The winners [Unknown Binding]

Julio Cortazar (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: 1965

The Argentine writer Julio Cortázar, called by Carlos Fuentes the Simon Bolivar of the Latin American novel, was one of the scintillating geniuses of twentieth-century literature—a writer of sly wit and immense sophistication with a keen eye for character and the workings of social life. The Winners is the story of a luxury cruise, bound for an unknown destination, which runs terribly amok. Funny, frightening, lyrical, and humane, it is a deeply satisfying philosophical novel about crossed lives and wayward love, as well as a brilliant meditation on the myth of the New World.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

Review

I greedily devour all the fabrications, myths, contradictions, and mortal games of the great Cortzar. -- Pablo Neruda

[Cortzar] creates a language and a rhythm and sensuality as mysterious and terrible as Melville's but all in his own voice.... The Winners is a novel of ideas that challenges and disturbs the reader and enlarges one's sense of the intricate single human being. -- William Goyen --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Language Notes

Text: English (translation)
Original Language: Spanish --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Unknown Binding: 374 pages
• Publisher: Pantheon Books; 374p. edition (1965)
• Language: English
• ASIN: B0006BM45W
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Discreet Charm of The Lottery Winners, February 3, 2002

By 

Doug Anderson (Miami Beach, Florida United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: The Winners (New York Review Books) (Paperback)

I read and enjoy Cortazar in the same way I enjoy Luis Bunuel films, in fact I think Bunuel could have made a wonderful film of THE WINNERS. Like Bunuel, Cortazar finds the things we accept as normal to be quite absurd but also like Bunuel he has a certain affection for those he makes fun of. All those on board the Malcolm are guilty of some sort of petty prejudice or limited world view but they all mingle and tolerate one another to a point. When things go absurdly wrong the lottery winners begin to wonder what it is they've actually won. Cortazar is an existential comic. A book which succeeds because it never forgets that despite our differences we are all bound together by our not knowing exactly what is going. With a little help from Cortazar we can see that knowing is just a pretense.
Perhaps the novel like Camus Plague is a parable with many possible levels of meaning. Not the least of which is the political level. After all Cortazar left Argentina under Peron to live and write in exile.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Another Ship of Fools, February 1, 2008

By 

Giordano Bruno - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Winners (New York Review Books) (Paperback)

What to say about this sardonic book that won't sound like an essay from the journal of the Modern Language Association? Yes, it's liminal. Yes, it's Lacanian. Yes, it's an existential comedy. Oy! Poor Julio Cortazar put himself in the sites of all the scholars of pretentious post-modern interpretation - just check out the amazon list of articles and books designed to take the fun out of reading him - and it's just about spoiled his reputation. But The Winners is a wild ride, my friends, an outrageously entertaining book in which a whole zoo of oddball Argentinians wind up together on an ark of satire.

There's an old tradition of books depicting a "ship of fools", from Erasmus to Sebastian Brant to Katherine Porter to Cortazar, and I suspect Erasmus had a classical model. They're all fun; I've never read a ship-of-fools book I didn't like, though I wouldn't mind NOT being a passenger on that ship myself. Reading The Winners reminded me strongly of Herman Melville's most experimental novel, The Confidence Man. None of the critics, so far as I've noticed, draw any connection between Cortazar and Melville. Heads up, PhD grubs! There's a thesis topic for you! Likewise, lovers of reading just for its own sake! I'm giving you two recommendations: The Winners & The Confidence Man. In the climate of the upcoming American elections, books about bunko and deception are bound to be comforting.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Seductive, September 10, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: The Winners (New York Review Books) (Paperback)

To be known, to fit in, to be understood, to see reality, to share that reality and therefore validate it...this would be the ultimate in seductive offers...this must be the search that blinds us all...this may be the epitaph for the human race as we know it. We sought--we failed to find. We came, we never saw, we conquered ourselves. Cortazar manages to not only explore these Dostoevskian themes, but also manages to seduce the reader with his words, into believing they may find themselves answered by this book. Do they? Well, to start things off, have a drink. Then look at the boat on the cover every half hour and decide and re-decide if it APPEARS to be a boat that would float, or if it IS a boat that would float, or if it is a boat at all. Prepare to question your truths and to take a long look at the person in bed beside you. They may not look the same after you read Cortazar.