Completed: The Savage Detectives

The Savage Detectives [Los detectives salvajes]
Roberto Bolaño
1998
Natasha Wimmer, translator
2007

I feel I am a poor reader really, a bad reader. I read for plot, for the story—not so bad except I read quickly, skipping over lines, sentences, words, going back because I lost the strand of meaning. Shakespeare corrects me in this; I cannot go so fast, a forced lesson in close reading, in slowing down. I do not know what makes some books great, why they are praised. I enjoy books, I am predisposed to enjoy them, always expecting  to enjoy them, so I am not bothered, usually, by the “great” books or “difficult” books; they are books, I will like them, and then I will move on.

Sometimes I think I am becoming a better reader. I read recently a book, one I should have enjoyed, would have enjoyed in the past, but I couldn’t, not thoroughly, I couldn’t let go and engage myself in its world, its place, I could only see the flaws, the errors. So perhaps I am becoming a better reader. But I still don’t know what makes books great, what makes a story grab ahold of me so it won’t let go, so I can’t escape it. I don’t know why I can read one of these books and feel like I’ve been struck by a bus, left dazed, why it is so satisfying and overwhelming and engaging, why I can’t let it go, no, why it won’t let me escape, its talons firmly grasp me. I sense these books, feel them; I don’t apply to them a critical criteria that tells me “this is great.” It simply is. But this is bad criteria, emotional criteria. It has no logic, no reason. Yet I know it must be so, the great books won’t let me go, they trap me, they engage me.

I can’t say why The Savage Detectives is so. It doesn’t seem to engage me as does Dante, Dante whose Divine Comedy I could not escape for weeks, a month (more?). It is a crash, a daze. Maybe I am wrong, maybe I will not escape it. I cannot explain it, no more than I could understand in those early days of reading it (so long ago, it took me nearly two months to read, slowly, interrupted by other books, lesser books, books I could rush through, not this one, it must be savored) why it is so beloved, so adored. It was good, well-written, that I could see, yes. But I didn’t like it. Perhaps I still don’t. I’m not sure. I find it depressing. Too realistic perhaps, but then I remember that there are many stories here, not everyone has the same ending, some are good: I remember Xóchitl. So not bad, realistic, and I’m not sure realistic is good right now. And I see all this, that I’m not sure about it, not sure I like it, yet it is good, I am sure of that, but I can’t say why. I can’t point to a passage and say, “See, here, the writing, isn’t it wonderful, lovely?” I can’t discuss technique, or theme. I just know that the critical appreciation seems right, that perhaps I love it even if I don’t like it.

This is why I keep reading, why I keep pushing myself. I know there must be a reason, a way to articulate the appreciation I have for some books, but not others. I can look at some already and show why they don’t work, but I cannot invert it. I just know but knowing is not convincing, is not knowledge.

But what is The Savage Detectives? I have more questions than answers as I finish it, perhaps that is a mark of its merit, but only when well done. It is well named, it seems to me, the title of the book, the titles of its three parts, all well chosen. The characters, so many that populate its pages, all savages in some way, youths at first, growing, searching—everyone searching for something—and so perhaps it touches us all because we are all searching. (Perhaps this is why I find it depressing.) It is a tale spread over time and space, not a linear narrative, the reader must divine the plot, the line of the story. The narration—so many narrators!—is always first person, often unreliable. Always unreliable? Can we any of us ever tell the tale accurately, or is it always colored by ourselves, our hopes, our dreams, our experiences, our bruisings? So there are more questions than answers, the structure, the end, the endings all hang in question. Do I read it badly, is there more there, how much do I miss?

I originally intended to read this for Richard’s and Rise’s readalong in January, but time escaped me, as it has so often this year. Thank you, however, to Richard and Rise for inspiring me to actually read this!