Complete Works and Other Stories

January 2, 1995
These clever stories from an author born in Honduras of Guatemalan and Honduran heritage offer one surprise after another, although, as with many collections, readers may come to anticipate the surprise. "Mister Taylor" is a Boston native who travels to the Amazon and begins exporting shrunken heads back home, inspiring huge demand. Brother Bartolom Arrazola tries to use his scientific knowledge to escape from Indian sacrifice, not realizing that Mayans are more than knowledgeable about such things, in "The Eclipse." The brevity of these stories is often a surprise in itself. "The Dinosaur" consists of a single sentence, and "Perpetual Motion 1981" is not much longer; it is a Mobius strip of a story that lives up to its title. "Flies" introduces an obsession with flies that permeates the second half of the book, comparing the insects with the punishing Eumenides and Furies. And throughout the collection, Monterroso writes about the process of writing-most successfully in "Leopoldo (His Labors)," a story about a hapless writer that includes the hilarious journal he hopes to use for inspiration ("Tuesday the 12th Today I got up early but nothing happened to me"). Writers aren't supposed to write about writing, and probably someone has decided that stories should be longer than eight words. Or that flies are not fit for discussion. Monterroso's work is a welcome reminder of the futility of preconceptions.

January 1, 1996
Born in Honduras in 1921 and residing in Mexico since 1944, this talented essayist/fabulist/aphorist/ enjoys flouting genre constraints. His knack is for creating ordinary/unusual characters like the American headhunter in the Amazon jungle who exports shrunken heads back to the United States, or the first lady of a Latin American country who rushes around like a lunatic giving poetry readings. His world is one where poetry can impoverish even the richest spirit, the belts with which drunken men beat their wives are made especially for that purpose, the habit of reading books is diminished by the acquisitive habit of buying books, and flies, along with love and death, are the third great theme of life. "The essay about the story about the poem about life is perpetual motion," he philosophizes, and the perpetual motion of his prose selection here is rich in Saki-like irony, the peeling away of veneer, insight, and compassion. Recommended for larger public libraries.--Jack Shreve, Allegany Community Coll., Cumberland, Md.