Writer Eduardo Sacheri, who rose to prominence when his work
La pregunta de sus ojos was made it into a Oscar-winning film by Juan José
Campanella (The Secret in Their Eyes), added another feather to his
cap as he claimed the 19th edition of the Alfaguara Prize for his novel La
noche de la usina.
Sacheri’s novel was chosen from among 707 entries. The
Alfaguara Prize, one of the most important distinctions in the Spanish-language
literature award, is endowed with a US$175,000 cash prize and ensures the
winning novel’s publication in Spain, Latin America and the US.
Cited by the jury for its agile, emotive tone, La noche de
la usina, set in a small town in the Buenos Aires Province during the 2001
socioeconomic crisis, is a novel about “dignified, good losers,” in Sacheri’s
own words. The losers in question are a bunch of victims of a financial scam
who decide to take revenge collectively. The novel’s vindictive nature
straddles the line between thriller and western. “These are ordinary guys
fighting it out for their lives, for a dream which, seen from the outside, may
seem rather ridiculous for their reaction,” Sacheri said.
Sacheri is the fourth Argentine writer to take the Alfaguara
Prize, which was announced through a video conference between Madrid, Mexico
and Buenos Aires, where the writer was waiting for the jury’s verdict.
“I like to write about credible characters, and I must
confess that I am fond of good people. I think that the characters in this
novel are dignified, good losers; good losers, now and then, try to overcome
their problems. This is at the core of this novel: a bunch of guys roughing it
out and trying to make it through bad times, dreaming of better times to come,”
Sacheri said after the announcement of his win.
“(The action) takes place in 2001 and 2004, and although
some people want to see political references (in the novel), this is not my intention,
because I feel that it’s the people rather than the governments who carry a
story forward. I don’t believe in Promethean governments but rather in the
people who work,” Sacheri said.
Asked about which aspects of his life made their way into
the novel, Sacheri said that, “The narrative core of this novel is long after
the 2001 crisis.” However, he admitted that there’s always an emotional motive
in his writing.
“In 2001, I was just on my way to becoming a published
writer, I was a fulltime history teacher, I faced huge problems, my children
were small, and I was concerned about how I would be able to provide for my
family. I remember holding my one-year-old daughter in my arms, thinking how to
get escape financial insecurity,” he said.
“I think some of my own doubts and longings are reflected in
the characters, but this is not a political novel, I do not seek to shape a
metaphor or make references that may be likened to my own personal situation,”
he continued.
La noche de la usina is set in an imaginary town called
O’Connor, and the protagonists are the owner of a bankrupt gas station; his
son, a college student; a railroad station manager; two workers from a factory
that went out of business; and the manager of the Road Board, which has also
shut down.
“My 2008 novel Aráoz y la verdad is set in an imaginary town
in the district of Villegas. I described several characters and their stories,
and they became very endearing to me. I told myself that I would one day return
to that town, and I did with La noche de la usina. (The western Greater BA
district of) Castelar, where I grew up, was more akin to a small town than
Buenos Aires, the capital. (Castelar) is very close to me from an emotional and
intellectual standpoint.
“It is often the case, when I talk with readers from small
towns or cities, that they identify deeply with narrow perspectives, the ones I
like best. In fact, I still live 10 blocks off from where I was born. That’s
where I live and that’s where I will die, I imagine,” Sacheri said.
What best describes Sacheri, perhaps, is the Tweet he posted
yesterday: “As humans, we must almost always face defeat, but what defines us
is the way we confront it.”
And how do Sacheri’s characters react to defeat? “They stand
together, they make a lot of mistakes related to their own foibles. But they do
stand together and try to help each other, they are honest people. Deep inside,
this is what they have in common, and I think this is what dignity is about:
fighting it out with valid weapons,” Sacheri said.
“When confronted with extreme situations your deepest traits
emerge. Horrible things may come up, but also (such things as) intelligence,
hatred, thirst for revenge and solidarity, all mixed up. Passion is what
defines us, but also brains, and we use our brains to keep passion in check. I
do not celebrate passion, I count on it, but the question is what we do with
it, we may become monsters, we are capable of inflicting ferocious damage on
those around us.”
Source: The Buenos Aires Herald
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