savage detective was awesome.the ambivalent of Bolano's thoughts and feelings towards art and artists (supreme or pretentious/naive? maybe both at the same time)is deliverd in a highly original way
― Zeno, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 15:05 (fifteen years ago) link
oh man, i want to read this but after finishing infinite jest i don't think i'll want to read another 900+ pager
― Jordan, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 16:16 (fifteen years ago) link
I'm put off by the size, but the boxed set is a thing of beauty
― James Morrison, Wednesday, 15 October 2008 22:32 (fifteen years ago) link
i think i might order this as a present for myself to read once i'm done with this semester of grad school. i can't handle anything this heavy while i'm doing school, unfortunately
― metametadata (n/a), Wednesday, 15 October 2008 22:40 (fifteen years ago) link
^^yah me too. this might be my winter break book. heard mixed stuff about savage detectives but i may give this one a go.
― Mr. Que, Friday, 7 November 2008 17:18 (fifteen years ago) link
savage detectives was great. i never actually ordered 2066, i should do that now.
― metametadata (n/a), Friday, 7 November 2008 17:23 (fifteen years ago) link
done ... now i just need to forget i ordered it before next week so it'll be a pleasant surprise when it arrives
― metametadata (n/a), Friday, 7 November 2008 17:29 (fifteen years ago) link
I ordered it a few days ago, along with Saramago's Death With Interruptions. I probably will not get a chance to start either until May 17th, 2009, my 26th birthday, graduate school graduation day, end of a personal nightmare, and beginning of the better part of my life. I'm really looking forward to that day.
― z "R" s (Z S), Friday, 7 November 2008 17:29 (fifteen years ago) link
You could say that 2666 got a fairly positive review in the NYT today:
“2666” is the permanently mysterious title of a Bolaño manuscript rescued from his desk after his passing, the primary effort of the last five years of his life. The book was published posthumously in Spanish in 2004 to tremendous acclaim, after what appears to have been a bit of dithering over Bolaño’s final intentions — a small result of which is that its English translation (by Natasha Wimmer, the indefatigable translator of “The Savage Detectives”) has been bracketed by two faintly defensive statements justifying the book’s present form. They needn’t have bothered. “2666” is as consummate a performance as any 900-page novel dare hope to be: Bolaño won the race to the finish line in writing what he plainly intended, in his self-interrogating way, as a master statement. Indeed, he produced not only a supreme capstone to his own vaulting ambition, but a landmark in what’s possible for the novel as a form in our increasingly, and terrifyingly, post-national world. “The Savage Detectives” looks positively hermetic beside it.
― z "R" s (Z S), Saturday, 8 November 2008 19:25 (fifteen years ago) link
"The Savage Detectives" is beautiful. I can't wait to see if "2666" lives up to the hype.
― Brad C., Saturday, 8 November 2008 19:46 (fifteen years ago) link
just got 2666 in the mail. it looks beautiful
― t_g, Friday, 14 November 2008 11:14 (fifteen years ago) link
me too
― metametadata (n/a), Friday, 14 November 2008 13:40 (fifteen years ago) link
What do you think about the slip cover paperbacks versus the hardcover?
― silence dogood, Friday, 14 November 2008 14:24 (fifteen years ago) link
i got the paperbacks but i kind of wish i'd gotten the hardcover. the package looks nice but i'm worried it's going to fall apart and start to look ratty very quickly
― metametadata (n/a), Friday, 14 November 2008 14:26 (fifteen years ago) link
will be easier to read though
i got the hardcover. its not really that unwieldy tho i dont have any plans to be truckin it around
― johnny crunch, Friday, 14 November 2008 14:31 (fifteen years ago) link
i got the paperbacks, because we're on vacation next week and it will be easier to carry around. the question is, do i take one volume or two??? don't think i will be able to get through all three in a week. though we have two long plane rides to get thru. i think i will hide the second volume in my luggage somewhere for the plane ride back.
― Mr. Que, Friday, 14 November 2008 14:47 (fifteen years ago) link
got the paperbacks also, just bcz i hate lugging round hardcovers
― t_g, Friday, 14 November 2008 15:23 (fifteen years ago) link
just bought the hardcover.CANT WAIT TO READ (but have to wait, busy..)
― Zeno, Saturday, 15 November 2008 01:46 (fifteen years ago) link
i pre-ordered 2666 (hardback) on amazon when i was really drunk, forgot about it, then a package showed up at my door, and i'm about 200 pages in. great, great, great.
mr. que i would honestly take v. 1 with you just because it seques so nicely into the v. 2 that i've read so far.
― Matt P, Saturday, 15 November 2008 10:48 (fifteen years ago) link
no no i am taking vol. 1 the question is, will I be able to finish it in a week and should i take vol 2. along with me and the answer to both is yes. i am like 40 pages in so far and hubba hubba
― Mr. Que, Saturday, 15 November 2008 14:00 (fifteen years ago) link
the part about the crimes is giving me nightmares
― Matt P, Thursday, 20 November 2008 01:17 (fifteen years ago) link
I'm getting this through the library because I'm poor. Hopefully I can read it before it's due (since there will probably be a line for it by the time it's due).
― _Rockist__Scientist_, Saturday, 22 November 2008 19:36 (fifteen years ago) link
yeah so i liked 2666 a lot. i loved the part about the crimes, which is the most haunting thing i have ever read, and i loved parts about everything else. i'm not a poetry reader and i'm not crazy and i'm not very well-read. i think being more of those things would have helped me enjoy this even more.
― Jake Sexchamp (Matt P), Sunday, 23 November 2008 10:48 (fifteen years ago) link
bought this yesterday
― some know what you dude last summer (Jordan), Sunday, 23 November 2008 15:30 (fifteen years ago) link
i think i said something out loud in the store when i saw how expensive books are these days, but then i figured eh, at least this one should last me a while.
― some know what you dude last summer (Jordan), Sunday, 23 November 2008 15:31 (fifteen years ago) link
the box set was like $20 on amazon, which is really reasonable for a new book
― n/a is just more of a character....in a genre polluted by clones (n/a), Sunday, 23 November 2008 19:48 (fifteen years ago) link
the two adjectives i would give 2666 are wild and uneven. it was a fun, fast read for me but i think i would have appreciated a little more cohesion between the 5 sections. . . just a touch more, really. highlights were all of sections 1 and 4 and the beginning of 5, until Archimboldio gets bogged down in WWII. 3 came off as this weird DeLillo-ish chunk. 2 seems a little pointless in retrospect. he's an interesting writer, the digressions just got a little old towards the end. considering how awesome 1 and 4 are, though, it hardly matters.
― Mr. Que, Wednesday, 26 November 2008 16:25 (fifteen years ago) link
yeah, list price on the hardcover at Borders was $30.
― some know what you dude last summer (Jordan), Wednesday, 26 November 2008 18:53 (fifteen years ago) link
just about to start book 4, loving it (although 1 is definitely the best so far). i hit book 4 during a really choppy plane ride and didn't want to read about death and make myself even more tense. i like how the sections are connected, there are definite ties but it's not overdone (like if the reporter would've crossed paths with the critics in a cafe or whatever).
― some know what you dude last summer (Jordan), Monday, 1 December 2008 22:04 (fifteen years ago) link
i agree 100% with this guy on 2666 http://quarterlyconversation.com/2666-by-roberto-bolano
― Mr. Que, Monday, 1 December 2008 22:06 (fifteen years ago) link
I'm looking forward to the translations of his poetry, too.
― Z S, Sunday, March 30, 2008 8:12 PM (8 months ago) Bookmark
finally out btw
― BIG HOOS'S poncho steencation (BIG HOOS aka the steendriver), Saturday, 6 December 2008 02:33 (fifteen years ago) link
I think I'm gonna read Savage Detectives as soon as I finish Yiddish Policeman's Union
― BIG HOOS'S poncho steencation (BIG HOOS aka the steendriver), Saturday, 6 December 2008 02:34 (fifteen years ago) link
i'm somewhere around page 300, and for now, i think Savage Detectives is better.2666 is a good,philosophical page turner but it has it's flaws, esp. with the somewhat too obscure surreal scenes, some of them impossible to decipher, but Bolani is talented and smart enough to keep me going.maybe iill change my mind by the end.
― Zeno, Saturday, 6 December 2008 15:42 (fifteen years ago) link
Anyone read The Romantic Dogs poetry collection? Some of them are pretty good. It also makes sense to read them in conjunction with the Savage Detectives, since many of them actually seem part of that book: esp. the ones about N. Parra, northern Mexico, la revolution, Spain
from one poem: "But back then, growing up would have been a crime"
― donald nitchie, Friday, 12 December 2008 16:31 (fifteen years ago) link
"Notes Toward an Annotated Edition of 2666":
http://us.macmillan.com/BookCustomPage.aspx?isbn=9780374100148&m_type=4&m_contentid=5953#cmscontent
those are some very helpfull comments.
the book is getting better and better.(i'm in the middle)it's the sort of a book one's need to get used to, i think.David Lynch,Witold Gombrowicz, and the other Bolano's usuall suspects of influence are presented (Cortazar,Dellilo,Sebald and so on)it's less focused than "savage",yes, (which wasnt focused as itself), but it's deeper, and more complex.still, not a hard read.Bolano gives a fresh, look at the old theme of life vs. death, logic vs. madness, order vs. chaos. etc.. while the latter will always win, trying to find the point of it all, art and life, with the horror of death around us.so realism and surrealism collide together,with endless details, places and names creating a huge picture of the modern modern world on which we live in, where we can only imagine we have control over our lifes, while death and misunderstanding are around the corner.
― Zeno, Monday, 15 December 2008 00:46 (fifteen years ago) link
part 4 is more of an endless,detached report about the endless women murders,with some inside stories, so it's the weakest of the parts in terms of literature (though it also has it's many moments of great prose to be sure), but it delivers the largest emotional impact upon the reader,digging deeper into THE theme of the novel - the horror ofdeath,forcing the reader to confront the subject in thoughts and emotion, turning back on his mind to the previous parts, trying to build the big picture, connect the parts to a whole.
and to think that Bolano himself was dying while writing the book , makes the impact more profound.
― Zeno, Monday, 15 December 2008 01:21 (fifteen years ago) link
This is really a book written for undergraduate students. I just finished book one, and I can already imagine about 50 undergraduate paper topics waiting to be handed in.
The Role of DreamsMorini as OutsiderWomen in AcademiaThe Whore/Medusa ComplexThe Eruption of Violence in Educated Academic SocietyThe Writer v. The CriticEtc, etc.
I gotta say, I love it :) I chatted with a friend on AIM about the first 150 pages for like two hours last night.
― Mordy, Monday, 22 December 2008 15:32 (fifteen years ago) link
after savage detectives, it's weird reading a bolano book with modern references (rap, robert rodriquez)
― congratulations (n/a), Monday, 22 December 2008 15:47 (fifteen years ago) link
part 4 sort of teases with movie hero-type saviors (the loner cop who's teaching himself criminology, the FBI profiler, the obsessive reporter who starts getting tips), but you it's not that kind of story and it's not going to go down like that.
― Tracy Michael Jordan Catalano (Jordan), Monday, 22 December 2008 15:48 (fifteen years ago) link
the fake robert rodriguez anecdote is great
― Tracy Michael Jordan Catalano (Jordan), Monday, 22 December 2008 15:50 (fifteen years ago) link
xxpost that part in the first section where the academics watch the ring!
part 4 is more of an endless,detached report about the endless women murders,with some inside stories, so it's the weakest of the parts in terms of literature
i found part 4 incredible but also near impossible. the litany of dead women was hard to read but that was certainly the point, right?
― i'm dreaming of a white xmas btw (Lamp), Monday, 22 December 2008 15:53 (fifteen years ago) link
yeah, it becomes pretty numbing and i started to skim through those paragraphs, which has got to be the intended effect.
― Tracy Michael Jordan Catalano (Jordan), Monday, 22 December 2008 15:56 (fifteen years ago) link
this book was fuckin rad
― eman cipation s1ocklamation (max), Sunday, 28 December 2008 15:58 (fifteen years ago) link
srsly! co-sign
― delicate mouse tune, crash of cat chords (Lamp), Sunday, 28 December 2008 17:53 (fifteen years ago) link
Was on holiday in Chile few weeks ago. Having drinks with some of my dad's friends, the ex-husband of one asked me if I had ever read Bolano. I said yes, I really like him and was currently reading 2666. Turns out he was best friends with him as boys. He had recently been sent interview questions about the young Bolano and his relationship with him. He said when he was young he was a storyteller, and all the boys in the crowd would crowd round him while he made up, on the spot, fantastical stories that they all really enjoyed. Also he told an anecdote about a time when he had shot a bird with a homemade slingshot, Bolano shouted at him, calling him a murderer, and then rung the bird's neck as it was still alive, but suffering.
― what U cry 4 (jim), Sunday, 28 December 2008 18:11 (fifteen years ago) link
wow!
― Tracy Michael Jordan Catalano (Jordan), Sunday, 28 December 2008 20:03 (fifteen years ago) link
dude was a totally unremarkable accountant, living in a provincial city. Forgot to ask him where he was from, because I've never read anything telling me where Bolano was from in Chile, though I suspect it was probably just a suburb of Santiago. Also it was this newspaper that sent him the questions: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Clinic and he didn't seem to think they had ever used his material.
― what U cry 4 (jim), Sunday, 28 December 2008 23:29 (fifteen years ago) link
can someone whos read more bolano clue me in on what 2666 is? i gather its a date that shows up a few times in his work?
― eman cipation s1ocklamation (max), Monday, 29 December 2008 01:37 (fifteen years ago) link
"The Ghost of Herbert Plantilla: Pynchon, Borges & the Specter of American Literature in Roberto Bolaño's 2666"
― eman cipation s1ocklamation (max), Monday, 29 December 2008 01:47 (fifteen years ago) link
After obsessing over this guy in my 30s, I honestly haven't thought much about him in a while. Mostly due to starting a family, but I also just burned out on him a bit. I should revisit one of his novellas. My favorite Bolano character type is the old friend/acquaintance who reappears in your life in an almost menacing way, now adrift and depressed, mumbling dark things to himself.
― Heez, Thursday, 29 April 2021 15:30 (two years ago) link
has much in common with Sebald in that respect
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 29 April 2021 15:30 (two years ago) link
found out that a friend of mines parents are depicted in the savage detectives, in the first part of the book theyre part of the artistic milieu like a sculptor and... something, been a while since i read the book, and since he told me lol, not a close friend
― lag∞n, Thursday, 29 April 2021 16:29 (two years ago) link
Influencers!
― So who you gonna call? The martini police (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 29 April 2021 16:30 (two years ago) link
lmao
― lag∞n, Thursday, 29 April 2021 16:30 (two years ago) link
Is that the foul-mouthed American woman?
― keto keto bonito v industry plant-based diet (PBKR), Thursday, 29 April 2021 16:37 (two years ago) link
yeah must be i know one of his parents is american
― lag∞n, Thursday, 29 April 2021 17:28 (two years ago) link
finishing up Distant Star rn, pretty good! I do like the concept of "how do you process it when someone in your little arts circle becomes a politically aligned psychotic murderer," because I am thinking of similar things now that I recently found out that someone I grew up with created a giant company that does new slavery or whatever.
for some reason this book is kinda reading like a musical to me, where things are happening in a semi-realistic way or whatever and then suddenly the plot takes off on these (kinda corny) flights of fancies and then comes down (like the skywriting poetry, or the the torture photography exhibit or w/e). Anyway, I tried to read him like 10-15 years ago and thought he was pretty overrated, couldn't get through anything, now I'm having a good time reading this book, not sure why. 10-15 years ago I was able to dive into Marias and Sebald and other more "it helps to be divorced to get it" authors, but whatever it's nice to have something to be into now.
― Bongo Jongus, Sunday, 6 February 2022 20:20 (two years ago) link