Staff Pick
Writing at his most caustic, acerbic best, Castellanos Moya's Revulsion: Thomas Bernhard in San Salvador is an unrelenting polemical screed against El Salvador — one which led the author's mother to receive phone calls threatening his murder. An "imitation novel" written in the style of Austrian author Thomas Bernhard (who composed a similar text condemning Salzburg), Revulsion was composed "with the pleasure of diatribe and darkness."
Set over two hours in a Salvadoran bar, Edgardo Vega (a Montreal-based art history professor returning to his native land to settle the affairs of his late mother after an 18-year absence from the country) unleashes a torrent of biting and reproachful commentary to Moya, a former friend/acquaintance from his school days long past. Berating El Salvador, its politicians, culture, cuisine, universities, newspapers, soccer, and even his own brother, sister-in-law, and nephews, Vega's implacable disgust at all things Salvadoran oozes out in a venomous, vitriolic effusion.
Written as a single paragraph, Castellanos Moya's novel is as rich in black, mordant humor as either Senselessness or The She-Devil in the Mirror were in their paranoia and mania. In Between Parentheses, Bolaño writes admiringly of Castellanos Moya (whose books he was recommended by both Rey Rosa and Villoro, and with whom he later "kept up an irregular and melancholy correspondence"), opining about Revulsion thus: "Herein lies one of the book's many virtues: nationalists can't abide it. Its acid humor, like a Buster Keaton movie or a time bomb, threatens the hormonal stability of the idiots who, upon reading it, feel an irresistible urge to string the author upon in the town square. Truly, I know of no greater honor for a real writer."
In the author's note that concludes the book, Castellanos Moya notes, "With Revulsion, a fact was reconfirmed: thanks to their work, some writers earn money, others obtain fame, and some writers only make enemies...like a stigma, the little imitation novel and its aftermath pursue me." Best read in a single sitting to indulge the ranting invective in all of its uninterrupted and visceral glory, Revulsion is, at once, literary homage, political/cultural harangue, exemplification of storytelling's inherent power, and a damn fine, entertaining novel. Castellanos Moya's fiction, never ever well-suited for those in need of enlivening, hums with frenetic energy; a foreboding din both jarring and ruthless. Recommended By Jeremy G., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
An expatriate professor, Vega, returns from exile in Canada to El Salvador for his mother's funeral. A sensitive idealist and an aggrieved motor mouth, he sits at a bar with the author, Castellanos Moya, from five to seven in the evening, telling his tale and ranting against everything his country has to offer. Written in a single paragraph and alive with a fury as astringent as the wrath of Thomas Bernhard, Revulsion was first published in 1997 and earned its author death threats. Roberto Bolano called Revulsion Castellanos Moya's darkest book and perhaps his best: "A parody of certain works by Bernhard and the kind of book that makes you laugh out loud."