The Bitch
コロンビア太平洋岸の海と密林に挟まれた寒村で、子を持てないまま中年に差しかかったダマリスは、母を失った子犬を引き取り、娘のように愛しはじめる。孤独、母性への渇望、夫婦の冷えた関係、過酷な自然が絡み合い、愛情はしだいに執着と暴力を帯びていく。
作品情報
一匹の雌犬に注がれる過剰な愛が、孤独と喪失の奥に潜む暴力をあらわにする、濃密なトロピカル・ゴシック。
『雌犬』は、ピラール・キンタナのスペイン語小説 La perra の邦訳である。舞台は、自然の美しさと暴力が隣り合うコロンビア太平洋岸。子どもをあきらめたダマリスが一匹の雌犬を迎えることで、母になりたいという願い、夫婦の沈黙、土地に染み込んだ貧しさと死の記憶が一気に噴き出す。余白の多い簡潔な文体で、愛することと支配することの境界を突きつめる作品。
レビュー要約
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抑制された文体と湿度の高い舞台が強い印象を残す一方、救いの少ない展開や主人公の感情の激しさに距離を感じる読者もいる。母性を美談に回収しない冷徹さが、読後に長く残る作品として受け止められている。
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短い小説ながら、海辺の村の生活、夫婦の緊張、動物への愛着が鋭く描かれる点が評価されている。簡潔さを力強いと見る声がある一方、残酷な場面と暗い結末を重く感じる反応もある。
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心理小説としての切れ味、無駄のない散文、愛と裏切りと見捨てられることをめぐる鮮烈な描写が高く評価されている。短い場面の積み重ねが、主人公の不穏な変化を強く印象づける。
書籍情報
- 出版社
- World Editions
- 発売日
- 2020-08-04
- ページ数
- 128ページ
- 言語
- 英語
- サイズ
- 12.45 x 1.52 x 20.07 cm
- ISBN-13
- 9781642860597
- ISBN-10
- 164286059X
- 価格
- 6778 JPY
- カテゴリ
- 洋書/Mystery & Thrillers/Thrillers/Psychological & Suspense
2020 NATIONAL BOOK AWARDS TRANSLATED LITERATURE FINALIST In Colombia’s brutal jungle, childless Damaris develops an intense and ultimately doomed relationship with an orphaned puppy. “The magic of this sparse novel is its ability to talk about many things, all of them important, while seemingly talking about something else entirely. What are those things? Violence, loneliness, resilience, cruelty. Quintana works wonders with her disillusioned, no-nonsense, powerful prose.” Juan Gabriel Vásquez , author of The Sound of Things Falling “ The Bitch is a novel of true violence. Artist that she is, Pilar Quintana uncovers wounds we didn’t know we had, shows us their beauty, and then throws a handful of salt into them.” Yuri Herrera , author of Signs Preceding the End of the World Colombia’s Pacific coast, where everyday life entails warding off the brutal forces of nature. In this constant struggle, nothing is taken for granted. Damaris lives with her fisherman husband in a shack on a bluff overlooking the sea. Childless and at that age “when women dry up,” as her uncle puts it, she is eager to adopt an orphaned puppy. But this act may bring more than just affection into her home. The Bitch is written in a prose as terse as the villagers, with storms―both meteorological and emotional―lurking around each corner. Beauty and dread live side by side in this poignant exploration of the many meanings of motherhood and love.
PILAR QUINTANA is a Colombian author. She debuted with Cosquillas en la lengua in 2003, and published Coleccionistas de polvos raros in 2007, the same year the Hay Festival selected her as one of the most promising young authors of Latin America. Her latest novel, The Bitch , is 2020 National Book Awards Translated Literature Finalist, has won the prestigious Colombian Biblioteca de Narrativa Prize, and was selected for several Best Books of 2017 lists, as well as being chosen as one of the most valuable objects to preserve for future generations in a marble time capsule in Bogotá. The Bitch is the first of her works to be translated into English. LISA DILLMAN lives in Georgia, USA, where she translates Spanish, Catalan, and Latin American writers and teaches at Emory University. Some of her recent translations include Such Small Hands (winner of the 2018 Oxford-Weidenfeld Translation Award) by Andrés Barba; Signs Preceding the End of the World (winner of the 2016 Best Translated Book Award), Kingdom Cons , and The Transmigration of Bodies (shortlisted for the 2018 Dublin Literary Award) by Yuri Herrera; and Breathing Through the Wound and A Million Drops by Víctor del Árbol.
レビュー
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Loved this book. Would definitely recommend.
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Recommended to our writing group. Heartbreaking and concise story. Very well written. Recommend.
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I found this dispiriting and dull. I enjoy literary fiction but I like a larger world view
関連する文学賞
- ナショナル・ブック賞（翻訳文学） 第3回（2020年） ・Nominee