Overview

The buzzing life of bars, warm evenings by the Manzanares river, the subterranean terrors of the Metro, icy winters and hot, empty summers, student days in the sixties, the ruthless underworld of the city's mafia - this captivating anthology reflects the character of Madrid and the lives of the madrilenos, as its inhabitants are called, in all their splendid variety. Some stories are bizarre, some funny, some serious, and as you read you'll travel through the city. The famous streets and monuments of Madrid - Cibeles, Calle de Alcalá, Plaza Mayor, and the Royal Palace - as well as the poor, working-class barrios unfrequented by sightseers will pass before your eyes like a moving picture. Some stories, like the Galdós story and Carmen Martín Gaite's 'A clear conscience' depict a journey across Madrid, while in Javier Marías' sinister tale, 'Fallen from fortune', a couple are unaware that their guide to all the usual tourist highlights is leading them to their death. In 'Through the wall' and 'Personality disorders', the characters barely leave their apartments, and the city lurks outside the windows. A rich assortment of characters - adolescent boys obsessed with sex; maids up from the country; provincial girls who slide into prostitution; a small boy excited at the prospect of going downtown with his grandfather; vain, self-absorbed thirty-somethings with too much money; immigrant families far from home; mafia types; diligent office-workers struggling to bring up a family - come alive in the tales.Few of these stories have previously been translated into English. Some names, such as Benito Pérez Galdós, Javier Marías, Juan José Millás, and Carmen Martín Gaite, will be more familiar than others but all deserve to be better known. There is a map at the back of the book to indicate the places mentioned in the stories and photographs complement and accompany each story. The reader will also find there biographical notes on the authors and suggestions for further reading.

Full Product Details

Author:   Helen Constantine ,  Margaret Jull Costa
Publisher:   Oxford University Press
Imprint:   Oxford University Press
Dimensions:   Width: 12.80cm , Height: 1.70cm , Length: 19.60cm
Weight:   0.353kg
ISBN:  

9780199583270

ISBN 10:   0199583277
Pages:   336
Publication Date:   26 April 2012
Audience:   General/trade ,  General
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   Manufactured on demand  
We will order this item for you from a manufactured on demand supplier.

Table of Contents

General Introduction Introduction Benito Pérez Galdós: The Novel on the Tram Emilia Pardo Bazán: The Solution Alonso Zamora Vicente: Sunday Morning Juan García Hortelano: A Testing Time Guillermo Busutil: Murder at the Atlantic Álvaro Pombo: Luzmila Ignacio Aldecoa: The Ballad of the River Manzanares Carmen Martín Gaite: A Clear Conscience Medardo Fraile: Restless Eyes Jorge Ferrer-Vidal: Mozart, K.124, for flute and orchestra Marina Mayoral: Through the Wall Carlos Castán: Return Journey Eloy Tizón: Flying Fish José Ferrer Bermejo: Let the Passengers Out Javier Marías: Fallen from Fortune Juan José Millás: Personality Disorders Carmen Posadas: How can this be happening to me? Elvira Lindo: Manolito's Toggle José María Merino: Sign and Message

Reviews

<br> A wonderful collection...For a reader looking to experience Spanish literature in translation, <br>Madrid Tales is a good start. Margaret Jull Costa has chosen nineteen diverse and entertaining stories that allow the reader to begin a journey that will continue. I hope to see Madrid Tales II in the near future. --World Literature Today<p><br>

A wonderful collection...For a reader looking to experience Spanish literature in translation, Madrid Tales is a good start. Margaret Jull Costa has chosen nineteen diverse and entertaining stories that allow the reader to begin a journey that will continue. I hope to see Madrid Tales II in the near future. --World Literature Today

Author Information

Helen Constantine taught languages in schools until 2000, when she became a full-time translator. She has published three volumes of translated stories, Paris Tales, French Tales, and Paris Metro Tales and is currently editing a series of City Tales for Oxford University Press. She has translated Mademoiselle de Maupin by Théophile Gautier and Dangerous Liaisons by Choderlos de Laclos for Penguin. She is married to the writer David Constantine and with him edits the international magazine Modern Poetry in Translation. Margaret Jull Costa has been a literary translator for over twenty years and has translated many novels and short stories by Portuguese, Spanish and Latin American writers, among them Nobel laureate José Saramago, Fernando Pessoa, Carmen Martín Gaite, and Juan José Saer. She has won various prizes for her work, including, in 2008, the PEN Book-of-the-Month Translation Award and the Oxford Weidenfeld Translation Prize for her version of Eça de Queiroz's masterpiece The Maias. More recently she won the 2009 and 2010 Premio Valle-Inclán for, respectively, The Accordionist's Son by Bernardo Atxaga and Your Face Tomorrow 3: Poison, Shadow and Farewell by Javier Marías.

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