«En 1913, el escritor norteamericano Ambrose Bierce, misántropo, periodista de la cadena Hearst y autor de hermosos cuentos sobre la Guerra de Secesión, se despidió de sus amigos con algunas cartas en las que, desmintiendo su reconocido vigor, se declaraba viejo y cansado». Sin embargo, en todas ellas se reservaba el derecho de escoger su manera de morir. La enfermedad y el accidente —por ejemplo, caerse por una escalera— le parecían indignas de él. En cambio, ser ajusticiado ante un paredón mexicano… Ah —escribió en su última carta—, ser un gringo en México; eso es eutanasia. «Entró en México en noviembre y no se volvió a saber de él. El resto es ficción.» Ésta es la asombrosa reconstrucción de lo que podría haber sido la trayectoria del anciano novelista. Elaborada como una larga vuelta atrás, esta novela es ante todo una reflexión sobre la identidad, la búsqueda del padre, el concepto de frontera como «cicatriz» unión y separación.

8481302163

8481302163

Durante los años de intensa lucha revolucionaria en México, un viejo escritor norteamericano cruza la frontera sur de su país para buscar un destino, acaso mortal, en el torbellino de la historia.

The novel is framed as the reminiscence of a woman. An old journalist heads to Mexico during the time of the Mexican Revolution seeking, not a story, but his death. He joins with a band of Pancho Villa’s guerilla fighters, led by General Tomas Arroyo, and witnesses events as they destroy all but the mirrored ballroom of a once great hacienda. And there he encounters a white woman, Harriet Winslow. Harriet had been hired as a governess for the owner’s children, but they had all fled by the time she arrived from the US, and now she is stranded and yet determined to stay and defend the property as best she can.

There has been much praise for this work; it was the first translated work by a Mexican author to become a bestseller in the United States. But I had great difficulty engaging with the characters and the plot, such as it was.

Fuentes interrupts the action with long stream-of-conciousness soliloquies by each of his characters. Some of these consist of one long sentence that takes more than a page of text to get through. Now, I’ve read other works with a similar technique – Jose Saramago’s works come to mind – and I’ve enjoyed them. But in this book, I felt that these interludes did nothing so much as interrupt the meager story and make me like the book even less.

Then there are the sex scenes. I’ll say this for Fuentes, he doesn’t pull any punches. But he also has NO IDEA how women think or what motivates them to act the way they do. These are nothing but a macho man’s fantasy. Enough said.

The Old Gringo in the story is based on Ambrose Bierce, an historical figure who disappeared shortly after he travelled to Mexico during that country’s revolution. But the name is mentioned only once towards the very end of the book. ( )