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The Magician of Vienna
by Sergio Pitol
Translated by George Henson
Introduction by Mario Bellatin
Afterword by Margo Glantz
Published by: Deep Vellum Publishing
Imprint: Deep Vellum Publishing
320 Pages, 5.25 x 8.25 in
- Paperback
- 9781941920480
- Published: April 2017
$15.95
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"We can read The Magician of Vienna not just as a work of literature but as one of the Holy Books in which we store humanity’s imaginary.” Mario Bellatin, author of Beauty Salon
The heartbreaking final volume in Sergio Pitol's groundbreaking memoir-essay-fiction-hybrid "Trilogy of Memory" finds Pitol boldly and passionately weaving fiction and autobiography together to tell of his life lived through literature as a way to stave off the advancement of a degenerative neurological condition causing him to lose the use of language. Fiction invades autobiographyand vice versaas Pitol writes to forestall the advancement of degenerative memory loss.
"Pitol’s writing the way he constructs sentences, inflects Spanish, twists meanings and stresses particular words reflects the multiplicity of languages he has read and embraced. Reading him is like reading through the layers of many languages at once.” Valeria Luiselli, author of The Story of My Teeth
Sergio Pitol, the greatest living Mexican writer, winner of the Juan Rulfo and Cervantes prizes, is profoundly influential to the current generation of Spanish-language writers, including Valeria Luiselli, Enrique Vila-Matas, and Yuri Herrera.
Sergio Pitol Demeneghi (1933-2018) was one of Mexico’s most influential and well-respected writers, born in the city of Puebla. He studied law and philosophy in Mexico City, and spent many years as a cultural attaché in Mexican embassies and consulates across the globe, including Poland, Hungary, Italy, and China. He is renowned for his intellectual career in both the field of literary creation and translation, with numerous novels, stories, criticisms, and translations to his name. Pitol is an influential contemporary of the most well-known authors of the Latin American “Boom,” and began publishing his works in the 1960s. In recognition of the importance of his entire canon of work, Pitol was awarded the two most important prizes in the Spanish language world: the Juan Rulfo Prize in 1999 (now known as the FIL Literary Award in Romance Languages), and in 2005 he won the Cervantes Prize, the most prestigious Spanish-language literary prize, often called the “Spanish language Nobel.”
George Henson is a literary translator and assistant professor of translation at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in Monterey. His translations include Cervantes Prize laureate Sergio Pitol’s Trilogy of Memory, The Heart of the Artichoke by fellow Cervantes recipient Elena Poniatowska, and Luis Jorge Boone’s Cannibal Nights. His translations have appeared variously in The Paris Review, The Literary Review, BOMB, The Guardian, Asymptote, and Flash Fiction International. In addition, he is a contributing editor for World Literature Today and the translation editor for its sister publication Latin American Literature Today.
Heather Cleary is a translator, writer, and one of the founding editors of the digital, bilingual Buenos Aires Review. Her translations and literary criticism have appeared in Two Lines, A Public Space, and Words Without Borders, among other publications. She is the translator of Roque Larraquy’s 2018 National Book Award-nominee Comemadre (Coffee House Press, 2018), Sergio Chefjec’s The Planets (2013) and The Dark (2014), and Girondo’s Poems to Read on a Streetcar. She holds an MA in Comparative Literature from NYU and a PhD in Latin American and Iberian Cultures from Columbia University. She currently teaches at Sarah Lawrence College.
“Pitol is a writer of another kind: his importance lies on the page, in the creation of his own world, in his ability to shed light on the world.” — Daniel Saldaña Paris, author of Among Strange Victims
"Pitol is probably one of Mexico’s most culturally complex and composite writers. He is certainly the strangest, most unfathomable and eccentric. . . . [His] voice . . . reverberates beyond the margins of his books." — Valeria Luiselli, author of Faces in the Crowd
"Reading him, one has the impression . . . of being before the greatest writer in the Spanish language in our time." — Enrique Vila-Matas
"A gorgeous, insight into literature, history, and a life lived through words. Sergio Pitol is one of Mexico's greatest authors." — Mark Haber, Brazos Bookstore (Houston, Texas)
“Reading Sergio Pitol will make any serious writer want to write—and write better. . . . In Pitol’s life and his writing, neither images nor thoughts flow naturally and automatically to their logical associations." — 3:AM Magazine
“Sergio Pitol is a legendary Mexican writer, whose ability and fame are best explained by noting that he has won both the Herralde and Cervantes Prizes.” — Tony Malone, Tony’s Reading List
"Sergio Pitol is not only our best active storyteller, he is also the bravest renovator of our literature."— Álvaro Enrigue, Letras Libres
“The Art of Flight has none of the obsessive, Proustian detail of Knausgaard, or the metafiction of Lerner. It resists the light-heartedness of Bolaño’s depictions of youth and escapades, and the moroseness of Hemingway. Instead, it resembles a cloudy gemstone: at once glimmering and opaque, layered and precise.” — Rosie Clarke, Music & Literature
“The Art of Flight is an homage to the value of stepping out of your comfort zone, to the difficult imperative of staying true to yourself, to living a life consumed with an intense quest for knowledge and perfection, and above all, a paean to a love of life and the power of books.” — Jennifer Smart, The Dallas Observer
“A dense, fascinating world, both familiar and strange, a world where different times, spaces, texts, journeys, ideas, and memories fuse and re-create one another.” — Rafael Lemus, Review: Literature and Arts of the Americas
“The Art of Flight reads like a long overdue celebration for a timeless art form that is constantly changing, constantly reinventing itself through the years, but rest assured, will never die.” — Aaron Westerman, Typographical Era
“The reflections on Pitol’s life as a writer are thoroughly enjoyable and, at time[s], gripping.” — Tony Messenger, Messenger’s Booker
“The Art of Flight is a book bursting with energy and curiosity. It is a collection of observations, set of diaries, travelogue and much more. It defies categorisation and cannot be summarised. Only experienced.” — Tulika Bahadur, On Art and Aesthetics
“Pitol is an inspiring teacher, and the experience of reading The Journey is akin to conversing with an admired professor, after which one hastily jots down the myriad writers and books mentioned in hopes of retroactively catching up on missed references. It feels like an honor as well to stumble on notes Pitol makes for future novels—as if we’re trusted confidants.” — Anne Posten, Words without Borders
"Told in intelligent and warm prose, Pitol once again shows the reader the profound importance of literature and travel in living a meaningful life. Bursting with wisdom and memories, The Journey is another unforgettable trip with a masterful guide." — Brazos Bookstore Staff Pick
"Witty, engaging, and regularly dizzying with its shifts between the real and the absurd, The Journey lives up to Pitol’s reputation as one of Mexico’s most intriguing writers." — World Literature Today
"Pitol is a tactful writer who masterfully handles hundreds of different subjects in a compact, novel-like form. . . . One of his great strengths is to turn from comic sentences to those of poetic resonance with a seamless and subtle finesse....this and the preceding volume—[The] Art of Flight—are some of the best to be published by a small press in the last few years." — Matt Pincus, Bookslut
"Simultaneously bewildering and fascinating. . . . To close The Journey, indeed, is to feel as if a dream has ended and the reader is finally returning to the real world with its harsh surfaces and clear light." — Jeffrey Zuckerman, The Quarterly Conversation
"In order to enjoy The Journey, the second volume of revered Mexican author Sergio Pitol’s idiosyncratic autobiographical trilogy, the reader must abandon expectations: of genre, of structure, of distinctions between the aesthetic “truth” of dreams and fiction, and truth in the sense of literal accuracy. Those who take this leap will find Pitol a warm companion and an erudite guide through both his own artistic process and a compelling moment in history that has much to say to our own." — Anne Posten, Words Without Borders
"Its richness and complexity as a book of memories and ideas are unmatched by any other work of literature written in Spanish in the last 25 years and available in English.” — Ignacio Sánchez Prado, The Los Angeles Review of Books
Pitol is a writer of another kind: his importance lies on the page, in the creation of his own world, in his ability to shed light on the world.” Daniel Saldaña Paris, author of Among Strange Victims
"Pitol is probably one of Mexico’s most culturally complex and composite writers. He is certainly the strangest, most unfathomable and eccentric. . . . [His] voice . . . reverberates beyond the margins of his books." Valeria Luiselli, author of Faces in the Crowd
"Reading him, one has the impression . . . of being before the greatest writer in the Spanish language in our time." Enrique Vila-Matas
"A gorgeous, insight into literature, history, and a life lived through words. Sergio Pitol is one of Mexico's greatest authors." Mark Haber, Brazos Bookstore (Houston, Texas)
Reading Sergio Pitol will make any serious writer want to writeand write better. . . . In Pitol’s life and his writing, neither images nor thoughts flow naturally and automatically to their logical associations." 3:AM Magazine
Sergio Pitol is a legendary Mexican writer, whose ability and fame are best explained by noting that he has won both the Herralde and Cervantes Prizes.” Tony Malone, Tony’s Reading List
"Sergio Pitol is not only our best active storyteller, he is also the bravest renovator of our literature." Álvaro Enrigue, Letras Libres
The Art of Flight has none of the obsessive, Proustian detail of Knausgaard, or the metafiction of Lerner. It resists the light-heartedness of Bolaño’s depictions of youth and escapades, and the moroseness of Hemingway. Instead, it resembles a cloudy gemstone: at once glimmering and opaque, layered and precise.” Rosie Clarke, Music & Literature
The Art of Flight is an homage to the value of stepping out of your comfort zone, to the difficult imperative of staying true to yourself, to living a life consumed with an intense quest for knowledge and perfection, and above all, a paean to a love of life and the power of books.” Jennifer Smart, The Dallas Observer
A dense, fascinating world, both familiar and strange, a world where different times, spaces, texts, journeys, ideas, and memories fuse and re-create one another.” Rafael Lemus, Review: Literature and Arts of the Americas
The Art of Flight reads like a long overdue celebration for a timeless art form that is constantly changing, constantly reinventing itself through the years, but rest assured, will never die.” Aaron Westerman, Typographical Era
The reflections on Pitol’s life as a writer are thoroughly enjoyable and, at time[s], gripping.” Tony Messenger, Messenger’s Booker
The Art of Flight is a book bursting with energy and curiosity. It is a collection of observations, set of diaries, travelogue and much more. It defies categorisation and cannot be summarised. Only experienced.” Tulika Bahadur, On Art and Aesthetics
Pitol is an inspiring teacher, and the experience of reading The Journey is akin to conversing with an admired professor, after which one hastily jots down the myriad writers and books mentioned in hopes of retroactively catching up on missed references. It feels like an honor as well to stumble on notes Pitol makes for future novelsas if we’re trusted confidants.” Anne Posten, Words without Borders
"Told in intelligent and warm prose, Pitol once again shows the reader the profound importance of literature and travel in living a meaningful life. Bursting with wisdom and memories, The Journey is another unforgettable trip with a masterful guide." Brazos Bookstore Staff Pick
"Witty, engaging, and regularly dizzying with its shifts between the real and the absurd, The Journey lives up to Pitol’s reputation as one of Mexico’s most intriguing writers." World Literature Today
"Pitol is a tactful writer who masterfully handles hundreds of different subjects in a compact, novel-like form. . . . One of his great strengths is to turn from comic sentences to those of poetic resonance with a seamless and subtle finesse....this and the preceding volume[The] Art of Flightare some of the best to be published by a small press in the last few years." Matt Pincus, Bookslut
"Simultaneously bewildering and fascinating. . . . To close The Journey, indeed, is to feel as if a dream has ended and the reader is finally returning to the real world with its harsh surfaces and clear light." Jeffrey Zuckerman, The Quarterly Conversation
"In order to enjoy The Journey, the second volume of revered Mexican author Sergio Pitol’s idiosyncratic autobiographical trilogy, the reader must abandon expectations: of genre, of structure, of distinctions between the aesthetic truth” of dreams and fiction, and truth in the sense of literal accuracy. Those who take this leap will find Pitol a warm companion and an erudite guide through both his own artistic process and a compelling moment in history that has much to say to our own." Anne Posten, Words Without Borders