Esther Tusquets, a great Spanish writer, died on July 23 at the age of 76. I feel like a horrible person because when I heard the sad news, the first thing that crossed my mind was, “God, now she will not be able to write any more books.”
I highly recommend Tusquets’s first and most famous novel The Same Sea as Every Summer. I first read this novel for an undergrad course at the age of 24.
“What a stupid novel,” I thought. “None of this makes any sense.”
When I reread the novel this year, I finally managed to glimpse what it was all about. The novel was written when Tusquets was 42, and the mature female sexuality that imbues its every page is not something that a 24-year-old woman can even begin to comprehend. What I find really funny is that the professor who assigned the novel was male. Since male sexuality develops in a different direction (has a different vector? Would that be a correct way of putting it?) than female sexuality, it probably never occurred to him that his all-female seminar of 20-year-olds was simply not physiologically equipped to understand the novel.
Here is just a random quote from the novel to give you an idea:
The howl that can unhinge the universe, that’s powerful.
R.I.P., Esther Tusquets.
P.S. Why are so many writers dying this summer? Carlos Fuentes, Hector Tizon, Ray Bradbury, now Tusquets. This is making me very sad.
Clarissa's Blog 
Add Gore Vidal to the list. I have not read him; he is one of numerous authors that I have promised myself to read but not yet begun.
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” I have not read him; he is one of numerous authors that I have promised myself to read but not yet begun.”
– Same here.
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There is a long discussion on Feministe and I wanted to ask your opinion, thinking you may be interested. The Feministe discussion and my question are not about the original question to Dear Prudie, but whether Juliette has a moral obligation to disclose.
Donna L in the 3rd comment presents her view of “No”, I think “Absolutely Yes”. What do you think?
http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2012/07/31/bad-advice-should-i-tell-my-cousins-boyfriend-that-she-was-assigned-male-at-birth/#comments
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Yes, I saw the thread. First of all, I believe that the relative is a freak who needs to go get a life of their own yesterday. I know that’s not what you are asking but I need to get it out of my system. 🙂 🙂 Intrusive relatives are a big issue with me.
What bothered me in the OP is the idea that “I don’t have the right to know.” Maybe the author of the OP doesn’t have that right. I do. I have the right to know absolutely anything I want about my partner if he wants me to be serious about the entire thing. But we are just talking about my partner, not every other person I meet.
Now, back to whether J. has an obligation to disclose. If it’s a casual, unimportant relationship, I can understand not sharing. I never mentioned either autism or my divorce (which, admittedly, are very different from gender reassignment) to casual dates. But if Juliette wants an actual relationship with this person, she will have to disclose. The main reason to be in a permanent, long-term relationship is that you can achieve this growing feeling of intimacy with another human being. That’s a very priceless thing. And you can’t avoid being honest and sharing the most personal details of your life because that is kind of the entire point. It takes time, of course. Years, sometimes. I just shared something that I never told to anybody on the planet with N. It took me 5 years to do it and I couldn’t have done it any earlier.
So Juliette will be forced to disclose not by any moral obligation but by her desire to have a profound relationship, if and when that desire comes to her.
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So Juliette will be forced to disclose not by any moral obligation but by her desire to have a profound relationship, if and when that desire comes to her.
That is exactly how I feel about this. Her not telling me wouldn’t be a betrayal or anything of the sort, just an indication that the relationship never achieved a truly deep connection.
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I am in the first few pages of The Same Sea As Every Summer, and I find that a little goes a long way. The level of thick description makes me want to put it down for a bit “to digest”. I like what I have read so far, but am not in a hurry to read 50 pages at a go. The translation is published by Univ. Nebraska, I believe, as part of their series of European women writers in translation.
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I’m really excited to hear that you are reading it! This is definitely not a book to be gulped down for the plot. The beauty of the language deserves to be enjoyed little by little.
If you have any comments as you go along, feel free to share!
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