Silvia hated public. Silvina, the protagonist of Things We Lost in the Fire, is not yet all the way committed to the protest movement. She lives in Edgewood, a Victorian trolley car suburb of Providence, Rhode Island, uncomfortably near Joseph Curwens underground laboratory. Originally published in Spanish, it was translated into English by Megan McDowell in 2017. And for those boys? A line of people playing the same loud snare drums as in the murga, led by deformed children with their skinny arms and mollusk fingers, followed by women, most of them fat . My parents let me read everything, and it really read like horror, especially if you were a child that didnt know the distinction between fiction and reality so clearly. Meanwhile, in his house, the dead man waits dreaming. So what is prisoned under the river? In effect, Enriquezs short fiction is populated by women suppressed by patriarchal necropolitics: lesbian teenagers (The Inn), girls both sexual and cruel (The Intoxicated Years), sufferers of anorexia (No Flesh over Our Bones), self-mutilated schoolgirls (End of Term), women who are raped, satanic, etc. But I saw these 30,000 girls screaming all the time. Get new fiction, essays, and poetry delivered to your inbox. The blend of horror, fantasy, crime, and cruelty has a particular Argentine pedigree. An emaciated, nude boy lies chained in a neighbor's courtyard. Its just that even the weirdest fiction needs a way to elide the seams between real-world horror and supernatural horrorand many authors have similar observations about the former. Spoilers ahead. She tries to get them out of there, and he grabs her gun. There's no requirement for joining, so pick up your book and come read with us! Botting, Ellis, Patrick, Stevens, Williams, Gross, Mighall, Punter, and Byron, among others). The police brutality, I think yeah, if you have to choose something as an echo of that [the dictatorship]. Just a few months ago, she helped win a case against a tannery that dumped toxic waste in the river for decades, causing a massive cluster of childhood cancers and birth defects: extra arms, cat-like noses, blind high-set eyes. Marina Pinat, Buenos Aires DA, isnt thrilled with the smug cop sitting in her office. Body horror based on real bodies is horrible, but not necessarily in the way the author wants. Enriquez: Of the authors I know who have works translated in English, there are Di Benedetto, Silvina Ocampo, Manuel Puig, Ricardo Piglia, and Julio Cortzar, who is very famous. All the New Fantasy Books Arriving in May! Her father, who once worked on a River Barge, told stories of the water running red. Adam Vitcavage: This short story collection has a lot of reoccurring themes related to the horrific and the mysterious. Enriquez spent her childhood in Argentina during the years of the infamous Dirty War, which ended when she was ten. Ruthanna Emrysis the author of the Innsmouth Legacy series, includingWinter TideandDeep Roots. Enriquez places feminisms struggle against capitalism in the foreground, given the impossibility of gender equality without class equality, through a gothic that opens up to more complex interpretations, in which women and marginalized classes, rendered ghostly, become dangerous harbingers of horror, even while being the most vulnerable and castigated subjects under capitalism. They open the door, open the cabinet, cross the wall. Its stench, he said, was caused by its lack of oxygen. After a few pages of that, walking corpses and abomination-imprisoning oil slicks just seem like a logical extension. Mariana Enriquez on teen-age desire. He tried to swim through the black grease that covers the river, holds it calm and dead. He drowned when he could no longer move his arms. Her absence is absolutely not due to nefarious extraterrestrial body-snatching, we promise. In the distance, she hears drums. The chairs have been cleared out, along with the crucifix and the images of Jesus and Our Lady. Second, these genres are literary. There are hints of sacrifice, mysterious deaths of the young. "Things We Lost in the Fire by Mariana Enriquez | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books", "Things We Lost in the Fire by Mariana Enrquez review gruesome short stories", "Brooding Books for the Dark Days of Winter", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Things_We_Lost_in_the_Fire_(story_collection)&oldid=1136661150, This page was last edited on 31 January 2023, at 13:55. Ive traveled just a bit in the United States, but I have a few friends there. https://medium.com/media/11bfe3a6b4f7b0925df45e65c1c190a5/href. Among them all, Mariana Enriquez stands out with her own flickering light. I had opened by complimenting this cocktail of politics and cult horror in her work. But hes not getting out, and neither is she. The title story almost takes up where Spiderweb left off, with women protesting domestic violence with a violence of their own. Anne wasnt able to submit a commentary this week. Similarly, in the title story, a hideously burned beggar kisses the cheeks of commuters, taking pleasure in their discomfort with her. Powered by WordPress and hosted by Pressable. I write for myself, thinking about my country and its reality.. All Rights Reserved. But, of course, her inspirations occasionally arise from those more innocuous sources: The girls, that kind of stayed with me. angelita" [The little angel's disinterment], . My favourite writers have written horror; Robert Aikman, Shirley Jackson, Stephen King I dont have a problem because I think Im in good company.. He tried to swim through the black grease that covers the river, holds it calm and dead. He drowned when he could no longer move his arms. And of course, whatever lies beneath the river might have been less malevolent, if it hadnt spent all that time bathing its ectoplasm in toxic sludge. Meet Mariana Enriquez, Argentine journalist and author, whose short stories are of decapitated street kids (heads skinned to the bone), ritual sacrifice and ghoulish children sporting sharpened teeth. Shes trying to get a glimpse when the thing moves, and its gray arm falls over the side. We dont know who has taken away a vanished girl, or murdered a child, or consumed a husband. Every author is very different but they account for the wide breadth of current Argentinian literature. Hes tried! Clearly these acts, and the concomitant economic instability and corruption, provide the earth for Enriquezs tales. Her absence is absolutely not due to nefarious extraterrestrial body-snatching, we promise. Author of web-comics, graphic short stories and novels, he has lately popularized the documentary style to relate the recent history, Alberto Chimals Twitter novel, Ciudad X: Novela en 101 Tuits, was originally published on Twitter on October 10, 2014, and subsequently in print version a year later, along with another, University of Oklahoma He hasnt brought a lawyerafter all, he says, hes innocent. The full schedule can be found hereand the marginalia can be found here. We publish your favorite authorseven the ones you haven't read yet. Im still intrigued by the idea of pollution as a messed-up attempt at bindingcontaining, of course, the seeds of its own destruction. Meet Mariana Enriquez, Argentine journalist and author, whose short stories are of decapitated street kids (heads skinned to the bone), ritual sacrifice and ghoulish children sporting sharpened teeth. What is the price of a body? An outsider comes in to investigate, and ultimately flees a danger never made fully clear. Adam Vitcavage is a Phoenix-based writer whose criticism and interviews have appeared in Electric Literature, Paste Magazine, The Millions, and more. He wouldnt touch politics, or football. The narrative too takes a sudden jolt, as the finely hewn realism reveals filaments of deeper and more mysterious origin. He came out of the water. Mariana Enrquez ( Buenos Aires, 1973) is an Argentine journalist, novelist, and short story writer. She dreamed that when the boy emerged from the water and shook off the muck, the fingers fell off his hands.. The proximity of others without these basic amenities creates a fragility in the better-off. Before she can react, he shoots himself. Not one of the blind kids with misshapen hands gets characterization, or even a speaking role other than to mouth platitudes about dead things dreaming. Her neo-Lovecraftian stories The Litany of Earth and Those Who Watch are available on Tor.com, along with the distinctly non-Lovecraftian Seven Commentaries on an Imperfect Land and The Deepest Rift. Ruthanna can frequently be found online onTwitterandDreamwidth, and offline in a mysterious manor house with her large, chaotic householdmostly mammalianoutside Washington DC. Since Esteban Echeverras foundational 1871 work The Slaughter Yard, Argentine literature has offered plentiful examplesArlt, Lamborghini, Chejfec, etc.of the representation of forms of violence. Vitcavage: What can readers learn about Argentina from yourstories? Wed Jul 11, 2018 2:00pm. In the specific case of the River Plate tradition, there are important precursors such as Quiroga, Cortzar (who even wrote the famous Notas sobre lo gtico en el Ro de la Plata [Notes on the gothic in the Ro de la Plata]), Onetti, Felisberto Hernndez, Silvina Ocampo, and Alejandra Pizarnik. (Its the most remarkable word weve ever seen.) Never mind how the priest knows shes there about Emanuel, or knows about the pregnant girl who pointed her this way. But I have to be careful that my personal passions and obsessions dont take over my stories and make them all sound toosimilar. All these tales are told from a womans point of view, often a young one, and they seem to be able to hold out against the horror that lures them for only so long. The boy opens the door; she goes in. A few years ago in Buenos Aires, two policemen detained two poor, young men who were coming back from a night club. Shadow Over Argentina: Mariana Enriquezs Under the Black Water. Pinats dubious about all this, or wants to be. 202 pages. Her father, who once worked on a River Barge, told stories of the water running red. (Its the most remarkable word weve ever seen.) But now he knows: they were trying to cover something up, keep it from getting out. Sign up for our newsletter to get submission announcements and stay on top of our best work. In Under the Black Water, a female district attorney pursues a lead into the city's most dangerous neighbourhood, where she becomes trapped in a "living nightmare". Vitcavage: What are some of the difficulties or obstacles you encounter while writing a shortstory? Vitcavage: Since youre a journalist as well, is there a sense of need when it comes to including political commentary within yourfiction? Hes in Villa Moreno. What about these themes exciteyou? Shes disturbed by his toothless mouth and sucker-like fingers. Things We Lost in the Fire: Stories ( Spanish: Las cosas que perdimos en el fuego) is a short story collection by Mariana Enriquez. After a few pages of that, walking corpses and abomination-imprisoning oil slicks just seem like a logical extension. Site designed in collaboration with CMYK. I dont have much contact with reality in my journalism. We discussed Argentina as a country and a character, the place of politics in literature, and what inspires Enriquez when shes working on astory. Horror is the drop of blood that flowers in the clear water of her social commentary. Privacy Policy. These stories blend the real-life horrors of domestic and state violence, homelessness and economic uncertainty with the supernatural; ghosts, demons and witchcraft. This article about a collection of horror short stories published in the 2010s is a stub. In the slum Buenos Aires frays into abandoned storefronts, and an oil-filled river decomposes into dangerous and deliberate putrescence.. Mythos Making: The graffiti on the church includes the name Yog Sothoth amid its seeming gobbledygook. TW for suicide. Ana Gallegos Cuiasis full professor in the Department of Spanish Literature of the University of Granada. Influenced by the works of Stevenson, Poe, James, Lovecraft, Bradbury, Silvina Ocampo, and Stephen King, she takes up the North American gothic and deterritorializes it toward an Argentine setting and toward Argentinas history, drawing on a feminist perspective that revises and broadens its meaning. You have no idea what goes on there. For more information, please see our I will concentrate on two books of short stories by Enriquez, Los peligros de fumar en la cama [The dangers of smoking in bed] (2009) and Things We Lost In the Fire (2016), in order to explain the singularity of her fiction, which we might synthesize in the militant use of the gothic, permeated by feminism and necropolitics. Enriquez: Sure, for example, Under the Black Water was inspired by a true story of police violence. Thats roughly the mechanism of my stories, I get my inspiration from a real life event and then I transform it into something fantastical or supernatural. The protagonists in Enriquezs stories are mostly aware of their privilege, if its a privilege to have a place to live, food to eat, a face thats not grotesquely disfigured. It was like, whats the power that these girls are conjuring?. Or, even better: what makes readers become addicted to her poetics? The body of Emanuel Lpez, the second boy, still hasnt surfaced. Pinats dubious about all this, or wants to be. Arthur Malcolm Dixonis co-founder, lead translator, and Managing Editor ofLatin American Literature Today. Children living on the street, a girl dying on the sidewalk after an illegal abortion, prisoners tortured at a detention center, sit in wait for those who would notice them, making broad daylight just as unnerving as midnight. Then she runs, trying to ignore the agitation of the water that should be able to breathe, or move. At Kenyon Review Young Writers Workshops, talented high school students from around the world join a dynamic and supportive literary community to stretch their talents, discover new strengths, and challenge themselves in the company of peers who are also passionate about writing. Yeah, skip continents, and the tainted roots of horror will still get you. T hough the terms are often used interchangeably, or as a compoundGothic Horrorin their primeval essences Gothic fiction and Horror fiction can be said to have as much to do with each other as classic and modern Country music.Modern Country, like Modern Horror, is a literal, unpretentious genre: we're from the American South, we sing how we talk, and primarily about the subjectsbeer . A DEAD BABY and her haunted great-niece open The Dangers of Smoking in Bed, Mariana Enriquez's collection of disquieting short stories. The evil of that police officer wanting to make the boy try to swim in a polluted river when he knows that hes going to die. Next week, Lovecraft and Henry S. Whitehead explain why you should be more careful about mirrors in The Trap.. Girls can be like bees or like locusts: there's something toxic and delicious and exotic about . The driver makes her walk the last 300 meters; the dead boys lawyer wont come at all. And death, how much is death worth? As it is, the cows head, and the yellowtainted cross and flowers, dont promise a happy relationship, regardless of who worships what. "She dreamed that . Never mind that Pinat has his voice on tape, saying Problem solved. Hey, wait a seconddoes this sound familiar to anyone else? I like dark themes, and I would say that its my way of looking atthings. [3], Reviews of the collection highlighted Enriquez's dark and haunting style. Yamil Corvalns body has already washed up, a kilometer from the bridge. This is a police force tainted by recent history, an aftershock of a violent past. Is fear political? You shouldnt have come, says Father Francisco. A very good Sunday morning talk, suggests Mariana, and sounds like she means it. Silvia was the one who came up with the idea of the quarry pools that summer, and we had to hand it to her, it was a really good idea. So, time to leave her desk and investigate. New York. Eventually, still unable to reach anyone, she tries to find her way to Father Franciscos church. Under the Black Water isnt quite a Shadow Over Innsmouth retelling, but it riffs on the same tune. Why is that a representation youre comfortable with? Its no murga, but a shambling procession. To withdraw your consent, see Your Choices. Hes emaciated, dirty, his hair overgrown and greasy. How many forms of violence run rampant with impunity in the present day? But, it must be said, the men get it tight in her modern gothic short story collection, Things We Lost in the Fire. Personalize your subscription preferences here. Site made in collaboration with CMYK. The truth is that I dont think too much about readers from any part of the world. Support our mission to make literature more exciting, relevant, and inclusive. Also hes very, very drunk. Even more brutal is 'Under the Black Water', a story that blends an investigation into police brutality with the reality of pollution and fear of the unknown. Madness Takes Its Toll: Father Francisco doesnt handle his parishioners new faith well. Shes disturbed by his toothless mouth and sucker-like fingers. Mariana Enriquez: When I was a girl, the first things I read were horror and fantasy. I also draw inspiration from Alan Moore and his idea of evil as a form of social hygiene in the context of inequality and institutionalized violence. Even so, the genre was almost completely pushed to the margins of the canon, considered minor and a colonial imposition. Finn House But we wont die: we will show our scars. The female body no longer disappears; rather, it (over)exposes its anormal materiality as proof of the distinct pedagogies of cruelty (Segato) it has suffered. But the next day, when she tries to call people in the slum, none of her contacts answer. Enriquez seems to imply that the feminine/feminized sixth sense is the only one capable of revealing the invisible (Merleau-Ponty) in a bodily and ideologically disciplined social mass that does not realize that the true horror is within the real: within the self. Just a while ago an English work of Antonio Di Benedetto was recovered. Theyre carrying a bed, with some human effigy lying on it. Enjoy strange, diverting work from The Commuter on Mondays, absorbing fiction from Recommended Reading on Wednesdays, and a roundup of our best work of the week on Fridays. The children born with those defects are, alas, treated more as symbols than characters, or as indications that the river leaches humanity. Translation: Under the Black Water [English] (2017) El chico sucio (2016) also appeared as: Translation: The Dirty Kid [English] (2017) I live between movies, celebrities, music, and theatre. [2] " Spiderweb" appeared in The New Yorker. Kaufman Hall, Room 105 The boy opens the door; she goes in. That is not hyperbole. His life and works were never the same afterthat. Hes tried! But we know that it is there through an inescapable logic, an intense awareness of the world and all its misery. She lives in Edgewood, a Victorian trolley car suburb of Providence, Rhode Island, uncomfortably near Joseph Curwens underground laboratory. She recognizes that little yellow house, so shes not lost. And her gun, of course. 780 Van Vleet Oval Vitcavage: Can you pick one of the stories and explain how you came up with the idea and then how you crafted it into a shortstory? And he says to me, I think its because we dont own the narrative. I remember having a conversation with a friend and saying, 'But you never complain when men are portrayed as corrupt politicians, violent cops, serial killers. What is the relationship like in Argentina between politics and literature? She leaves the church crying and shaking. The immense pleasure of Enriquezs fiction is the conclusiveness of her ambiguity. Does our apathy make us complicit? But, in my opinion, she goes further, developing what we might call a gothic feminism that proclaims the empowerment of women, building upon the sinister, as a process of subjectivization. Enriquez always puts forth the body, be it deformed, mutilated, sexual, etc. Our mission is to amplify the power of storytelling with digital innovation, and to ensure that literature remains a vibrant presence in popular culture by supporting writers, embracing new technologies, and building community to broaden the audience for literature. That being said, the plot that offers the most radical feminist reading is, without a doubt, Things We Lost in the Fire. The motivation behind the story is a series of femicides whose victims are burned with alcohol, which leads a group of burning women to set their own bodies alight, subverting beauty standards and fighting back against the discipline imposed upon their bodies by patriarchal society: they are no longer burnt up by men, but rather by themselves. He came out of the water. [1], "The Intoxicated Years" was published in Granta. Because even if its a long time ago, even if they are trained as a democratic force, theres still a sediment there of that brutality and impunity the power that they used to have over the people that somehow is still there., The collection's translator, Megan McDowell, states so perfectly in an excellent afterword: The horror comes not only from turning our gaze on desperate populations; it comes from realizing the extent of our blindness. This feeds well into Enriquez reply to me when asked why she focusses on the darker side of her country. Augusto Mora is a Mexican comics artist and graphic designer. How do they affect women? She is the author of nine books, including two short story collections, The Dangers of Smoking in Bed and Things We Lost in. I dont write pedagogically. That pause before the inevitable is the space of fabulist fiction, torqueing open the rigid rules of reality to create a gap of possibility. Spoilers ahead. Isolated locals take dubious actions around a nearby body of water, resulting in children born wrong. A new and suspicious religion drives Christianity from the community. These rudderless, narcotically charged delinquents cast dark shadows in the nations flickering light: I walked slowly over to him and tried to imitate the look of hatred in the eyes of the girl in Parque Pereyra. Im still intrigued by the idea of pollution as a messed-up attempt at bindingcontaining, of course, the seeds of its own destruction. Enriquez: Sure, for example, "Under the Black Water" was inspired by a true story of police violence. Fear is one of the most powerful and motivating emotions. The short stories of Argentine author and journalist Mariana Enriquez are seeing machineslenses that throw the uglier side of the human condition into uncomfortably sharp focus. We read and post about several books each month that are suggested by members and selected by popular vote. Author: Mariana Enriquez Author Record # 265086; Legal Name: Enrquez, Mariana? Yamil Corvalns body has already washed up, a kilometer from the bridge. Translation is its own art, of course, and je ne parle pas Espanol, so the story Ive actually read may be as much the work of Megan McDowel as Enriquez. I didnt do it, the cop says. Novel, short story collection, a long investigative non-fiction book? Whats Cyclopean: This is very much a place-as-character story. Except these teenagers are thoroughly unlikeable, and they take teenage callousness and self-centeredness to unusual levels. Normally there are people. Its interesting to me that there can be a certain disdain for whats popular, but I reject that, thats an elitist way of thinking. Other contemporary authors to look for are Leila Guerriero, Samanta Schweblin, Juan Jos Saer, Hernn Ronsino, Liliana Bodoc, Rodrigo Fresn, and Hebe Uhart. "[4] Jennifer Szalai, writing in The New York Times, wrote "[Enriquez] is after a truth more profound, and more disturbing, than whatever the strict dictates of realism will allow. June 17, 2022 . Our Privacy Notice has been updated to explain how we use cookies, which you accept by continuing to use this website. In Under the Black Water, a district attorney pursuing a witness ventures into a slum that even her cab driver wont enter. Either way, its good to read a story with different settings from our usual selection, different points of view, different horrors. Spoilers ahead. I think so, yeah, Enriquez ponders, but what fiction does is slower, lets say In journalism, it's more urgent. And he wants to meet Pinat. They learned how to swim. The time stamp suggests that he at least knew that two young men were thrown into the Ricachuelo River. This type of phenomenaI can find no better word to describe itis ever less frequent in world literature. And when they are left to themselves, because theres a crisis that is quite over their heads and nobodys paying attention to them, god knows what they can do alone., The collections most darkly thrilling story is Under the Black Water, a Lovecraftian tale of two boys tortured by the police and made to cross a polluted river. Hes only been back a little while. [1] "The Intoxicated Years" was published in Granta. And I think thats an effect of CsarAiras literature., Then, after some chit chat and pleasantries (a reference to Dawn of the Dead amongst them), shes off to prepare for some sort of party later in the day, which it seems is being approached in the style of her writing: It's a BBQ basically, but brutal., Things We Lost in the Fire is out now, published by Portobello Books, RRP 12.99. New York, NY: Hogarth Press, 2016. But I think that readers can gather that Argentina is a diverse and unequalsociety. Indeed, one of the most fertile readings that has yet been undertaken of her fiction starts from the gothic, a genre that has garnered a great deal of visibility and critical appreciation in recent decades (i.e. We are delighted to offer a range of residential and online programs to support writers at every stage of their writing journey. And yet Enriquez shifts this interiority outward into a landscape made ghastly by political and economic forces. I felt unpleasant echoes of That Only a Mother, a much-reprinted golden age SF story in which the shocking twist at the end is that the otherwise precocious baby hasnt got any limbs (and, unintentionally, that the society in question hasnt got a clue about prosthetics). A review in The Guardian called the collection "gruesome, violent, upsetting and bright with brilliance. Argentina is a theme and a character in my stories. and our Additionally, the river marks the geographical limit between the city of Buenos Aires and what we call Gran Buenos Aires, or the suburbs. But then, that sort of thing happens a lot in the Villa Moreno slum, and convictions are few. Birthplace: Buenos Aires, Argentina Birthdate: December 1973 . He passes her, gliding toward the church. Here Enriquez creates a terrifying scenario where reality is suspended and the crimes the Argentinean authorities have committed rise up to take revenge. Before she can react, he shoots himself. So we share interests then? Its refreshing to encounter somebody so political and literary who, instead of turning from genre, adopts it to save her work falling into preaching or pamphleteering. On the southern edge of the city, past the Moreno Bridge, the city frays into abandoned buildings and rusted signs. Is this enormous symbolic production around evil a response to economic crises and the implementation of ever-more-savage neoliberal policies? Meanwhile, in his house, the dead man waits dreaming. So what is prisoned under the river? [But] it wasnt about the boys, it was about them, feeding off each other, their energy, and trying to release something. The Villas not empty any more; the drums are passing in front of the church. I want my stories to have an air of familiarity, especially those in a collection or in a book. When I wrote "Our Lady," I was obsessed with teen-age girls and with my own teen-age years. But they project bravery as well as outrage at the awful muck theyve dipped into. political horror like "Under the Black Water, " "El desentierro de la. Ruthanna Emrysis the author of the Innsmouth Legacy series, includingWinter TideandDeep Roots. "The Gothic Feminism of Mariana Enriquez" by Ana Gallego Cu . This seems very different from the American horror trope, which often involves the comeuppance of someone blithely heedless of what lies beneaththe burial ground under the housing development, or the bland cheerleader unsuspecting of the slashers claws. It was like the Furies. Mythos Making: The graffiti on the church includes the name Yog Sothoth amid its seeming gobbledygook. Characters range from social workers to street dwellers to users of dark magic. She leaves the church crying and shaking. [Scheduled] South American: Things We Lost in the Fire, by Mariana Enriquez, "Under the Black Water", Scan this QR code to download the app now. Among the children marked by the black water, she thinks she spots the cop, violating his house arrest. Penguin Random House. The "propulsive and mesmerizing" (The New York Times) story collection by the International Booker-shortlisted author of The Dangers of Smoking in Bed and Our Share of Nightnow with a new short story.The short stories of Mariana Enriquez are: "The most exciting discovery I've made in fiction for some time."Kazuo Ishiguro But then, that sort of thing happens a lot in the Villa Moreno slum, and convictions are few. She also comes from a tradition of Argentinian fabulists, beginning with the revered Jorge Luis Borges.