I think it's not done giving. 18/08/09

He'd kill me if he knew I haven't opened this book yet.

(the page this links to should appear below this post if you click on "this book", above)

Maybe I could have used it to write something. Actually, maybe not. I don't think I've written on the novel since I found the book, wrapped in its bag from Librerías Gandhi, in my mailbox at school on a day I most needed something like it.



It's still wrapped. I wanted to wait to open it until. I'm not sure until what. So, I'm going to open it now.

I didn't open it yet. I had to clean my desk off. Make the right atmosphere, a tranquil one.

Now I'm going to.

The tape's been on so long it won't easily peel off. I'll slit it with scissors. I don't want to slice the bag.

I sliced it a little.

Now that I've taken it out of the bag, I find I don't want to remove the plastic cover that protects books sold in Spanish-speaking countries. I'll just first read the back cover's description through the transparent plastic.

Its first sentence, in my clumsy translation: Like a chorus of multiple voices that simulate waves and hurl words over the blank page, or like a long series of thoughts that become confused in mental waters and are sighs, language, reflections, so are the chapters of this book, which intend to figure out what is a novel, what it should be or what it isn't.

It wouldn't really have worked for anything I've written, other than for, perhaps, a surprising phrase or two in an unexpected tone. It won't really help on my written exams, on which I won't be defining literary genres or classifying the works I'm studying by them. I might have to argue why Bernal Díaz's crónica can be read as a novel, but perhaps other sources might be more apt than this simply because they are on the list. And I need to keep my focus there.

I think I'll wait to unwrap the next layer for another couple of weeks.