Books by Adolfo Bioy Casares
Where There's Love, There's Hate (Neversink)
by Silvina Ocampo, Adolfo Bioy Casares
A witty yet gripping pastiche of murder mysteries set in an Argentine seaside resort, peppered with literary allusions
In seaside Bosque de Mar, guests at the Hotel Central are struck by double misfortune: the mysterious death of one of their party, and an investigation headed by the physician, writer and insufferable busybody, Dr. Humberto Huberman. When quiet, young translator Mary is found dead on the first night of Huberman's stay, he quickly appoints himself leader of an inquiry that will see blame apportioned in turn to each and every guest--including Mary's own sister--and culminating in a wild, wind-blown reconnaissance mission to the nearby shipwreck, the Joseph K.
Never before translated into English, Where There's Love, There's Hate is both genuinely suspenseful mystery fiction and an ingenious pastiche of the genre, the only novel co-written by two towering figures of Latin American literature. Famously friends and collaborators of Jorge Luis Borges, husband and wife Bioy Casares and Ocampo combine their gifts to produce a novel that's captivating, unashamedly erudite and gloriously witty.
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Borges
In Adolfo Bioy Casares’s diaristic portrait of his friendship with Jorge Luis Borges, the two titans of Latin American letters discuss their shared literary passions (including police procedurals, gothic novels, fantastic literature, and more); take down canonical authors such as Shakespeare and Joyce; and together, model the rollicking and joyous way a life in literature should be lived.
Jorge Luis Borges might be said to be the most significant Spanish-language writer since Cervantes, and Borges is an astonishing document of the life of this twentieth-century giant through the diaries of his friend, the fellow Argentine writer Adolfo Bioy Casares.
Over the course of their remarkable, five-decade-long friendship, Bioy Casares kept meticulous record of their energetic discourse on everything from the philosophies of authorship to the virtues of detective plots to the inner workings of sentences and of people. Devotees of police procedurals, the gothic novel, gaucho literature, and fantastic literature, they perform a mesmerizing double act, wielding their razor wit to offer blistering critiques of canonical writers such as Goethe, Shakespeare, Baudelaire, and Joyce.
Bioy paints a portrait of Borges as not only a writer at the pinnacle of his craft, but also an omnivorous reader who delights in nothing more than applying his staggering erudition to the sheer, unadulterated joy of literature. Borges is literature at its most wondrous, its most scathing—is literature as life itself.
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$24.95
The Invention of Morel (New York Review Books Classics)
Jorge Luis Borges declared The Invention of Morel a masterpiece of plotting, comparable to The Turn of the Screw and Journey to the Center of the Earth. Set on a mysterious island, Bioy's novella is a story of suspense and exploration, as well as a wonderfully unlikely romance, in which every detail is at once crystal clear and deeply mysterious.
Inspired by Bioy Casares's fascination with the movie star Louise Brooks, The Invention of Morel has gone on to live a secret life of its own. Greatly admired by Julio Cortázar, Gabriel García Márquez, and Octavio Paz, the novella helped to usher in Latin American fiction's now famous postwar boom. As the model for Alain Resnais and Alain Robbe-Grillet's Last Year in Marienbad, it also changed the history of film.
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Asleep in the Sun (New York Review Books Classics)
Lucio, a normal man in a normal (nosy) city neighborhood with normal problems with his in-laws (ever-present) and job (he lost it) finds he has a new problem on his hands: his beloved wife, Diana. She’s been staying out till all hours of the night and grows more disagreeable by the day. Should Lucio have Diana committed to the Psychiatric Institute, as her friend the dog trainer suggests? Before Lucio can even make up his mind, Diana is carted away by the mysterious head of the institute. Never mind, Diana’s sister, who looks just like Diana—and yet is nothing like her—has moved in. And on the recommendation of the dog trainer, Lucio acquires an adoring German shepherd, also named Diana. Then one glorious day, Diana returns, affectionate and pleasant. She’s been cured!—but have the doctors at the institute gone too far?
Asleep in the Sun is the great work of the Argentine master Adolfo Bioy Casares's later years. Like his legendary Invention of Morel, it is an intoxicating mixture of fantasy, sly humor, and menace. Whether read as a fable of modern politics, a meditation on the elusive parameters of the self, or a most unusual love story, Bioy's book is an almost scarily perfect comic turn, as well as a pure delight.
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La Otra Aventura y Otros Escritos / the Other Adventure and Other Stories
La otra aventura y otros escritos reúne cinco obras de no ficción que escribió Bioy Casares en diferentes años entre 1968 y 1999.
Inaugura este volumen de no ficción La otra aventura (1968), una serie de prólogos y artículos de Bioy entre los que se destacan un análisis en torno a la originalidad de La Celestina y una valiosa nota sobre su amistad con Borges; en Memoria sobre la pampa y los gauchos (1970) Bioy explora las múltiples resonancias de esas palabras que a él le despiertan ansiedad pero «para la mayoría de los argentinos son de uso turístico»; el hilarante y satírico Diccionario del argentino exquisito (1971) incluye verdaderos hallazgos; Unos días en el Brasil (1991), el diario de un viaje realizado en 1960 en el contexto de un congreso del PEN Club, y De las cosas maravillosas (1999), reflexión luminosa que tiene como objetivo ayudar a conocernos mejor.
ENGLISH DESCRIPTION
The Other Adventure and Other Stories gathers five non-fiction works Bioy Casares wrote between 1968 and 1999.
This non-fiction volume opens with "The Other Adventure" (1968), a series of prologues and papers he wrote, among which stand out an analysis about the originality of La Celestina and a valuable note regarding his friendship with Borges. In "Memories of La Pampa and the Gauchos" (1970), Bioy explores the multiple resonances of these words, which to him are a source of anxiety, but "to most Argentinians are of common touristic use." The hilarious and satirical "Dictionary of the Exquisite Argentinian" (1971) includes true findings. "A Few Days in Brazil" (1991) is a travel journal he wrote in 1960, within the context of a PEN Club congress. And "Of Wonderous Things" (1999), luminous reflection to help us learn more about ourselves.
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