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gongo's review against another edition
3.0
Me sabe fatal darle pocas estrellas a un libro tan remarcado, pero es que verdaderamente me ha aburrido en algunas partes.
Es tan rompedor y tiene un mensaje tan bonito que me dan ganas de ponerle 5 estrellas a posteriori, pero no sería justo.
La idea de que los autores dan vida a sus personajes y vierten su propia alma en ellos es bonita bonita. Augusto Pérez le dice a Unamuno algo así como: "tenga cuidado, no vaya a ser que exista usted únicamente para contar mi historia" y es que qué chulada.
Es tan rompedor y tiene un mensaje tan bonito que me dan ganas de ponerle 5 estrellas a posteriori, pero no sería justo.
La idea de que los autores dan vida a sus personajes y vierten su propia alma en ellos es bonita bonita. Augusto Pérez le dice a Unamuno algo así como: "tenga cuidado, no vaya a ser que exista usted únicamente para contar mi historia" y es que qué chulada.
malink1199's review against another edition
5.0
Me ha gustado mucho el concepto de nivola, como habla Unamuno con el personaje y con el lector, y como hace diálogos de lo que serían parrafos largos o monólogos. También me ha gustado como divaga el protagonista, que piensa en mil cosas a la vez y de cada una saca otras tantas ramificaciones. Genial.
gwendle_vs_literature's review against another edition
medium-paced
3.5
I discovered that this book exists when a conversation meandered in such a direction that it lead me to wonder whether the movie Stranger Than Fiction was based on a book. It wasn’t, but apparently it was inspired by Miguel de Unamuno’s Niebla (variously translated as “Fog” or “Mist”) which is often credited as being the first work of Magical Realism, and with which it shares its central conceit; a man discovers that he is a character in a work of fiction, and the writer is going to kill him.
This is a dense text, a little bit difficult to get through — like other modernist texts it’s a bit dense with some stream of consciousness, and like other absurdist texts it’s a little all over the place, dragging it’s heels through the inconsequential, and then finding itself at major plot points with very little indication of how it arrived there. Much of the humour falls a little flat more than a century after it was written, but the same is true of almost everything. And reading a work in translation tends to add another layer of obfuscation since cultural and linguistic differences (even of contemporary works, let alone works from 100+ years ago) something is always lost.
It’s an okay story, and apparently a highly influential one, so I’m glad I read it — but I struggled to enjoy it. If I revisit it in a few years (which I likely will given the trouble I went through to get my hands on a copy in English translation) I might like it more.
This is a dense text, a little bit difficult to get through — like other modernist texts it’s a bit dense with some stream of consciousness, and like other absurdist texts it’s a little all over the place, dragging it’s heels through the inconsequential, and then finding itself at major plot points with very little indication of how it arrived there. Much of the humour falls a little flat more than a century after it was written, but the same is true of almost everything. And reading a work in translation tends to add another layer of obfuscation since cultural and linguistic differences (even of contemporary works, let alone works from 100+ years ago) something is always lost.
It’s an okay story, and apparently a highly influential one, so I’m glad I read it — but I struggled to enjoy it. If I revisit it in a few years (which I likely will given the trouble I went through to get my hands on a copy in English translation) I might like it more.
irati_naranjo's review against another edition
dark
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
4.0
gabicita's review against another edition
3.0
3.5*
Ya sé porque Pizarnik se mató después de leer esto.
Ya sé porque Pizarnik se mató después de leer esto.
blackbird27's review against another edition
5.0
To be reading this alongside Zuleika Dobson was a fascinating experience; I wonder whether anyone has ever thought to compare them before. They share many themes (romantic attraction, unpredictable women, suicide, metanarrative) and even a tone, saying baroquely funny things in a faux-ponderous manner. But Beerbohm has no serious point beneath his gossamer humor; and Unamuno, the philosopher of Spanish identity, does.
This novel -- or nivola, Unamuno's invented term for a nebulous narrative, more philosophy than plot, and deconstructing the elements of fiction decades before deconstruction occurred to any French academic -- is probably the most celebrated Spanish novel of the 1910s; the only English translation dates from 1928, and is not entirely worthy of it. Although it can be read as an early metafictional novel in the sense popularized by Flann O'Brien, the nouveau roman, and the 1960s prankster postmodernists, Unamuno is really only following the lead of his teachers Cervantes and, to a lesser extent, Kierkegaard.
As a philosopher he's no lightweight; but he's a really engaging storyteller as well, cutting description down to zero and letting his characters spin into baroquely philosophical and cod-philosophical dialogue. (Entirely typically, he inserts his reasons for doing so into the conversation; but what he doesn't mention is that he was also a successful playwright, and his conversations, when he gets around to dispensing with abstrusities or absurdities, have the narrative logic, the emotional force, and the sense of hinging as much on things unsaid as things said, as great dramatic dialogue.)
This isn't the place for a close reading of my reasons for disagreeing with the back-cover copy and the academic introduction which calls the most prominent female character "deceitful, scheming," but although Unamuno was no feminist he wasn't the misogynist his political and ethnological conservatism might suggest. The central male character, the one who has all the philosophical discussions and experiences all the novel's Weltschmerz, is never not a figure of fun; the women are (for the most part) sensible, dispassionate, and self-respecting. But this is just a Goodreads blurb.
Yeah, five stars. It's great.
This novel -- or nivola, Unamuno's invented term for a nebulous narrative, more philosophy than plot, and deconstructing the elements of fiction decades before deconstruction occurred to any French academic -- is probably the most celebrated Spanish novel of the 1910s; the only English translation dates from 1928, and is not entirely worthy of it. Although it can be read as an early metafictional novel in the sense popularized by Flann O'Brien, the nouveau roman, and the 1960s prankster postmodernists, Unamuno is really only following the lead of his teachers Cervantes and, to a lesser extent, Kierkegaard.
As a philosopher he's no lightweight; but he's a really engaging storyteller as well, cutting description down to zero and letting his characters spin into baroquely philosophical and cod-philosophical dialogue. (Entirely typically, he inserts his reasons for doing so into the conversation; but what he doesn't mention is that he was also a successful playwright, and his conversations, when he gets around to dispensing with abstrusities or absurdities, have the narrative logic, the emotional force, and the sense of hinging as much on things unsaid as things said, as great dramatic dialogue.)
This isn't the place for a close reading of my reasons for disagreeing with the back-cover copy and the academic introduction which calls the most prominent female character "deceitful, scheming," but although Unamuno was no feminist he wasn't the misogynist his political and ethnological conservatism might suggest. The central male character, the one who has all the philosophical discussions and experiences all the novel's Weltschmerz, is never not a figure of fun; the women are (for the most part) sensible, dispassionate, and self-respecting. But this is just a Goodreads blurb.
Yeah, five stars. It's great.
secemozmen's review against another edition
dark
emotional
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
olichoreno's review against another edition
5.0
Uno de mis libros favoritos ¿Hasta dónde somos dueños de nuestros inventos? Una novela que entra a la categoría de Zweig
florencia_rodriguez's review against another edition
challenging
dark
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0