This documentary casts a gaze on the writer
Roberto Bolaño and his relation with Chile.
Its narrative structure takes a detour on its way to Chile
through Mexico and Catalunya
It invites us to disentangle some of the puzzles that made up
his life and his literature,
drawing us into his universe
through an exploration of his forms,
his nonchalant attitude
and a literary proposal that eludes clasification.
Finding a thread from which to pull
is one of the recurring games laid out
in the work of this writer, always shifting but never distant.
The Future Battle Chile
Rodrigo Fresan Journalist, writer, friend
Ignacio Echevarria Literary critic, friend
Alvaro Bisama Writer
Poli Delano Writer and friend in Mexico
Jorge Herralde Publisher, friend
Everything that begins as comedy inevitably ends as comedy.
The Savage Detectives
Leon Bolaño Father of Roberto
Victoria Abalos Mother of Roberto
Guillermo Bravo Neighbour and friend
Jovana Skarmeta Agenda for Bolaño at Anagrama Chile.
Beatriz Berger Journalist
The privileged sunsets of Los Angeles
Los Angeles full of low houses and dirt roads.
The city where Lebert and Carcamo
always walked together
and where the tolerant Cardenas
was class rep at the men's school
designed by some aide of the devil.
Jorge Lebert. Schoolmate.
Carlos Carcamo. Schoolmate
Everything that starts as comedy ends as a cryptographic exercise.
The Savage Detectives
I must ask Frau Else for a bigger table
or two small ones, to set up the game.
Just thinking of the possibilities of my new opening strategy
and all the various outcomes
makes me want to get the game out right now and test it
But I won't.
The Third Reich
Everything that starts as comedy ends as tragedy.
The Savage Detectives.
Jaime Quezada. Friend, writer
Ximena Bolaño. Cousin
Go figure. Mauricio Silva, aka The Eye,
always tried to escape violence
even at risk of being seen as a coward.
But true violence is inescapable.
At least for us, who were born in Latin America in the fifties.
For us who were round about 20 when Allende died.
To a large extent, all I have written
is a love letter, or a goodbye note to my own generation.
To those born in the fifties and who at some point chose
to be a militia, or rather, militants, and who gave as little, or as much,
we had to give that is, our youth, to a cause which
we thought was the most generous of all causes. Except it wasn't.
My routine consisted of getting up early,
having breakfast with my mother, father, and sister,
pretending to go to school,
then catching a bus to the center of the city,
where I would devote the first part of my morning
to books and walking around,
and the second part to movies and, more surreptitiously, to sex.
The Grub. Last Evenings on Earth
Rodrigo Quijada Lawyer, writer, Chilean exile in Mexico
Daniuska Gonzalez Professor, researcher
Ramon Mendez Infrarrealist.
Carmen Boullosa Writer, literary friend
I accosted him and asked who he was.
He said I'm Ulises Lima, real, visceralist poet.
Second to last real, visceralist remaining poet in Mexico.
What can be said about the drowning Barcelona twilights.
City of slipstreams and completely gratuitous secrets.
City of genuflections and cords.
Twilight in Barcelona. The Romantic Dogs.
Marta Matas Close friend from Blanes
Victoria Avalos Mother of Roberto
Back then, I’d reached the age of twenty and I was crazy.
I’d lost a country but won a dream.
As long as I had that dream nothing else mattered.
Not working, not praying not studying in morning light
alongside the romantic dogs.
//And the dream lived . in the void of my spirit.
A wooden bedroom, cloaked in half-light,
deep in the lungs of the tropics.
And sometimes I’d retreat . inside myself
and visit the dream: a statue eternalized
in liquid thoughts, a white worm writhing in love.
//A runaway love. A dream within another dream.
And the nightmare telling me: you will grow up.
You’ll leave behind the images of pain and of the labyrinth
and you’ll forget.
But back then, growing up would have been a crime.
I’m here, I said, with the romantic dogs
and here I’m going to stay.
The Romantic Dogs
Alexandra Edwards Former chief editor Paula magazine
The phone rang, and I got out of bed to pick it up.
A female voice asked me if I'd like to travel to Chile.
I said yes immediately.
I don't know what I was thinking.
Perhaps I was making love.
Yes, now I know. That's what it was.
Fragments from Un regreso al pais natal.
Cristian Warnken. Journalist and TV host.
Gonzalo Contreras. Novelist of Chile's New Narrative
Malala Planeta Publishing
Marcial Cortés-Monroy. Friend.
Everything that begins as comedy
ends as a dirge in the void.
The Savage Detectives.
Roberto Bolaño would die in Barcelona on 15 July 2003 at the age of fifty.
On 18 June 2011 a street is named after him
in the Spanish city of Gerona, Catalonya.
Patti Smith Singer, poet, fervent admirer of Bolaño
They asked Bolaño in 2003 what advice he could give
to a starting writer, and he replied:
I'd advise them to live. To live and be happy.
Years later, he made a precision:
Live a lot, read a lot, and fuck a lot.
Echevarria found a hand-written note by Bolaño
titled For the epigraph to 2666:
That's all, folks. I did it all, lived it all.
If I was strong enough I would cry.
This is good bye from yours truly, Arturo Belano.
For my father Daniel -painter- and my father Hernan -poet-
who fly around freely, turned into stardust.
And to my mother.