Augusto Monterroso Bonilla (December 21, 1921 – February 8, 2003) was a Honduran writer who adopted

Guatemala Guatemala, officially the Republic of Guatemala, is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico, to the northeast by Belize, to the east by Honduras, and to the southeast by El Salvador. It is hydrologically b ...

n nationality, known for the ironical and humorous style of his

short stories A short story is a piece of prose fiction. It can typically be read in a single sitting and focuses on a self-contained incident or series of linked incidents, with the intent of evoking a single effect or mood. The short story is one of the old ...

. He is considered an important figure in the Latin American " Boom" generation, and received several awards, including the Prince of Asturias Award in Literature (2000),

Miguel Ángel Asturias National Prize in Literature --> Miguel is a given name and surname, the Portuguese and Spanish form of the Hebrew name Michael. It may refer to: Places * Pedro Miguel, a parish in the municipality of Horta and the island of Faial in the Azores Islands *São Miguel (disamb ...

(1997), and Juan Rulfo Award (1996). Monterroso was a member of the Honduran Academy of Language.

Life

Monterroso was born in

Tegucigalpa Tegucigalpa ( )—formally Tegucigalpa, Municipality of the Central District ( or ''Tegucigalpa, M.D.C.''), and colloquially referred to as ''Tegus'' or ''Teguz''—is the capital and largest city of Honduras along with its sister city, Comaya ...

Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Ocean at the Gulf of Fonseca, ...

, to a Honduran mother and Guatemalan father. In 1936 his family settled definitively in

Guatemala City Guatemala City (, also known colloquially by the nickname Guate), is the Capital city, national capital and largest city of the Guatemala, Republic of Guatemala. It is also the Municipalities of Guatemala, municipal capital of the Guatemala Depa ...

, where he would remain until early adulthood. Here he published his first short stories and began his clandestine work against the dictatorship of

Jorge Ubico Jorge Ubico Castañeda (10 November 1878 – 14 June 1946), nicknamed Number Five or also Central America's Napoleon, was a Guatemalan military officer, politician, and dictator who served as the president of Guatemala from 1931 to 1944. A ge ...

. To this end he founded the newspaper ''El Espectador'' with a group of other writers. He was detained and exiled to

Mexico City Mexico City is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Mexico, largest city of Mexico, as well as the List of North American cities by population, most populous city in North America. It is one of the most important cultural and finan ...

in 1944 for his opposition to the dictatorial regime. Shortly after his arrival in Mexico, the revolutionary government of Jacobo Arbenz triumphed in Guatemala, and Monterroso was assigned to a minor post in the Guatemalan embassy in Mexico. In 1953 he moved briefly to

Bolivia Bolivia, officially the Plurinational State of Bolivia, is a landlocked country located in central South America. The country features diverse geography, including vast Amazonian plains, tropical lowlands, mountains, the Gran Chaco Province, w ...

upon being named Guatemalan

consul Consul (abbrev. ''cos.''; Latin plural ''consules'') was the title of one of the two chief magistrates of the Roman Republic, and subsequently also an important title under the Roman Empire. The title was used in other European city-states thro ...

La Paz La Paz, officially Nuestra Señora de La Paz (Aymara language, Aymara: Chuqi Yapu ), is the seat of government of the Bolivia, Plurinational State of Bolivia. With 755,732 residents as of 2024, La Paz is the List of Bolivian cities by populati ...

. He relocated to

Santiago de Chile Santiago (, ; ), also known as Santiago de Chile (), is the capital city, capital and largest city of Chile and one of the largest cities in the Americas. It is located in the country's Chilean Central Valley, central valley and is the center ...

in 1954, when Arbenz's government was toppled with help and intervention of the United States of America. In 1956 he returned definitively to Mexico City, where he would occupy various academic and editorial posts and continue his work as a writer for the rest of his life. In 1988, Augusto Monterroso received the highest honor the Mexican government can bestow on foreign dignitaries, the Águila Azteca. He was also awarded the

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many countries in the Americas **Spanish cuisine **Spanish history **Spanish culture ...

Prince of Asturias Award The Princess of Asturias Awards (, ), formerly the Prince of Asturias Awards from 1981 to 2014 (), are a series of annual prizes awarded in Spain by the Princess of Asturias Foundation (previously the Prince of Asturias Foundation) to individuals ...

, in 2000. In 1997, Monterroso was awarded the Guatemala National Prize in Literature for his body of work. He died of

heart failure Heart failure (HF), also known as congestive heart failure (CHF), is a syndrome caused by an impairment in the heart's ability to Cardiac cycle, fill with and pump blood. Although symptoms vary based on which side of the heart is affected, HF ...

at the age of 81 on February 8th, 2003, in

."Recordando a Augusto Monterroso"
''Proceso'', 11 February 2003.

Work

Although Monterroso limited himself almost exclusively to the short story form, he is widely considered a central figure in the

Latin American Boom The Latin American Boom () was a literary movement of the 1960s and 1970s when the work of a group of relatively young Latin American novelists became widely circulated in Europe and throughout the world. The Boom is most closely associated with ...

, a movement centered on the work of a group of young Latin American novelists. He is recognized alongside such canonical authors as

Julio Cortázar Julio Florencio Cortázar (26 August 1914 – 12 February 1984; ) was an Argentine and naturalised French novelist, short story writer, poet, essayist, and translator. Known as one of the founders of the Latin American Boom, Cortázar influenc ...

Carlos Fuentes Carlos Fuentes Macías (; ; November 11, 1928 – May 15, 2012) was a Mexican novelist and essayist. Among his works are ''The Death of Artemio Cruz'' (1962), '' Aura'' (1962), '' Terra Nostra'' (1975), '' The Old Gringo'' (1985) and '' Christop ...

Juan Rulfo Juan Nepomuceno Carlos Pérez Rulfo Vizcaíno, best known as Juan Rulfo (; 16 May 1917 – 7 January 1986), was a Mexican writer, screenwriter, and photographer. He is best known for two literary works, the 1955 novel ''Pedro Páramo'', and the ...

and

Gabriel García Márquez Gabriel José García Márquez (; 6 March 1927 – 17 April 2014) was a Colombian writer and journalist, known affectionately as Gabo () or Gabito () throughout Latin America. Considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th centur ...

. Save for ''Lo demás es silencio'' ("The Rest is Silence"), his foray into the form of the novel, Monterroso only published short pieces. He worked throughout his career to perfect the short story form, often delving into analogous genres (most famously the

fable Fable is a literary genre defined as a succinct fictional story, in prose or verse, that features animals, legendary creatures, plants, inanimate objects, or forces of nature that are anthropomorphized, and that illustrates or leads to a parti ...

) for stylistic and thematic inspiration. Even ''Lo demás es silencio'', however, largely eschews the traditional novelistic form, opting instead for the loose aggregation of various apocryphal short texts (newspaper clippings, testimonials, diary entries, poems) to sketch the "biography" of its fictional main character. Monterroso also was known for popularizing short stories and was the author of what is often credited to be one of the world's shortest stories, "El Dinosaurio" ("The Dinosaur"), published in ''Obras completas (Y otros cuentos)''. The story reads, in its entirety: : ''Cuando despertó, el dinosaurio todavía estaba allí.'' : ("When he awoke, the dinosaur was still there.")

wrote of Monterroso (referring specifically to ''The Black Sheep and Other Fables''): "Imagine

Borges Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo ( ; ; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986) was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator regarded as a key figure in Spanish-language and international literature. His best-known w ...

' fantastical bestiary having tea with

Alice Alice may refer to: * Alice (name), most often a feminine given name, but also used as a surname Literature * Alice (''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland''), a character in books by Lewis Carroll * ''Alice'' series, children's and teen books by ...

. Imagine

Jonathan Swift Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish writer, essayist, satirist, and Anglican cleric. In 1713, he became the Dean (Christianity), dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin, and was given the sobriquet "Dean Swi ...

and

James Thurber James Grover Thurber (December 8, 1894 – November 2, 1961) was an American cartoonist, writer, humorist, journalist, and playwright. He was best known for his gag cartoon, cartoons and short stories, published mainly in ''The New Yorker'' an ...

exchanging notes. Imagine a frog from Calaveras County who has seriously read

Mark Twain Samuel Langhorne Clemens (November 30, 1835 – April 21, 1910), known by the pen name Mark Twain, was an American writer, humorist, and essayist. He was praised as the "greatest humorist the United States has produced," with William Fau ...

. Meet Monterroso."

Bibliography

*''Obras completas (y otros cuentos)'', 1959. **''Complete Works (and Other Stories'') *''La oveja negra y demás fábulas'', 1969. ** ''The Black Sheep and Other Fables'', trans. Walter I. Bradbury (Doubleday, 1971) ** ''The Black Sheep and Other Fables'', trans. Rupert Glasgow and Philip Jenkins (Tadworth: Acorn, 2005. ) *''Movimiento perpetuo'', 1972. ** ''Perpetual Motion'' *''Lo demás es silencio'', 1978. **''The Rest Is Silence'', trans. Aaron Kerner (New York Review Books, 2024) *''Viaje al centro de la fábula'', 1981. *''La palabra mágica'', 1983. *''La letra e (Fragmentos de un diario)'', 1987. *''Esa fauna'', 1992. drawings. *''Los buscadores de oro'', 1993. **''The Gold Seekers'', trans. Jessica Sequeira (Sublunary Editions, 2023) *''La vaca'', 1998. *''Pájaros de Hispanoamérica'', 2002. *''Literatura y vida'', 2004.

Compilations in English

* ''Complete Works and Other Stories'', trans.

Edith Grossman Edith Marion Grossman (née Dorph; March 22, 1936 – September 4, 2023) was an American literary translator. Known for her work translating Latin American literature, Latin American and Spanish literature to English, she translated the works o ...

; University of Texas Press, 1995. ** Includes both ''Complete Works (and Other Stories)'' as well as ''Perpetual Motion''

References

External links