Javier Marías (1951–2022)
Author of A Heart So White
About the Author
Javier Marias, a literary phenomenon worldwide, is still in the process of being discovered in America. Among his awards are the Premio Ciudad de Barcelona, The Spanish Critics' Award, the Prix L'Oeil et la Lettre, the Premio Mondello, the Premio Internacional de Novela Romulo Gallegos, the Prix show more Femina Etranger, the Nelly-Sachs Prize, and the Dublin International IMPAC Award. He is also King Xavier I of Redonda. show less
Series
Works by Javier Marías
Donde todo ha sucedido. Al salir del cine (Contemporanea) (Spanish Edition) (2005) 24 copies, 1 review
Tema do homem, O 1 copy
Tres novelas esenciales (estuche edición limitada): (estuche con: Todas las almas | Corazón tan blaco | Mañana en la… (2023) 1 copy
La zona fantasma, 2020 1 copy
La zona fantasma 1 copy
Sale caractère 1 copy
Marias Javier 1 copy
Schöne Ferien — Contributor — 1 copy
Yarınki Yüzün 1 copy
Ástir 1 copy
Opaka narav 1 copy
Sve duše 1 copy
Crna leđa vremena 1 copy
NJE ZEMER KAQ E BARDHE 1 copy
Un epigramma di lealtà 1 copy
Sutra s boju misli na mene 1 copy
Associated Works
The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman (1759) — Translator, some editions — 7,850 copies, 119 reviews
Lost Classics: Writers on Books Loved and Lost, Overlooked, Under-read, Unavailable, Stolen, Extinct, or Otherwise Out… (2000) — Afterword — 304 copies, 5 reviews
McSweeney's Issue 42 (McSweeney's Quarterly Concern): Multiples (2013) — Contributor — 64 copies, 2 reviews
A Thousand Forests in One Acorn: An Anthology of Spanish-Language Fiction (2014) — Contributor — 47 copies
The Origins of Desire: Modern Spanish Short Stories (Modern European Short Stories) (1993) — Contributor — 14 copies
Lecciones y maestros: II Cita internacional de la literatura en español — Contributor — 1 copy
Over X-jes, de zandloper en de herenbobbel. Een handleiding tot de kunsten voor Maarten Asscher (1998) — Contributor — 1 copy
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Legal name
- Marías Franco, Javier
- Birthdate
- 1951-09-20
- Date of death
- 2022-09-11
- Gender
- male
- Nationality
- Spain
- Birthplace
- Madrid, Spain
- Place of death
- Madrid, Spain
- Cause of death
- pneumonia
- Places of residence
- Madrid, Spain
Barcelona, Spain
Boston, Massachusetts, USA
New Haven, Connecticut, USA
Oxford, Oxfordshire, England, UK
Venice, Italy - Education
- Complutense University of Madrid
- Occupations
- professor
writer
novelist
translator
columnist - Relationships
- Marías, Julián (parent)
Franco, Jesús (uncle)
Marías, Fernando (sibling)
Marías, Miguel (sibling) - Organizations
- Royal Spanish Academy
- Awards and honors
- Nelly Sachs Prize (1997)
Premio Herralde de Novela (1986)
Nonino Prize (2011)
Austrian State Prize for European Literature (2011)
King of Redondo (as Xavier I, 1997) - Agent
- Alfaguara
Members
Reviews
It seems that I was in just the mood for an atmospheric, circuitous novel this evening. 'All Souls' concerns a Spanish scholar visiting Oxford, who observes college life and absorbs himself in an affair with a married woman. More specifically, he ruminates on memory, mortality, loneliness, and the strange malaise of academia. I found the writing really beautiful, somewhat akin to that of José Saramago. Like Saramago, Marías indulges in long sentences and paragraphs that take you inside the narrator’s mind with impressive efficacy. The non-linear structure of the novel added to its evocative nature; it felt like a true chain of recollections, in which one anecdote reminds you of another that is emotionally but not temporally adjacent. At times these recollections were very funny, at others moving and profound, but always impeccably constructed.
I took 'All Souls' out of the library with a view to comparing my own postgraduate Cambridge experience to its account of The Other Place. The grotesque portrait of dining at High Table is barely an exaggeration. I have definitely experienced a enthusiastic, Halliwell-esque lecture on someone’s very specific research interest whilst I ate two courses and nodded politely. I also identify with the periodic concern that too much solitary research is turning you into an over-obsessed mad person - in the narrator’s case, through his identification with Gawsworth. I am far too junior to take part in the academic gossip-mongering, though.
There are too many wonderful passages in the book for me to pick a definite favourite. Nonetheless, here is a lovely quote I happened upon:
Overall, I found this novel gorgeously well-written and involving. I am inclined to read more by Marías. Actually, I have the nagging suspicion that I read his first 'Your Face Tomorrow' novel years ago, when I was a teenager. Even if that is the case, I’d probably appreciate it much more now.… (more)
I took 'All Souls' out of the library with a view to comparing my own postgraduate Cambridge experience to its account of The Other Place. The grotesque portrait of dining at High Table is barely an exaggeration. I have definitely experienced a enthusiastic, Halliwell-esque lecture on someone’s very specific research interest whilst I ate two courses and nodded politely. I also identify with the periodic concern that too much solitary research is turning you into an over-obsessed mad person - in the narrator’s case, through his identification with Gawsworth. I am far too junior to take part in the academic gossip-mongering, though.
There are too many wonderful passages in the book for me to pick a definite favourite. Nonetheless, here is a lovely quote I happened upon:
Everything that happens to us, everything that we say or hear, everything we see with our own eyes or we articulate with our tongue, everything that enters through our ears, everything we are witness to (and for which we are therefore partly responsible) must find a recipient outside ourselves and we choose that recipient according to what happens or what we are told or even according to what we ourselves day. Each thing must be told to someone - though not necessarily always to the same person - and each thing will undergo a selection process, the way someone out shopping one afternoon might scrutinise, set aside, and assess presents for the season to come.
Overall, I found this novel gorgeously well-written and involving. I am inclined to read more by Marías. Actually, I have the nagging suspicion that I read his first 'Your Face Tomorrow' novel years ago, when I was a teenager. Even if that is the case, I’d probably appreciate it much more now.… (more)
This is really a philosophical novel, maybe even a love story, in the framework of an espionage novel. Tomas Nevinson, Spanish but able to pass for British, spent many years undercover in England for MI6 after being recruited at Oxford. He is bicultural, as Javier Marias himself has been described. Now retired from that life for a decade and in the employ of the British embassy in Madrid, he is called upon again by his manipulative former handler, Bertram Tupra.
One of three women in a town in Northwest Spain is a former terrorist, affiliated with both the IRA and Spanish terror group ETA. Nevinson moves to the town, posing as a teacher, until he can identify, then kill, the correct woman.
He’s reluctant to do what’s necessary, and is having difficulty finding out which one is the true terrorist, although he has his suspicions. If he doesn’t identify one suspect Tupra has threatened to have all three women killed.
There’s a moral and psychological complexity to Nevinson, his mission and to this novel in general. Right, wrong and the shady areas between the two are all well represented. A satisfying and hefty story.… (more)
One of three women in a town in Northwest Spain is a former terrorist, affiliated with both the IRA and Spanish terror group ETA. Nevinson moves to the town, posing as a teacher, until he can identify, then kill, the correct woman.
He’s reluctant to do what’s necessary, and is having difficulty finding out which one is the true terrorist, although he has his suspicions. If he doesn’t identify one suspect Tupra has threatened to have all three women killed.
There’s a moral and psychological complexity to Nevinson, his mission and to this novel in general. Right, wrong and the shady areas between the two are all well represented. A satisfying and hefty story.… (more)
This short novel starts with an opera singer looking back on a train journey with strangers four years ago. It's not until the very end the reader finds out more about what led him to think about the past just now. And for a lot of the book, it feels like men are talking about a woman who's only barely a presence in the book herself. I don''t think I really got into the story at any point, but as the description made me curious, I'm glad I've read this now.
Lists
Awards
You May Also Like
Associated Authors
Statistics
- Works
- 119
- Also by
- 14
- Members
- 11,882
- Popularity
- #1,978
- Rating
- 3.8
- Reviews
- 380
- ISBNs
- 732
- Languages
- 24
- Favorited
- 51
Indeed, I did find this novel dragged on somewhat frustratingly. I’d previously read [b:All Souls|1655608|All Souls|Javier Marías|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1330711132s/1655608.jpg|1650254], which I’m pretty sure is also from the perspective of Deza. In that, Marías used his formidable writing talents to satirise Oxford academic life and I greatly enjoyed it. ‘You Face Tomorrow: Fever and Spear’ reminded me less of [b:All Souls|1655608|All Souls|Javier Marías|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1330711132s/1655608.jpg|1650254] and more of Sebald’s [b:Austerlitz|88442|Austerlitz|W.G. Sebald|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1327920142s/88442.jpg|2193696] or [b:The Rings of Saturn|434903|The Rings of Saturn|W.G. Sebald|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1386921954s/434903.jpg|17952027], with their winding diffusiveness. Yet Sebald grounds the reader in a sense of place, whereas Marías allows the narrative to float along in a series of conversations and anecdotes. It’s elegantly done and at times deeply profound, yet neither what I was expecting nor what I hoped for. Moreover, the book ended in the most abrupt, disconcerting manner, just as something threatened to occur. Is this intended to encourage the reader to pick up the sequel? I must say, I’m not really inclined to, as either it will either be more of the same, which I am content to do without, or will grow a plot and thus fit poorly with this first instalment. I wonder if this book was a thought experiment - what if someone was supernaturally good at reading people, but did not care in the least about what he found out? The answer is: he would spend a lot of time listening to old men ramble about their pasts.… (more)