The Taker and Other Stories - Hardcover

Fonseca, Rubem

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 193482402X ISBN 13: 9781934824023

Publisher: Open Letter, 2008

Synopsis

"Each of Fonseca's books is not only a worthwhile journey; it is also, in some way, a necessary one."—Thomas Pynchon

Most widely admired for his short fiction, The Taker and Other Stories is Fonseca's first collection to appear in English translation, and it ranges across his oeuvre, exploring the sights and sounds of the modern landscape of Rio de Janeiro. Rubem Fonseca's Rio is a city at war, a city whose vast disparities—in wealth, social standing, and prestige—are untenable. In the stories of The Taker, rich and poor live in an uneasy equilibrium, where only overwhelming force can maintain order, and violence and deception are essential tools of survival.

Whether recounting the story of a businessman who runs over pedestrians to let off steam, a serial killer being pushed to ever greater crimes by his bourgeois lover, the desperate poor rushing to butcher a cow that has been killed in a traffic accident, or a man seeking out confirmation for a past which his friends deny, Fonseca repeatedly reaffirms his status as one of the purest storytellers on the contemporary Brazilian literary scene.

Rubem Fonseca is considered one of Brazil's most influential writers, and was awarded the Prémio Camões—considered the Nobel Prize of Portuguese language literature—for his body of work in 2003. That same year he was awarded the Juan Rulfo Prize.

Clifford E. Landers has translated many of the great writers of Brazil, including Jorge Amado, João Ubaldo Ribeiro, Patricia Melo, Osman Lins, and Moacyr Scliar among others. He received the Mario Ferreira Award in 1999.

About this title

About the Author:

Rubem Fonseca is considered one of Brazil's most influential writers, and was awarded the Prémio Camões—considered the Nobel Prize of Portuguese language literature—for his body of work in 2003. That same year he was awarded the Juan Rulfo Prize.

Clifford E. Landers has translated many of the great writers of Brazil, including Jorge Amado, João Ubaldo Ribeiro, Patricia Melo, Osman Lins, and Moacyr Scliar among others. He received the Mario Ferreira Award in 1999.

From Publishers Weekly:

The stories in Fonseca's collection, the first translated into English, are beautifully grim and superbly clever as stand-alone reading. Together, though, these tales of very bad people doing very bad things can be fatiguing. From the first story to the last (a bored businessman runs down pedestrians to relax; two women vie, fatally, for the narrator's affections), Fonseca is relentless in his cynicism toward the human condition. In the title story, a poet threatens, beats, rapes and murders his way across Rio de Janeiro before meeting his match, an equally masochistic woman. Account of the Incident is a relatively whimsical entry, about a fight among neighbors over a dead cow recently hit by a bus. Like Flannery O'Connor, Fonseca uses cathartic, revelatory horror to explore the logical ends of society's collective fears and foibles; in his world, hope is a foolish luxury and the only way to live is to take. For all his grim plotting, though, every story is wired with moments of explosive humor; fans of South American literature and the macabre should be pleased. (Nov.)
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About this edition

• Publisher: Open Letter
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 193482402X
• ISBN 13: 9781934824023
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 166