Now, with the permission of her publisher, Tusquets, Prensa Ibérica reproduces the part she told at the request of the journalist through her newspapers. the beginning of one of the greatest literary eventsand editorials in editions of books in 20th century Spain.
In this conversation, Beatriz de Moura recounted what she said to her when she announced that she was interested in becoming the editor of her Czech teacher. At one point in that first conversation she asked him, “But what did you really read about my work?” A love was born, which the Tusquets publishing house did better, and also the geography of literature was translated into Spanish. Milan Kundera is dead. Here is a testimony that brings him to life.
Excerpt from ‘For an enjoyable read’
In 1984, Toni and I answered a phone call and went to Paris. milan kundera in response to a letter in which I offer to publish his work if he likes the accompanying catalogue. We heard you just left your old publishing house in Spain. And it turned out. Regardless, I’m excited about this high-risk operation. As a reader, and as with all things, I had heard quite a few stories about Kundera. he was a very careful man about translations and that you are not always happy with them. I read The Joke in French when it came out in France, I think in 1969, and luckily, I also read it in Spanish later, because the book dazzled me. At that time, he had also read ‘Life is elsewhere’. only in spanish.
Kundera immediately placed me in a third degree. I roughly remember how that exaggerated conversation took place between the Czech author and his hypothetical theory about a possible translation from Czech to Spanish. future Spanish editorHe is of Brazilian origin, communicating in the still very scholarly French, debating which translation seems more valid: Czech to Spanish or Czech to French. Reproducing it thirty years later is not only completely false, but somehow betrays the truth. In fact, I just remember that at one point in that conversation—he’s not immune from some laughter for how crazy it got—Kundera interrupted him and asked me frankly: “But what do you really think about my work? Read it?”.
Luckily, I was able to answer him, somewhat embarrassed, by saying that I had only read two of his books, but the Spanish translation of ‘La joke’ continued, simply inserting a random page from one version and the other. it was already closer to the original Czech. I took a big risk because I had never seen the original Czech version of not only Joke but any other book.
Kundera went into the next room where Vera was still speaking to Toni in French, apparently very animated.
Q. Did Toni speak French?
R. Yes, he even said he was thinking in French. There was a French Mademoiselle who taught French to eleven brothers.
Q. But what happened next?
R. Toni, always a gentleman, came to the room that served as an office to Milan at the time, where we would both await the outcome of the couple’s Czech conversation. He scolded me for my impudence, which sometimes happens to me, and I was sure Milan would no longer give us the rights to the Spanish edition.
The truth is, after a while they both walked in smiling. Its end is already known to half the world.
Q. But what a load of work it has given you.
R. Yes, what a pleasure, isn’t it? Vera asked if we could write something like a small comparative study of translations into three languages I know well: Italian, Spanish, and French. It was like going back to school. In return, I asked them not to give this novel to anyone until they made a decision. She said she would sign a “little ticket” for me out of respect for this deal. I said it would take fifteen days. I remember the “small ticket” offer very clearly but probably neither he gave it nor we asked for it because I couldn’t find it anywhere. It will wander lost among mountains of letters and papers, still in a furniture warehouse until further notice.
I did that short but very comprehensive study. I wonder where it went too. by the way i talked Fernando de ValenzuelaYour usual translator from Czech to Spanish; He told me he knew Kundera when he was in Czechoslovakia. and if I could show him the confirmation of my theory—even if it was partially confirmed—he would be eternally grateful. It was. And starting with ‘The Joke’, Kundera’s books originally written in Czech have always been translated into Spanish by Fernando de Valenzuela.
P. There was an excellent relationship between you.
I don’t know if it’s perfect, but over time it becomes a friendly relationship.
S. Kundara’s conversation with Carlos Fuentes, Julio Cortázar and Gabo in Prague is well known…
A. In 1968, during the brief period of the famous Prague Spring, Milan apparently met and befriended Julio Cortázar and Carlos Fuentes. They seem to have had a great time in that hopeful Prague, which will soon be occupied by Soviet tanks. Perhaps with the advice of this and other friends, he sent his newly written novel ‘The Joke’ to the famous French publishing house Gallimard, which would publish it the following year.
At the time, Fuentes was the Mexican ambassador in Paris. No wonder today’s popular legend says that it was Charles who smuggled this novel from Czechoslovakia and delivered it to its current owner and publisher’s father, Claude Gallimard, who was also its publisher.
P. Kundera exposed you to a third degree, you told him the truth but he was also interested in your catalog, right? Did you mention the catalog?
R. That’s what prompted him to call us. He told me on the phone that he found some friends in him, like Ionesco, a friend of Beckett’s. I told him that I wanted to meet another Romanian, Emil Cioran. But that’s another date.
We have reached S. Kundera. Now I want you to talk about your relationship with Marguerite Duras. In your text for the latest Tusquets catalogue, you talk about the delicious dinner you had, about his character, about his departure from Lindon…
R. Yes, quite the character. He has not left an editorial by Jéròme Lindon, to whom he has always remained faithful, along with that of the Gallimards. Only sometimes, especially after ‘The Last Love’, he made them compete for their books, sometimes for economic reasons and sometimes for strategic reasons, but he never broke up with someone or was angry at someone for getting angry, it was always mutual. agreement between its editors, his and her.
Q. But there was one case you mentioned, and that was that Lindon didn’t like that he objected to publishing his novel ‘North China Lover’, a sort of sequel to ‘The Lover’.
R. He didn’t like it because at the time, after the huge success of ‘The Lover’, this kind of ‘continuation’ seemed to Lindon above all opportunistic. Lindon was an editor very much like Duras, an elderly person who was quite sick and lagging behind in many things. It seems to me that what happened to them was that they got impatient and their arch-rival Gallimard was victorious. Things like this happened in those days…
Q. I had a success back then and I believed that…
R. And Duras believed it didn’t matter because they were going to publish whatever he did. It was.
Q. How did you come to Marguerite Duras?
R. As your reader, in the sixties. In those years, Lindon created a very attractive catalog of writers who founded a new literary movement known as the ‘Nouveau Roman’, something Barral wanted to emulate with Novísimos in the seventies, but it didn’t. it was good and above all very durable. I must admit that at that time Duras dazzled me from the very first moment, and the rest of the ‘Nouveau Roman’ i found it so boring
Regarding this whole story with Marguerite Duras, I have to say that despite our discussions about the ‘Nouveau Roman’, my relationship with Lindon has been wonderful my entire life.. He got fed up and ate He admitted to me that the Spaniards are more encouraging.and he always quoted Cervantes. “Oh, sinous avionseu en Cenvantes!” The truth is, for years I stopped reading Durras and any author of the ‘Nouveau Roman’.
In the early eighties I found a very small book on Duras published by Lindon in a bookstore in Paris. It would be nearly fifteen years since I read anything from him! It was “The Man Sitting in the Hallway”. A masterpiece, a gem! It was a book with a brutal erotic scene, extraordinarily narrated in that language, that abrupt and concise rhythm, that distorted language, and that little dramatic narrative. A very short, loosely published story.
Wow, where would it fit, I thought to myself, because I was already walking with the Andanzas collection.