In Bonsai, Chilean author Alejandro Zambra spins a highly literary affair about reading and writing, about honesty in life and fiction. This is his first novel, and it hides stories-within-stories.
The book centers on two university students, Emilia and Julio. They meet at a study group and become friends, then lovers. Their relationship, and their very lives, revolve around a short story they read together and a variation of which Julio types out in a manuscript he calls Bonsai. Zambra demonstrates a deep understanding of the way young people think, how their blinkered wisdom holds them back from true intimacy; one sees in Emilia’s lexical games and her desire to always keep literature at a distance, and in Julio’s boyish unease with love, a desire to hold it at arm’s length.
In the end, they separate. He goes on with his life, gets married, has children, but he never forgets her, and in his later years he decides to pay her some kind of homage. What exactly that consists of is left up to the reader.
Anderson Tepper: The book was originally published in 2008, but it is now being retranslated by Megan McDowell. What led you to decide to bring it to the US now?
I was attracted to the beauty of McDowell’s prose, but more importantly her approach to the text. She is an intelligent, discerning translator who does not merely render words into English but conveys the spirit of the original text. It is an extraordinary translation, and I am proud to have had a part in it.
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