I worked nights as a phone operator, and it was one of the best jobs I’ve ever had. The money wasn’t good, but it wasn’t awful either, and although the place looked inhospitable—a cramped office on Guardia Vieja, whose only window looked out on an immense gray wall—it was a pleasant place to work: not too cold in winter or too hot in summer.

“For someone who grew up with the Spanish of Chile, reading Carpentier was, to travel to the island of Cuba, but above all it was to travel to the island of Carpentier.”

I saw myself as a deflated yoga ball. I saw myself as a giant snail drooling slime on the floor.

Alejandro Zambra proposes we revisit the work of a literary legend.

Books are still scandalously expensive in Chile. Alejandro Zambra remembers reading the classics as warm bundles of pages from the copy shop.

Alejandro Zambra recalls his first encounter with ‘Madame Bovary.’