Documents is unflinchingly human and essential evidence of a sublimely talented writer working at the height of his powers.