Wanted: reviewer for Aira

GhostsAira

We’re looking someone to review Three Novels by César Aira, for gorse online. If interested, please get in touch: info[at]gorse[dot]ie.

From BOMB‘s 2009 interview with Aira:

Before I was published, when I was a kid, I was surrounded by people who considered me a great writer. They insisted that I publish and they introduced me to publishers, things that I would sabotage because I was already very satisfied with my consecration — I might publish a book somewhere and they’d see that it wasn’t as good as they had thought. I think I have traces exclusively of Osvaldo [Lamborghini] because of the relationship that we had, his personality, and our difference in age. All this is still very present for me. A lot of times I think, “What would Osvaldo say about this?” And at times I write against him, because it’s not a question of staying loyal to ghosts. The other day I was thinking about him because I went by the corner of Córdoba and Pueyrredón, where there used to be a little bar called Tobas. It was in that little bar that the two of us first met one-on-one—I was 22 or 23 years old at the time — and I ordered myself a gin and tonic, I don’t know why because I never drank alcohol and I have no tolerance for drinking. I probably wanted to look interesting. Osvaldo was drinking coffee. Later, in all our years of friendship, he would remember thinking at that moment, “This guy is one of my people.” I remember one time — I still hadn’t published anything — he said to me, “You’re a great writer.” Then another day he decided to be more specific and he said, “You’re a great writer, but not like these writers, more like Thomas Mann or Borges.