How Do You Get Rid Of A Blocked Nose

Hatier pocket publishes an anthology of News Traven, the mysterious writer whose biographies are unreliable. These stories are drawn from everyday life with the Mexican people in small towns like Mexico.

In these stories, the setting is quite realistic but stripped. "Indians" are simple people, sometimes harsh, filled with common sense. The character of "gringo" White takes his relief by maladjustment to life and manners in Mexico. Some stories are told in third person, others to the first singular. The themes are varied. The first is to describe the daily life of Mexican people: housing, food, trade, and then the strange links between man and animal. Then Traven explores aspects unexpected: matriarchy, religion, industrialization, relations with local power, repression.

Overall, the look of Traven on Mexican society is mixed with respect and distance. Traven uses his critical faculties but never condemns the Mexicans. It does make central government and the "gringos" in charge. Such as Mr. Winthrop, of New York philanthropist argues that the Mexicans out of their misery by speculating on the artistic value of their handicrafts. He plays more candid while making all the necessary calculations to ensure his personal fortune, except that the Mexican he tries to exploit him, is really a simple man. Also, when he dangled the pesos per thousand, the look of the craftsman is lost ... he does not know what these big numbers. Winthrop and his company humanist can go back. Other news is almost allegories, like "Buy a donkey" and "Melancholy of St. Anthony" for example.

I'm not sure Traven is well translated, and then his tongue should be rather poor, syntax rather flat. The narrative is punctuated by action, not by style. However, few new read voraciously. They are here presented with a toolkit rather well done, for college students and their teachers.


80 pages + 50 pages of record, al. College Hatier Paperback - 4 €
Bibliography: Golo is the author of a bio-comic entitled Traven, Portrait of a famous anonymous published in 2007 in Futuropolis