Breve reseña personal: Selected short stories de Guy de Maupassant (escritor francés, 1850) es una compilación de algunos de los cuentos más conocidos del autor, iniciando, por supuesto, con Bola de sebo, su primera y más importante obra, que apareció en 1880 en la antología que hizo Émile Zola titulada Las veladas de Médan. Es un relato de 'gran corte realista', según su mentor Flaubert (escritor de Madame Bovary).
Gracias
a este relato, Maupassant adquirió renombre y prestigio en el
ambiente literario y fue el género en que más destacó, pues llegó
a escribir más de 300 cuentos y se le iguala con Edgar Allan Poe en
lo referente a los relatos de terror, cuestión por lo que se
convirtió para mí en lectura obligada y que tuve hasta ahora el
placer de interpretar.
A
pesar de que esta colección de cuentos no abunda en la temática de
terror, su narrativa fluida y el manejo cuidadoso que hace del
lenguaje crean atractivas líneas llenas de diversos significados que
en conjunto construyen la atmósfera necesaria para cada relato, en
donde toca temáticas tan diversas como la guerra franco prusiana, la
prostitución, la vida simple de los campesinos normandos, el
adulterio, la muerte, la venganza y los dilemas sentimentales.
El
motivo por el que no retrasé más su lectura fue gracias a que
recientemente descubrí un video titulado 'Ray Bradbury Gives 12 Pieces of Writing Advice to Young Authors' (2001)
debido a mi nueva fijación con él, y
descubrí que el tercer consejo es el siguiente:
Examine
“quality” short stories. He
suggests Roald Dahl,
Guy
de Maupassant, and the lesser-known Nigel Kneale and
John
Collier.
El
video en general es genial y es un must en caso de que les guste
escribir y sean fans (como yo) de Bradbury.
Usualmente
no comento mucho sobre la vida de los autores, pero en el caso de
Maupassant fue algo que contribuyó demasiado para atraerme a su
trabajo, y es que tal como lo dice el prólogo '(...) his writing
greatly reflected his dissatisfaction with the world.' Vivió
presa de la tensión y el agotamiento por fuertes depresiones; tenía
síntomas de demencia hereditarios (Hervé, su hermano menor, muere
por locura en 1889) y sufría de desordenes mentales debido a la
sífilis. Tras varios
intentos de suicidio finalmente, en 1893, muere internado en una
clínica sin haber recobrado el conocimiento y es sepultado en su
país de origen.
Frases
destacadas de los cuentos:
“For
hatred of the foreigner always inspires a few brave men, ready to die
for an ideal.” P. 17
“Sharp
words were even exchanged over trifles.” P. 44
“The
crude violence of nature or man may bring cries of horror or
indignation to our lips, but it does not wring the heart or send the
shiver down the spine, as does the sight of certain heart-rending,
though trivial, incidents.” P. 58
“(...)
painters specialize in absurd mariages. They nearly always marry a
model, who has been somebody else's mistress before (...)” P. 96
“You
ought to read Alphonse Daudet's little book, Artists' Wives –
a gem of a book, so true to life and so cruel.” P. 97
“Who
can say how much the element of cruelty and how much that of
sincerity ever enters into women's actions? (...) They are
passionate, criminal, devoted, heroic or mean, at the bidding of
fleeting emotions, of which they are quite unconsciuos.” P. 97
“He
fell in love with her, as a man always falls in love with any
attractive woman whom he sees a lot of. He imagined he really loved
her. It is a curious phenomenon. As soon as a man wants a woman, he
is geniunely convinced that he will never be able to do without her
for the rest of his natural life. He is fully aware that the same
thing has happened to him before and that, when desire is satisfied,
disgust ensues; he knows that, in order to spend one's whole life
with another human being, it is not the transient passion of the
primitive animal that is needed, but a kinship of soul, temperament
and feeling. He must be able to distinguish, in the midst of the
attraction he feels, whether it is the result of purely physical
factors, a kind of intoxication of the senses, or of the deeper union
of minds.” P.98
“We
felt as though we could perform superhuman feats and fall in love
with the fictious creations of our own poetical imagination; we were
oddly aware of the stirring of strange emotions, longings and
aspiratins.” P. 99
“'If
you marry, I shall kill myself...you understand that.'
“He
shrugged his shoulders:
“'Very
well – kill yourself.'
“'You
say... you say... say that again.'
“He
repeated:
“'Well,
kill yourself, if you want to.'
“She
went on, alarmingly pale:
“'Don't
think I don't mean it; I'll throw myself out of the window.'
“He
began to laugh, went to the window, opEned it and, like a man bowing
a guest out of a room, said politely:
“'This
way – after you!'
“She
stared at him for a moment with the light of madness in her eyes;
then, taking a run as if she were going to jump over a hedge in a
field, she dashed past both of us and, clearing the balcony railing,
disappeared from sight.” P. 102
“(...)
lost in the jungle of life, where all our instincts, our tastes, our
passions are paths to lead us astray (...) with a child's fear of the
dangers of the unknown.” P. 110
“(...)
she couldn't live in the cottage without imagining all day, and
especially all night, that they would all be murdered.” P. 112
“(...)
his heart was torn with the strange physical agony of a man who has
never succeeded in quite forgetting and is living again through the
tortures of the past (...)” P. 117
“(...)
her words tripped over one another, fighting for utterance.” P. 204
“Boredom
had made them irritable.” P. 214
