Press first issued the collection as “The Burning Plain” (1967) in an elegant volume with illustrations by Kermit Oliver, the translation by George D. Published in Mexico by the Fondo de Cultura Económica in 1953, Rulfo’s short stories, together with his only other book, the novel “Pedro Páramo” (1955), established his international reputation as one of the 20th century’s greatest writers of fiction. And what a book it is - a collection of short stories widely considered to be among the finest in world literature, taking its place with de Maupassant, Chekhov, Poe, Borges and other gods of the genre. It never disappointed, it remained fresh and germane and mysterious, a classic. Until I read “The Plain in Flames,” Ilan Stavans’ translation of “El llano en llamas” by Juan Rulfo, I had never read it in English, only in Spanish decades ago, rereading it many times in the intervening years.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |