Reclining Woman Reading, 1939
A bongo (canoe) navigates the Arauca River
bordering the ravines on the right bank.”
Rómulo Gallegos/Doña Bárbara (1929)
It is a seduction.
A secret invitation to retreat to a silent corner, a soft sofa, a recliner, bed.
The magic begins with a gaze, from which it is impossible to detach yourself. Then intriguing, inspiring words, flow…
The world as we know it disappears and we succumb to the abyss, the one that, according to Nietzsche, stares back at you.
I hope I don’t disappoint you.
These captivating lovers I am referring to are the first paragraphs of good novels.
Before them, I surrender.
So please allow me to leave you with a collage of some of those irresistible authors that you already know but that are always a pleasure to reread.
“In a village of La Mancha, the name of which I purposely omit, there lived not long ago, one of those gentlemen, who usually keep a lance upon a rack, an old target, a lean horse, and a greyhound for coursing.”
Miguel de Cervantes / Don Quixote (1605)
“Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.”
Gabriel García Márquez/One Hundred Years of Solitude (1966)
“Stately, plump Buck Mulligan came from the stairhead, bearing a bowl of lather on which a razor and a mirror lay crossed.”
James Joyce/Ulysses (1922)
And with this old “lover,” I retire to my reading chair, in front of the fireplace, with a glass of Port.
Good night!
Leonor Henríquez (Caracas, Venezuela) Civil Engineer by training (UCAB 1985), writer and apprentice poet by vocation. From her time in engineering emerged her Office Stories (1997), another way of seeing the corporate world. Her latest publications include reflections on grief, Hopecrumbs (2020) (www.hopecrumbs.com) and “The Adventures of Chispita” (2021) (www.chispita.ca) an allegory of life inside Mom’s belly.
Today she shares her “impulsive meditations” from Calgary, Canada, where she lives.
leonorcanada@gmail.com