sarab

if anyone likes short stories, i would recommend Ron Carlson...i really admire his control of the English language.

Nadia D

Hi Sara,
Thanks for the recommendation!! What kind of short stories does he write?

mvictoria

Hi Sara, thanks for the recommendation! if someday you feel like reading short stories in Spanish, you can't miss BESTIARIO by Julio Cortázar, or any of his short story books for that matter. :-)

Later,
V

'enry'iggins

here is a passage and translated passage of my own contriving. It is about a blundering Captain who commands little else than the english languadge, though his sharp tongue has sent many a word to the dark floor of the sea.

----"What a cruel Captain you are! I will not sail with such as you!"
----"Too late, we have already set sail! So you will have to swim to shore in proper disgrace, whatever you may chose!"
At this Miss Hello stole upon the Captain's sword and dared to swing at him, but the Captain swiftly leapt through the open window to escape her! And yet, as Miss Hello looked down at the floor she saw that she had managed to cleave the formidable blonde mustache off her Captain's face, and it remianed upon the floor in it's entirety! She fell back laughing upon her bed, and verily heard the Captain call angrily from behind the door.
----"Dinner's at sundown! I'll be wanting my sword back!"~~~

As Captain Crecy saw to his ship, one by one the crew began to notice that his great mustache was missing, and little by little the more brusk sailors began to summon the courage to ask him what had happened. At this, the Captain's reaction was most unexptected and he started to laugh, leaping upon a barrel and calling for all of the crew to gather around!
---"Listen you lot! I lost my mustache the only way a Captain ever loses it! From kissing a woman with such repetition that before long her mouth was full of hair! I so excited her that many of her kisses failed to land upon my lips, and in such a way did my mustache little by little find itself gone from my face! Hahaha! Now clean up this ship before sundown! We've got a damn woman on board and we're gonna behave like gentlemen for her!"
The crew laughed well and did as the Captain said, for they thought him to be the most brilliant man ever born! The Captain clapped his hands as they worked and sang many songs of yore.
When sundown arrived, Miss Hello wandered timidly out from her cabin, making her way along the walkway. Verily, she found a great wooden table set out upon the main deck complete with candles and two great benches filled with rowdy sailors! There were two chairs proper to gentle folk, one at either end of the great table. One was empty, and in the other sat Captain Crecy, twisting his great blonde mustache which had grown back in the few hours that had transpired since it had been shorn from his face! Miss Hello looked upon this in amazement, stunned by the manly forces that must have brought forth such a mustache so quickly! Verily, Miss Hello took her seat, not knowing how to comport herself otherwise under the Captain's watchful eyes.
As she took her seat, Captain Crecy leapt upon the table with great cunning and strength.
----"Ha! See how my mustache has returned in the short space that we were apart!"
The crew lifted their flasks to applaud their great Captain as he danced upon the table and cracked many a plate beneath his boots! He then came to stand proudly before Miss Hello, bragging over his assumed victory.
----"You blokes did not see, but when me and Miss Hello were alone she kissed the very mustache from my face! I have never seen such passion in a woman before!"
Miss Hello rose at her place and protested, pulling out from her pocket the shorn mustache that had fallen in its familiar shape from a single swipe of the sword. She held it before the crew for all to see!
----"Not so! I never did and never would kiss your Captain! Rather, I chopped his mustache from his face for his foul manners! Why else would his mustache remain in its proper shape, if not for that it was shorn prescicely by the blade! And here, I have his sword as well! How do you think I came to have it? I stole it from his belt to defend my honor!"
Captain Crecy laughed well at this, and further decieved his crew.
----"Ha! The fact that my former mustache remains in proper form is that it was removed by one single kiss from that woman! Then she had the theatrics to smile at me like a cat with a bird in its mouth! I only allowed her to keep my mustache as a souveneir of our love making! And so great was our love making that a second souveneir, my sword, seemed fitting. And yet she bends all these truths to her advantage, and she would wish to decieve you all!"
At this the crew was joyful and rose their flasks, for whether they believed their Captain or Miss Hello, they were pleased by the cunningness with which the two spoke, and all aboard felt themselves to be a volume wiser in the ways of seduction!~~~

"What cannon? I'm too busy supplying the world with formidable histories to more than glance at a sensible page of hitherto."--Captain Crecy, the blundering captain.

--Que cruel capitán tu eres! No voy a hacerme velar en compañía con tal hombre como tu!
--Es demasiado tarde por eso! Ya hemos empezado nuestro viaje. Axial, tendrás que nadar a tierra de todos modos, en propia desgracia, cualquier elegirías!
Aquí, Señorita Hola robo de su espada y oso hacer girarlo a su capitán, pero el capitán salto rápidamente por la ventana para que se la escapar. Sin embargo, Señorita Hola miro hacia el piso y dio cuenta que ella se lo ha cortado de su bigote rubio a su capitán, y ello quedaba en el piso en su integridad, manteniendo su propia forma. Ella se cayo hacia atrás en su cama, riéndose, y verdadamente oyó a su capitán llamando desde atrás de la puerta.
---La cena será a las seis. Mandare que luego me retornares mi espada a mi!
Mientras que Capitán Crecy cuidaba a su barco, uno por uno a su tripulación empezaba a darlos cuenta que el grande bigote de su capitán era extraviado de su cara, y los marineros mal educados se punieron bravo y consiguieron el valor poder preguntarle lo que ha pasado. Aquí, la reacción de su capitán era el mas inesperado, y empezó a reírse, soltando sobre la topa de un barril, y llamando para que todos los marineros juntaran alrededor de el.
---Escuchad me, mal educados! Me perdí a mi bigote en el solo modo en que los capitanes pierden sus bigotes, por besando a una mujer con tanto repetición que antes de pasa mucho, su boca era llena de pelo. Tales era mis besos a ella que sus besos a mi fallaron aterrizar en mis labios, por la mayor parte, y poco a poco, mi bigote se encontró perdido de mi cara! Jajaja! Ahora, limpiad este barco antes de la puesta del sol. Tenemos una mujer en borde, y comportaremos asi, como caballeros del mar.
La tripulcacion rieron a su capitán,
...translation in progress by myself, hoping for suggested translations. I am sure the current translation is riddled with holes, and would prefer that it was seaworthy
http://www.geocities.com/estreightof...et/riddle.html

carlam

Hey Sara! U never said what kind of stories he writes- I'm interested! And also if there are any books you liked in Spanish, as a native English speaker, that you could recommend?

sarab

hi carla! i have heard that he is kind of the "king of happy endings" but he has a really great sense of humor and writes about day-to-day things, he creates fabulous and memorable characters which i think is really admirable in short stories! i read "hotel eden" and really liked it!

as for authors i like in spanish...juan carlos onetti, juan rulfo, márquez...all great short story writers, as for novels i really like alicia gímenez-bartlett, rosa montero, lucia etxebarria...i will keep thinking!

SandraT

For sure, you can't miss novels by Isabel Allende. She is just great, her style is very like Garcia Marquez, so full of passion. She writes about love, death and everything in such a way that you just can't stop reading until you are through with the book. The famous casa de los espiritus, house of the spirits is also a movie, that although far from the book, has its achievements too.

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[Have a nice day!!!
♥ Sandra T ♥

sabrina

I recommend his short stories...They are the best!

sarab

Is there a particular collection of short stories that you could recommend Sabrina? Thanks!

justinb

Flannery O'Connor's "A Good Man Is Hard to Find" is one of my favorite short stories. It includes a nice quote from "the Misfit."

"She would of been a good woman, if it had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life."


Hemingway has some good short stories as well, one classic being "The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber."

I'm going to check out Ron Carlson. Thanks!