Each of Fonseca's books is not only a worthwhile journey; it is also, in
some way, a necessary one.--Thomas Pynchon
Most widely admired for his short fiction, The Taker and Other Stories
is Fonseca's first collection to appear in English translation, and it
ranges across his oeuvre, exploring the sights and sounds of the modern
landscape of Rio de Janeiro. Rubem Fonseca's Rio is a city at war, a
city whose vast disparities--in wealth, social standing, and
prestige--are untenable. In the stories of The Taker, rich and poor
live in an uneasy equilibrium, where only overwhelming force can
maintain order, and violence and deception are essential tools of
survival.
Whether recounting the story of a businessman who runs over pedestrians
to let off steam, a serial killer being pushed to ever greater crimes by
his bourgeois lover, the desperate poor rushing to butcher a cow that
has been killed in a traffic accident, or a man seeking out confirmation
for a past which his friends deny, Fonseca repeatedly reaffirms his
status as one of the purest storytellers on the contemporary Brazilian
literary scene.
Rubem Fonseca is considered one of Brazil's most influential
writers, and was awarded the Prémio Camões--considered the Nobel Prize
of Portuguese language literature--for his body of work in 2003. That
same year he was awarded the Juan Rulfo Prize.
Clifford E. Landers has translated many of the great writers of
Brazil, including Jorge Amado, João Ubaldo Ribeiro, Patricia Melo, Osman
Lins, and Moacyr Scliar among others. He received the Mario Ferreira
Award in 1999.
