I am almost finished reading La Colmena--only a few more pages to go. I have also viewed the movie. Unfortunately, I haven't any insights to share right now. Hopefully I will have some thoughts to share when I have actually finished the book. Or maybe it will take a second reading!

Whew!

LA COLMENA is proving a difficult book for me to wind through. It's not that the Spanish is hard. Reading vignette after endless vignette that are supposed to be related yet seem to leave only hints is wearying to me. I can't wait till it's over with. I had wanted to ENJOY my journey through Spanish literature. The first time that I read the first chapter of LA COLMENA, I truly did enjoy it! Now I am sloughing my way through Chapter Three and feeling so miserable. What happened?

I have been watching the movie LA COLMENA (1982). It helps me a little, but not all that much. I hope I will find enjoyment again later on in the bookk.

I am continuing my slow journey through Cela's La Colmena. Martín Marco is becoming an ever more interesting character as I read.

I am no longer writing from  a netbook, but from a REAL laptop. What a difference. Spanish puncuation is now much easier!

I am enjoying my slow journey through Cela's LA COLMENA. I like reading about Martín Marco even though I feel sorry for him because he is homeless and broke.

I now believe that Cela cared about his characters, at least more than I thought. I don't think he's enamored of Dona Rosa's ways, however.

I am having some trouble getting Spanish punctuation to work on this blog. It may be that it doesn't work very well with an Acer Netbook.

Down With My Characters?

Camilo José Cela gives the impression that he thinks the characters he creates are a bunch of stupid jerks. I need to learn a lot more about this author! However, I find La Colmena to be very interesting and will continue to read it.

Next, I am reading a book by Camilo José Cela: LA COLMENA. I am reading it in Spanish, its original language. How grateful I am for our computer and internet world, for who  would I have to talk to about these books?

A Word About Don Quixote

I was fascinated by Cide Hamete Benengali, the Moorish scholar who wrote down the history of Don Quixote in Arabic. I also found the Bachelor Sansón Carrasco to be an interesting character. Isn't it amazing that he announced the study of Don Quixote at his school in Salamanca?

I would love to study this book and make more comments, but I had to return the book to the library. When I can get my own copy, I can highlight and comment to my heart's content. I  may live in the dark ages, but I am not yet into downloading books onto Kindle or Nook I like those hard copies!

I HIGHLY recommend Edith Grossman's translation of Don Quixote.

FANTASY WORLDS

I wish that I could read all of those stories that Don Quixote was into about knights and enchantment. But in our day, don't we have many more fantasy stories of our own? I doubt that anybody ever went daft for the reading of them.

DON QUIXOTE LIVES IN ENGLISH! I have never read Don Quixote in Spanish, and the English translations I came across in the past were terribe; either academic and boring or "dirty old book" partial translations. A few days ago, my husband brought home from the library the new translation by Edith Grossman. It's not boring at all! In it's full context, it's not a "dirty" book in the least. It's a much more wonderful read than I could have imagined. I felt very sad when I read about the priest and the barber preparing to burn Don Quixote's books. Books were not abundant in those days. In today's world we would deem it silly to blame mental illness on a bunch of fantasy knight stories. Storybooks were a very good scapegoat, weren't they?

CHANGED MY MIND! I am going to open this blog up again. I have been gone a long time because of illness, but now I am well.

Change Must Come

I don't think that the title to my blog is working. Since I don't see any way of changing the name of my blog, I am going to transfer over to a new one. Saying LATIN WORLD isn't attracting the people that I wanted, English speakers that are interesting in deepening their understanding of Spanish. It may take me a while to create a new blog, then delete the old one. Patience, please.

This Place Is A Big Help!

As I struggle my way through "La Tia Julia Y El Escribidor" (Aunt Julia And The Scriptwriter), I find myself enormously grateful to spanishdict.com for helping me to cope with all of the vocabulary stumblings. I recommend this site to all who want to read Spanish/Latin American works in their own language!

http://www.spanishdict.com

All That Vocabulary!

A major stumbling block for those trying to imbibe another language is vocabulary, vocabulary, vocabulary. Spanish is especially prone to causing frustration in this area because there are many, many dialects; reading literature from different Spanish Speaking areas exposes you to an enormous number of words that are vital for understanding. This causes me to read a book in Spanish much more slowly than I would read the same book in English. It takes incredible patience to attain true knowledge of the Spanish language because after you put aside the first basic textbook, you realize that nobody in the world speaks or writes (real books) in Standard Spanish.

I am planning to start a blog where I write almost everything in Spanish, but I am not naive enough to believe that I can do it without making mistakes and scrambling lots of meanings. I hope that people will politely point out my mistakes to me. Laugh if you want! It is not my fault that I was not born a native speaker, but I am very optimistic that I can come close.

Joyful Reading!

I love reading AUNT JULIA AND THE SCRIPTWRITER (La Tía Julia Y  El Escribidor) by Llosa! What an enjoyable book. I'm going to spend a lot of time with this work of wonderful literature before moving on. Pedro Camacho is a name I'm remembering as I work thriugh this book.

Llosa versus Màrquez

I absolutely LOVE reading AUNT JULIA AND THE SCRIPTWRITER! My first Llosa reading. Can it be that I will like Llosa better than Màrquez?

I am thinking of creating a second blog where I write in Spanish, and use this one for English. If I choose to do so, I know that I will make plenty of mistakes using the Spanish language, for it is not my native tongue. But it will be fun, and I may get that much closer to native ability.

Solitude for Latinos?

In EL AMANTE DEL TEATRO, Lorenzo O'Shea wants to take time from work so he can sit all day and watch this woman across from him move around in her apartment, sometimes with the curtain drawn, sometimes with it open, but never in communication with her. How can anybody spend day after day doing that?

Here are Carlos Fuentes' words in this story: "La soledad no espanta a los hispanos. and "Ningùn latino se ha muerto de soledad." He is saying that solitude doesn't scare hispanics and that no Latino ever died from being alone.

Understanding La Latindad--Or Trying To!

En Fuente's EL AMANTE DEL TEATRO, I catch something of the Latino mindset..at least I think.  When Lorenzo falls in love with the woman across from him by watching her through his window, he thinks nothing of going to a Spanish doctor (there in la Gran Bretaña) and requesting a fake certificate of illness so he can sit and wiatch this woman for a month without going to work. Why would an otherwise honest Spanish doctor in Great Britain do this? Because AMOR comes first, before all other causes. Also because it is a great way to "get back" at snooty British who feel themselves so superior. For those of you who read Spanish, consider these lines:

"Oponerle obstàculos al amor es un delito superior a extender un falso certificado de enfermidad."

"La Latindad, cuando no es ejercicio que perfecciona la envidia, es complicidad nutrida por el sentimiento de que, siendo culturalmente superiores, recibimos trato de segundones en tierras imperiles."


These lines are from Carlos Fuentes' El Amante Del Teatro or The Theater Lover. I hope I'm not breaking any laws by quoting them.

Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter?

I have temporarily misplaced my copy of Fuentes' "Inqueta Compañía". As I was in the mood to work on my Spanish Lit, I picked up Mario Vargas Llosa's "La Tía Julia Y El Escribidor." So far it's about a man who studied law for security but really wished he could be a writer. He has a good job as the Director of Information at Radio Panamericana. Llosa has a very interesting style of writing and I'm finding the book enjoyable. I think I will finsih this book and get back to Fuentes' novelas later.

Novela or Short Story?

I have begun reading Carlos Fuentes' novela (or short story) EL AMANTE DEL TEATRO. It is included in a book of Novelas (or short stories) titled: INQUIETA COMPAÑIA. Lots of what is called La Latindad is talked about in this story. It's quite exciting so far. The hero is Lorenzo O'Shea. He explains that lots of Mexicans have Irish surnames because lots of Anglo-Irish migration happened to Mexico, not just the Spanish as we may think.

Learning To Read Spanish?

Recently I went to a Borders clearance sale and was happy to come across a book called EASY SPANISH READER--A THREE-PART TEXT FOR BEGINNING READERS. It is a wonderful book to use to get started in reading Spanish. BY WILLIAM T TARDY. It is interesting, full of cultural elements, and starts with easy Spanish that gradually gets more complex. When I run across someone who is earnestly longing to learn to read in Spanish, I will likely present the book to them as a gift.