Montevideo
Report an issue
Tell us what's wrong and we'll take a look.
Thanks – we got it. We'll review and follow up if needed.
The narrator of Montevideo is an itinerant writer and erstwhile drug pusher in the throes of a personal and literary transformation. Increasingly disillusioned with life in Paris and hoping for an artistic breakthrough, he ventures out in search of a "new style." His quest takes him to Barcelona and then to a hotel in Montevideo, Uruguay, called the Cervantes, where seemingly both Julio Cortázar and Adolfo Bioy Casares found inspiration. Montevideo, however, is not the final stop: Bogotá, Reykjavík, New York, and St. Gallen in Switzerland are ahead on the narrator's journey. But to what?
In this brilliant new novel, Enrique Vila-Matas deepens and extends his inquiry into the purposes and functions of fiction: Can the products of the imagination be set on paper, coherently and faithfully? Or is literature forever destined to fall hopelessly short--consigned to be nothing more than an impoverished, inaccurate representation? Moving between cities and genres, from coarse slapstick to insightful criticism, from travelogue to metaphysical speculation, Montevideo is a narrative vortex, a labyrinthine tale of mirrors and illusions.
Enrique Vila-Matas
Enrique Vila-Matas (b. 1948) is an acclaimed Spanish writer, critic, filmmaker, and journalist. He is the author of numerous novels, stories, and essay collections.
Sophie Hughes
Translated by
Sophie Hughes is the translator of over twenty books from Spanish. She has been nominated for the International Booker Prize four times, and in 2021 she won the Queen Sofia Spanish Institute Translation Prize. Her work has featured in the New York Times, The Paris Review, the Guardian, Granta, frieze and The White Review.
Annie McDermott
Translated by
Annie McDermott is the translator of a dozen books from Spanish and Portuguese, by such writers as Mario Levrero, Ariana Harwicz, Brenda Lozano, Fernanda Trías and Lídia Jorge. She was awarded the Premio Valle-Inclán for her translation of Wars of the Interior by Joseph Zárate, and her translation of Brickmakers by Selva Almada was shortlisted for the Warwick Prize for Women in Translation. In 2024 her translation of Selva Almada's novel Not a River was shortlisted for the International Booker Prize. She has previously lived in Mexico City and São Paulo, and is now based in Hastings in the UK.
Why Readwise Books?
Readwise Books is an ebook & audiobook platform that automatically logs how much you and your friends read, making it fun and easy to read more. Learn more →