Staff Pick
This book may be useful to all artists, creators, thinkers, musers, wanderers, etc. Since Llosa is writing to a friend, the tone is very conversational, yet quite profound. He says that the act of creation in general comes from a desire to see something new in the world and is itself revolutionary! Who isn't curious about what a creative revolution could like?! Recommended By Dana S., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
A literary apprenticeship in eleven letters, by the internationally acclaimed master of the novel.
In the tradition of Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet, Mario Vargas Llosa condenses a lifetime of writing, reading, and thought into an essential manual for aspiring writers, revealing in the process his deepest beliefs about our common literary endeavor.
A writer, in his view, is a being seized by an insatiable appetite for creation, a rebel, and a dreamer. But dreams, when set down on paper, require disciplined development, and so Vargas Llosa undertakes to supply the tools of transformation. Drawing on the stories and novels of writers from around the globe Borges, Bierce, Céline, Cortázar, Faulkner, Kafka, Robbe-Grillet he lays bare the inner workings of fiction, examining time, space, style, and structure, all the while urging young novelists not to lose touch with the elemental urge to create.
Conversational, eloquent, and effortlessly erudite, this little book is destined to be read and reread by young writers, old writers, would-be writers, and all those with a stake in the world of letters.
Review
“A fascinating commentary...distills [great works] brilliantly, revealing an architecture to their greatness.” —
The Washington Post Book World“Ought to be dubbed the worlds cheapest MFA...Not just a book for writers, but one for readers, too...And for those who want to do more than read, [it] will instruct, illuminate, and most important, inspire.” —St. Petersburg Times
“[This book] will make you, if not a novelist, at least a subtler taster of novels.” —San Antonio Express
“Less a collection of dictums on the craft of the novel than a tribute to its formal complexities and potential through his admiring comments on works by the likes of Flaubert and Cervantes.” —The New York Times Book Review
Synopsis
WINNER OF THE NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE
Mario Vargas Llosa condenses a lifetime of writing, reading, and thought into an essential manual for aspiring writers. Drawing on the stories and novels of writers from around the globe-Borges, Bierce, C line, Cort zar, Faulkner, Kafka, Robbe-Grillet-he lays bare the inner workings of fiction, all the while urging young novelists not to lose touch with the elemental urge to create. Conversational, eloquent, and effortlessly erudite, this little book is destined to be read and re-read by young writers, old writers, would-be writers, and all those with a stake in the world of letters.
Synopsis
Mario Vargas Llosa condenses a lifetime of writing, reading, and thought into an essential manual for aspiring writers. Drawing on the stories and novels of writers from around the globe—Borges, Bierce, Céline, Cortázar, Faulkner, Kafka, Robbe-Grillet—he lays bare the inner workings of fiction, all the while urging young novelists not to lose touch with the elemental urge to create. Conversational, eloquent, and effortlessly erudite, this little book is destined to be read and re-read by young writers, old writers, would-be writers, and all those with a stake in the world of letters.
About the Author
MARIO VARGAS LLOSA was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2010 “for his cartography of structures of power and his trenchant images of the individuals resistance, revolt, and defeat.” Perus foremost writer, he has been awarded the Cervantes Prize, the Spanish-speaking worlds most distinguished literary honor, and the Jerusalem Prize. His many works include The Feast of the Goat, The Bad Girl, Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter, The War of the End of the World, and The Storyteller. He lives in London.