The Mirror of Lida Sal: Tales Based on Mayan Myths and Guatemalan Legends (Discoveries (Latin American Literary Review Pr))
The Nobel prize-winning Guatemalan writer, ethnologist, and diplomat Asturias (1899-1974) is known to English-language readers pirmarily for his brilliant political novel El se?or presidente (1946), translated as The President (LJ 2/1/64), and a subsequent novel, Hombres de maiz (Men of Maize, LJ 8/75). Yet this prolific surrealist writer, considered the progenitor of magical realism, clearly deserves more recognition. Thus, it is a pleasure to see this present collection of ten stories, which interweave Mayan and other early Guatemalan folk myths about confronting harsh reality into tales that transcend jungle and city, space and time, waking and sleeping. Alter-Gilbert's translation has captured the power of Asturias's complex language of hallucination and violence. Highly recommended for academic and larger public libraries.?Mary Margaret Benson, Linfield Coll. Lib., McMinnville, Ore.Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.