The Obscene Bird of Night: A Novel

José Donoso

David R. Godine Publisher, 1973 - Fiction - 438 pages

THIS HAUNTING MASTERPIECE of a novel has been hailed as "a masterpiece" by Luis Bunuel and "one of the great novels not only of Spanish America, but of our time" by Carlos Fuentes. The story of the last member of the aristocratic Azcoitia family, a monster deliberately surrounded by other freaks to protect him from the knowledge of his deformity, The Obscene Bird of Night is a triumph of imaginative visionary writing. Among the first examples of the "magic realism" emanating from South America, its luxuriance, fecundity, horror, and energy will not soon fade from the reader's mind.

Contents

• Section 1: 8
• Section 2: 51
• Section 3: 63
• Section 4: 99
• Section 5: 102
• Section 6: 130
• Section 7: 177
• Section 8: 230
• Section 9: 284
• Section 10: 305
• Section 11: 338
• Section 12: 364
• Section 13: 372
• Section 14: 434

About the author

Donoso obsessive subject is the decay of the Chilean bourgeoisie, but he vigorously rejects anything reminiscent of traditional realism or the portrayal of regional customs. In This Sunday (1966), he focuses on a family's activities on Sundays in order to view the boredom, passions, and misery of Chilean bourgeois society and its servants. The Obscene Bird of Night (1970) deals with the decline of feudal society through the story of a landholding family in a kaleidoscopic vision of decay and outrageous behavior.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The Obscene Bird of Night: A Novel; Volume 5 of Verba Mundi
• Author: José Donoso
• Translated by: Hardie St. Martin, Leonard Mades
• Edition: reprint
• Publisher: David R. Godine Publisher, 1973
• ISBN: 1567920462, 9781567920468
• Length: 438 pages
• Subjects: Fiction / General; Fiction / Literary