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The Old Man Who Read Love Stories Paperback – July 14, 1995
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- Print length144 pages
- LanguageEnglish
- PublisherHarperVia
- Publication dateJuly 14, 1995
- Dimensions5.25 x 0.36 x 8 inches
- ISBN-100156002728
- ISBN-13978-0156002721
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From Publishers Weekly
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.
About the Author
Luis Sepúlveda was politically active first as a leader of the student movement and in the Salvador Allende administration in the department of cultural affairs where he was in charge of a series of cheap editions of classics for the general public. He also acted as a mediator between the government and Chilean companies. After the Chilean coup of 1973 which brought to power General Augusto Pinochet he was jailed for two-and-a-half years and then obtained a conditional release through the efforts of the German branch of Amnesty International and was kept under house arrest. He managed to escape and went underground for nearly a year. With the help of a friend who was head of the Alliance française in Valparaíso he set up a drama group that became the first cultural focus of resistance. He was rearrested and given a life sentence (later reduced to twenty-eight years) for treason and subversion. The German section of Amnesty International intervened again and his prison sentence was commuted to eight years of exile, and in 1977 he left Chile to fly to Sweden where he was supposed to teach Spanish literature. At the first stopover in Buenos Aires he escaped and managed to go to Uruguay but since many of his Uruguayan and Argentinian friends were dead or in prison because of the respective dictatorships he went first to São Paulo in Brazil and then to Paraguay. He had to leave again because of the local regime and finally settled in Quito in Ecuador guest of his friend Jorge Enrique Adoum.
He directed the Alliance Française theatre, founded a theatrical company and took part in a UNESCO expedition to assess the impact of colonization on the Shuar Indians. During the expedition he shared the life of the Shuars for seven months and came to an understanding of Latin America as a multicultural and multilingual continent where the Marxism-Leninism he was taught was not applicable to a rural population that was dependent on its surrounding natural environment. He worked in close contact with Indian organizations and drafted the first literacy teaching plan for the Ibambura peasants' federation, in the Andes.
In 1979 he joined the Simón Bolívar international brigade which was fighting in Nicaragua and after the victory of the revolution he started working as a journalist and one year later he left for Europe.He went to Hamburg in Germany because of his admiration of German literature (he learnt the language in prison) especially the romantics as Novalis and Friedrich Hölderlin and worked there as journalist traveling widely in Latin America and Africa.I n 1982 he came in contact with Greenpeace and worked until 1987 as a crewmember on one of their ships. He later acted as co-ordinator between various branches of the organization.
Product details
- Publisher : HarperVia; First edition (July 14, 1995)
- Language : English
- Paperback : 144 pages
- ISBN-10 : 0156002728
- ISBN-13 : 978-0156002721
- Item Weight : 4.3 ounces
- Dimensions : 5.25 x 0.36 x 8 inches
- Best Sellers Rank: #180,513 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1,952 in Contemporary Literature & Fiction
- #11,382 in American Literature (Books)
- #11,511 in Literary Fiction (Books)
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Sepulveda's writing style is very descriptive and captivating, The different character voices had me in awe as they didn't all sound the same. I have never stepped foot in a jungle let alone one in Ecuador.
There are eight chapters total in the book and I'm sure it could be read in under 3 days total. There are very graphic and violent scenes that can be little disturbing throughout the book. There is strong language in this book which expresses a variety of curse words but does not contain any F-bombs. There is also sexual content but mostly expressing the differences in culture.
I do not recommend this book to younger audiences such as under highschool age. But to anyone else I DO recommend to give this book a chance and by the end of the first chapter the real stuff literally had me turning the pages. Sepulveda;s characters are very 3-dimensional espcially the old man.
"It was the most important discovery of his whole life. He could read. He possessed the antidote to the deadly poison of old age. He could read. But he had nothing to read."
After traveling to El Dorado and going through numerous books in the library, Antonio finally comes across a book that keeps his attention.
Sepulveda takes the story further inserting wit, humor, and sarcasm, to explore the issues of a "civilized population" attempt to belittle and force their way of life on unsuspecting natives or the "uncivilized population." Though it is the "uncivilized population" who have mastered and understands what it takes to live in the jungles, it is the "civilized population" who finds themselves inept in surviving the same terrains.
I discovered this wonderful volume when it was mentioned in the foreign film, "My afternoons with Margueritte" which I would also like to recommend.
An engrossing story that conveys some of the ways experience can shape perspective. It touches on cultural and environmental issues and on consciousness, but the story is front and center and the book is hard to put down.
A lot of writing pontiffs say that one should never to open a story with the weather. This is an example of why some rules were made to be broken. If you can write like Sepulveda, open however you please.
Top reviews from other countries

One of the books that has touched me the most. Sepulveda's writing is grounded in deep humanism and humility.
And his humanism is one which embraces the Earth and the consciousness of the natural world.
This book is sadly, so relevant to our off-kilter times. The forests are crying.



