Quim Monzó, O´Clock, New York: Ballantine Books, 1986. Traducció de Mary Ann Newman. 

Amazon, gràcies a una d’aquestes utilitats web que tenen la seva gràcia, ens permet fullejar quatre pàgines de la, coneixent-la suposo que excel·lent, traducció de Mary Ann Newman del mític recull Olivetti, Moulinex, Chaffoteaux et Maury (Cuaderns Crema, 1980) de Quim Monzó. Per cert, impagable la fotografia de jovencell de la contraportada…  

Tot i saber que el canvi de títol obeeix a primàriament pràctiques raons comercials, trobo que no hi ha forma millor de definir la simple, neta i ajustadíssima prosa de Monzó. O’CLOCK és un títol perfecte, perfecte com cada una de les línies que escriu el pioner i importador de la short-story americana a al literatura catalana.

Quin millor regal per aquestes festes per als vostres amics/parelles/amics invisibles de parla anglesa que aquest llibret de 15 dòlars? Voleu comprar O’CLOCK?

I us deixo amb el què en el seu dia escriví Oliver Conan al The New York Times.

“Oppressive boredom and a terror lurking at the heart of everyday routine grip the perverse, disaffected characters in these tales by the gifted young Catalan writer Quim Monzó. In “North of South,” a man about to marry anticipates “the hair in the sink, the stockings on the sofa, the unsought advice, the visits to all the wrinkled relatives,” and then, typically, imagines “the all-too-frequent hand wrapped around the knife.”

 In “Cacophony” the very idea of routine existence, as embodied ín traffic lights, provokes in the protagonist “the insane desire to drive the wrong way up Balmes” (a Barcelona thoroughfare) simply to “shatter the opaque mírror of routine.” Mr. Monzó has read Kafka, as the plethora of alienated protagonists known only by their initials attests, and draws as well on the rich tradition of Spanish surrealism both for his deliberately paranoiac sense of the menace in apparently ordinary things — there is an exploding typewriter and an electric razor that grows fangs — and to sustain the intermittently lyrical, visionary quality of his imagination.

One could wish for more by way of real conversation; Mr. Monzó’s people don’t converse, they interrupt each other’s monologues. The stories can be derivative and sensationalist: “To Choose”, about a motiveless murder à la André Gide, manages to be both. Most of the stories are imaginative and wítty in what may well be a dry, Catalonian kind of way, but none provide profound revelation of character. Precedence is given instead to some obligatory narrative trickiness and a studied depravity. The English translation is clear, idiomatic and lively throughout.

Oliver Conan al The New York Times“