El mundo de afuera

AUTHOR: Jorge Franco
PUBLISHER: Santillana Ediciones
GENRE: Literary Fiction
READER’S NAME: Julia Shirek Smith
DATE: 13 April 2015

El mundo de afuera begins with a Colombian Army bulletin dated 9 August 1971 tersely informing the public that Señor Diego Echavarría Misas of Medellín has been abducted by three armed criminals.

The scene is set, and for a moment the reader wonders whether the literary market really needs yet another sensational crime story. It soon becomes apparent, however, that Jorge Franco has used the details of this real-life kidnapping (carefully researched by the author) not for their shock value but as framework for a marvelously imaginative work of fiction about the lives of those involved in the event. Skillfully managed flashbacks and parallel stories present a fascinating collection of characters, some invented, some drawn from real life. The major ones (and indeed, many of the minor) have desires and dreams at odds with the realities of the outside world, hence the title.

Don Diego, the kidnap victim, is a wealthy industrialist who prefers Europe to Latin America, adores Wagner and scorns Colombian poets. He comes home from Paris with his German beloved, Dita, and builds her a replica of a 17th century French castle, which rises arrogantly above the hustle and bustle of daily life in Medellín.

 The couple’s daughter, Isolda, sheltered from that hustle and bustle, carries on a make-believe life in the castle’s lush gardens. As a child, she befriends mythical rabbit-like creatures, who adorn her hair with flowers; as a teenager, she dons a stolen red miniskirt and performs solo rock-and-roll shows in a wooded grove.

Spying on Isolda as she spins her fantasies is Mono, an aging Mama’s boy from the slums. Obsessed by love for this inaccessible princess, he hides in a tree on the castle grounds and reads poetry as he patiently waits for her to appear. Mono resolves to kidnap Isolda, but she dies suddenly, and he abducts her father instead. Bewildered when the victim’s family won’t pay the ransom, and unable to control his bumbling cohorts, he escapes into drink and an affair with a neighborhood boy. The young lover talks Mono into the purchase of a pricey motorcycle, which depletes the kidnap gang’s cash supply. Not surprising that things do not turn out well.

El mundo de afuera is the product of a sure and experienced hand: Colombian Jorge Franco has published six other novels, several of them prize winners. He does not burden the reader with tricks and flourishes of style that might obfuscate the various narrative strands—the prose is straightforward, yet polished. Dialogue abounds, and believable dialogue it is. There are just enough “colombianisms” to lend authenticity to the characters’ speech. Nor does he overburden the reader with the cruelty and violence inherent in a story about a major crime: El mundo de afuera has many comic moments. The reader laughs when the kidnap gang’s only female member, Twiggy, painstakingly applies eye makeup before heading out to burglarize a house, or when Isolda’s stern governess, Hedda, neglects her charge as she indulges erotic fantasies about the lover left behind in Germany.

The author studied cinematography before he took up writing, which may explain why his narrative shifts back and forth in time and place so painlessly: one minute the reader is in a 1950s Berlin opera house; the next, in a sleazy beer joint in 1960s Medellín. This very visual text would make a fine film.

El mundo de afuera well deserved Spain’s Premio Alfaguara, the prestigious literary prize it won in 2014. The reader has given the book a 9.5 rather than a 10 only because Mono’s obsessive love for Isolda is not always convincing; its origins and nature are never fully clarified.

This absorbing and beautifully crafted tale should definitely be made available in English. Many North Americans are already familiar with two of Franco’s novels,

Paraíso Travel and Rosario Tijeras, which have been translated and have been made into successful films.

 

A competent translator with a good ear for dialogue could turn out a lively English-language version. The text does not pose any major cultural problems for a US audience. Explanatory notes would be needed for a few plant names, some talk about Colombian politics, and references to national poet Julio Flórez. 

Sign up to our newsletter: