Week 11 - Distant Star, Roberto Bolaño - Nicholas Latimer - On Curious storytelling, and Mystification


Hi all,

I will echo my peers by agreeing that this has been a very amusing read. Although by no means a light book in terms of its heavy theme, and the whirlwind of politics that were going on around the poets in this story, Bolano, or our narrator, wrote in a very digestible manner/tone. I’m someone who enjoys the more peculiar inclusion of details that authors/storytellers include - like when recounting Bergman describes Weider’s apartment as “naked and bleeding”. Although this perhaps was perhaps a slip of what was to come later in that same place. Another attempt to appreciate the structure of Bolano’s story is found in his opening of chapter 8: “This is where Abel Romero appears on the scene and I make my reappearance”. Beyond the syntax which I found fun in a way that it was unexpected - we are actively being told where we are in the storyline. This is unique from the more complex plots we’ve previously followed.

…

Beyond my liking - I want to reflect on a broader concept in the book. Blindness. Jon & Professor Long discuss the idea of uncertainty in their interview - which really made me think about the use of mystification as a reflection of the political climate as experienced by young people, specifically artists, at the time of the coup.

I thought of the hatred of free-thinking. The lack of appreciation for “art for art's sake” etc, which follows with anti-socialist ideology. This leads/has led to the imprisonment, oppression, and exile of the bright thinkers (such as those who we are initially introduced in the story). There are many times when the reader is sort of a step back from the happenings of the story - almost in the same way young onlookers to authoritarian regimes would be confused, unable to understand the greed and violence in front of them. We are withheld the name of our storyteller, and when it came time for Weider’s show, we are initially withheld the exact details of the photographs, later offered descriptions like “the photos were of poor quality, although they made an extremely vivid impression on all who say them” (98). Or near the end of the book - we are once again met with the same blurriness, when the narrator asks “Are you going to kill him?” to which we’re told: “Romero gestured in reply, but it was too dark to see what he meant” (161). 

In fact, the book even acknowledges the feelings of this sort of distrust before the climactic art show (in regards to the proceeding performance): “The foregoing account of the airshow may or may not be reliable. Or not. [...] But perhaps it happened all differently. [...] The following recount of the photographic exhibition in the flat is, however, accurate” (92). Well, where do we go from here?

Essentially what I hoped to get at, if this made any sense, was whether you also felt this mystification / confusion throughout - and what sort of purpose you drew from it.

Looking forward to discussing tomorrow!


Comments

  1. Daniel OrizagaMarch 27, 2023 at 8:57 PM

    Thanks for your post. The idea is that we can talk in class about what we have read and be able to compare notes, and perhaps clarify what we have been confused about. But sometimes it is the very intention of the text to show us that tension between what is told and what is kept silent, between hinting at what may be abject or even unspeakable, such as what may be represented or captured in those photographs. And you were right: behind an apparently simple plot there is a complex plot full of clues.

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  2. MelikaMarch 27, 2023 at 10:07 PM

    Hello Nicholas,
    Great post! I loved reading your thoughts. To respond to what you mentioned in your post, I think this mysterious aspect was intentional, just like how the narrator was kept a secret. The whole book had this mysterious vibe to it, and our mission was to solve the mysteries by figuring out who this mysterious man was and what his purpose was. Weider was also a very distant and mysterious character, relating back to the title of the text… distant star.

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