Clara Pastor was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1970 and currently lives in Barcelona. In 2009 she founded Elba Editorial. She is a translator and teaches literature at Esade. She tells us that her language of learning has been English: "I write in Spanish as if I were writing in a language that is not mine, nor have I studied in Spanish, nor have I read much in Spanish." However, the stories of Los buenos vecinos (2020), like now those of Voices at dawn and other stories, are written in perfect Spanish.
But as happens when you know another language well, a distancing is possible that, in the case of Pastor, has allowed him to create this feeling of emptiness, no, of emptiness that his prose has, which allows us to reflect the desolating silence that we hear all along. throughout the book and that expresses the emptiness that is created in the relationship between the characters and at the same time the feelings with intensity and without drama. Nor is there any need to seduce the reader. However, he is seduced by everything that this camera records. This is what he expresses when he tells us (or tells Xavi Ayén in the pages of La Vanguardia): "I'm not interested in autofiction, it's a step down, a lack of effort, you have to add alchemy to what you've experienced."
The four stories can be considered four short novels with no other relationship between them than the unique voice of this alchemist and a series of recurring motifs. The interest in the family, for what there is in them of union and disunity; the houses and their gardens; the effects of light; the birds. In the first story, Voices at Dawn, the narrator is called Elba (yes, the name of Elba Editorial) because her parents spent a few days as newlyweds on the island of Elba. Various types of relationships are established with neighbors or with the family. Elba feels attracted to Raimundo, and in the same way that a bond is established, we witness its dissolution.
Memories are always present. And we witness the appearance and disappearance of the sun, with the well-known lighting effects. Mentions of herons, flamingos or seagulls are frequent. The bicycle revolves around a historical figure, that of Professor Attilio Brilli, author of, among others, The trip to Italy: History of a great cultural tradition (1987), a book published by Elba Editorial and recommended in its day by La Vanguardia . As in the rest of the book, the title can be misleading: the bicycle is anecdotal compared to the relationship with the mother (here with her portrait), with her sister Concetta and, above all, with the protagonist, with her comments on Caravaggio and his painting of the Magdalene and the legend surrounding her as the lover of Jesus. There is talk of a trip never made to Naples and Brilli's senility.
Relationships, feelings and sensations become more intense in The Guest. Among the plants, winter jasmine and camellia stand out. He oppresses us the absence of the trills of the sparrows and memories accompany us. All marked by something that defines the spirit of the book: "the delay of a resolution that did not arrive". In La noche de las tortolas "the love of nature in its purest state" is more present than ever, the need to protect lynxes, the prehistoric flight of storks, the notes of the turtle dove and, especially, turtles . As well as the feeling that "some of the things they loved the most" have been lost.
There is much more that I could say about these Voices at Dawn and their exquisite sensitivity. She leaves it up to the reader.
Clara Pastor. Voices at dawn and other stories. Cliff
144 pages. €13.30
