Ariel DorfmanRezensionen

It dragged on.

This is a very well written book with many themes, not all of which are totally completed in this very long book. There are many characters and many people with similar names. I did not take the time to know the details about everyone, as I read this mainly for Dorfman's ideas. His care for all humans was refreshing and very evident. His intelligence and knowledge of what best to do with a variety of people was also humbling. The very sad part of this book is how close we may be today to living in an autocracy, where our constitution will have no weight.½

interesting book. definitely one of my favourite works off cultural studies I 've seen. written in an anti imperialist context it looks at how Disney comics uphold bourgeois ideas about where wealth comes from, for example,that support capitalist ideas in children. notably,Disney's treatment of indigenous populations is shown to be horrifying and completely support white saviour myths and romantic ideas of colonialism. also talked about is how Disney restricts childhood imagination to consumption and money,and the peculiar lack of women and mothers. it sometimes overeggs it a bit and could have done with more detail about the comic form particularly but it's definitely a fascinating work of cultural analysis that may not be essential or completely empirical but is a truly revolutionary look at media that's useful for anyone trying to make sense of media themselves

The authors do an excellent job of revealing the ideology baked into Disney comics and arguing why it's objectionable. The perspective of a South American reader is very interesting; it must have been incredibly galling to be lectured by these ducks embodying the limited and cruel worldview of the very people meddling with your country at that moment.

They keep a lively sense of fun throughout what would otherwise have been a bit of a slog. Ridicule is an entirely appropriate response to being bombarded by the kind of messaging represented by the Donald Duck comics.

Con La Nana y el iceberg asistimos a una deslumbrante combinación de aventura, erotismo, suspense y humor desde ese Chile postPinochet marcado explosivamente por la historia. Un relato en el que la violencia y la represión actúan en forma de ecos de fondo...

I'll forgive Dorfman the cliched expressions and the bits of purple prose because he's led an admirable life yet he's not afraid to show himself at his most embarrassing (e.g. the story involving Sting). Fascinating reading.

Publicado en 1972, durante el gobierno de Allende en Chile, supone una obra clave en la literatura política de esa década. Descrito por sus autores como un “manual de desconolización”, Para leer al pato Donald es un análisis sobre la literatura de masas publicada por Walt Disney en Latinoamérica. El libro muestra de qué manera las historietas del pato Donald inducen en los niños una clara ideología de clase dominante en la que se enseña que no se puede luchar contra el orden establecido. En las aventuras protagonizadas por el Tío Rico, Donald y sus sobrinitos todo intercambio humano toma la forma mercantil y la solidaridad entre iguales desaparece, solo existe la competencia. En la incesante y codiciosa búsqueda de oro, a menudo se encuentran con pueblos salvajes y primitivos, los cuales son manipulados por los patos para hacerse con su tesoro, y todos tan felices. El saqueo imperialista y la sumisión colonial no aparecen en su carácter como tales. El consumismo o el menosprecio machista son algunos de los valores que pululan por el mundo Disney, y la violencia simbólica que encontramos en sus viñetas conducen a interpretaciones ideológicas muy concretas.

interview dorfman: https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/fiction-this-week-ariel-dorfman-2015...
story itself: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/11/02/the-gospel-according-to-garcia

"Disney expulsa lo productivo y lo histórico de su mundo, tal como el imperialismo ha prohibido lo productivo y lo histórico en el mundo del subdesarrollo. Disney construye su fantasía imitando subconscientemente el modo en que el sistema capitalista mundial construyó la realidad y tal como desea seguir armándola".

In his introduction to the Fourth Edition of How to Read Donald Duck: Imperialist Ideology in the Disney Comic, Ariel Dorfman explains the continued importance of he and Armand Mattelart’s original analysis from 1971, “Only an America that bathes over and over in this false innocence, this myth of exceptionalism and natural God-given goodness destined to rule the earth, could have produced a Trump victory and only a recognition of how that innocence is malevolent and blinding can address the causes of that triumph as well as Trump’s amazing hold upon those who adhere to his policies, personality and philosophy (if I dare use the latter term in proximity of such an unlettered and unthoughtful member of our species)” (pg. x). Summarizing the work, translator David Kunzle writes, “The value of their work lies in the light it throws not so much upon a particular group of comics, or even a particular cultural entrepreneur, but on the way in which capitalist and imperialist values are supported by its culture. And the very simplicity of the comic has enabled the authors to make simply visible a very complicated process” (pg. 2). Kunzle further explains, “The system of domination which the U.S. culture imposes so disastrously abroad, also has deleterious effects at home, not least among those who work for Disney, that is, those who produce his ideology. The circumstances in which Disney products are made ensure that his employees reproduce in their lives and work relations the same system of exploitation to which they, as well as the consumer, are subject” (pg. 5).

Dorfman and Mattelart address the possible opposition to their analysis, writing, “There is the implication that politics cannot enter into areas of ‘pure entertainment,’ especially those designed for children of tender years” (pg. 28). They outline the nature of the children’s culture industry, writing, “Adults create for themselves a childhood embodying their own angelical aspirations, which offer consolation, hope, and a guarantee of a ‘better,’ but unchanging, future. This ‘new reality,’ this autonomous realm of magic, is artfully isolated from the reality of the everyday. Adult values are projected onto the child, as if childhood was a special domain where these values could be protected uncritically” (pg. 31). Further, “Mass culture has opened up a whole range of new issues. While it certainly has had a leveling effect and has exposed a wider audience to a broader range of themes, it has simultaneously generated a cultural elite which has cut itself off more and more from the masses” (pg. 32).

Discussing how childhood becomes the site for imperialism, Dorfman and Mattelart write, “The comics, elaborated by and for the narcissistic parent, adopt a view of the child-reader which is the same as their view of the inferior Third World adult. If this be so, our noble savages differs from the other children in that he is not a carbon copy aggregate of paternal, adult values” (pg. 55). Dordman and Mattelart continue, “When something is said about the child/noble savage, it is really the Third World one is thinking about. The hegemony which we have detected between the child-adults who arrive with their civilization and technology, and the child-noble savages who accept this alien authority and surrender their riches, stands revealed as an exact replica of the relations between metropolis and satellite, between empire and colony, between master and slave” (pg. 60). They argue that Disney reinforces these ideas through the oversimplification of cartoon and caricature art, writing, “Disney does not invent these caricatures, he only exploits them to the utmost. By forcing all peoples of the world into a vision of the dominant (national and international) classes, he gives this vision coherency and justifies the social system on which it is based. These clichés are also used by the mass culture media to dilute the realities common to these people” (pgs. 70-71).

Invoking Marxist theory, Dorfman and Mattelart write, “Disney, throughout his comics, implies that capitalist wealth originated under the same circumstances as he makes it appear in his comics. It was always the ideas of the bourgeoisie which gave them the advantage in the race for success, and nothing else” (pg. 96). Within this system, the ideas of the bourgeoisie underpin everything in mass media. As Dorfman and Mattelart write, “Entertainment, as it is understood by the capitalist mass culture, tries to reconcile everything – work with leisure, the commonplace with the imaginary, the social with the extrasocial, body with soul, production with consumption, city with countryside – while veiling the contradictions arising from their interrelationships. All the conflicts of the real world, the nerve centers of bourgeois society, are purified in the imagination in order to be absorbed and co-opted into the world of entertainment” (pg. 108). They argue that Disney’s work flattens history and culture, serving imperialism by obliterating subaltern cultures by replacing the indigenous cultural touchstones they might normally draw upon as sites of resistance to imperialism.

Dorfman and Mattelart conclude, “All the relationships in the Disney world are compulsively consumerist; commodities in the marketplace of objects and ideas. The magazine is part of this situation. The Disney industrial empire itself arose to service a society demanding entertainment; it is part of an entertainment network whose business it is to feed leisure with more leisure disguised as fantasy” (pg. 143). Finally, Dorfman and Mattelart write, “Just why is Disney such a threat? The primary reason is that his products, necessitated and facilitated by a huge industrial capitalist empire are imported together with so many other consumer objects into the dependent country, which is dependent precisely because it depends on commodities arising economically and intellectually in the power center’s totally alien (foreign) conditions” (pg. 145). Their analysis was particularly cutting on the eve of U.S. intervention in Chile and remains all the more so in the twenty-first century as the Disney empire has grown and further dominates media throughout the world. Further, the role How to Read Donald Duck: Imperialist Ideology in the Disney Comic played in defining the place of fair use in educational and scholarly should not be forgotten as Disney continues to work to extend copyright provisions to prevent characters and work from entering the public domain.½

What happens in a newly democratic country post-dictatorship? How does it grapple with the crimes of the past? How does it handle truth and justice and punishment? How do the people live in the aftermath?

Written shortly after Chile's own dictatorship was overthrown, Dorfman's unremittingly stark play answers the above (not very deeply) while packing an intense cat-and-mouse thriller in its claustrophobic setting and sparse (three!) characters. It's a fairly straightforward play with clear themes, with history contributing much of its gravitas of importance. The thriller aspect is mostly what's sticking to my mind, as well as Pauline's characterisation and twist of ingenuity.½

A journey through the northern desert of Chile and through the past which like the desert hides and reveals and is implacable. Poetic and philosophical, the joys of companionship are contrasted constantly by the loneliness of the desert in which we meet and must rely upon only ourselves.½

Ariel Dorfman’s “Desert Memories: Journeys through the Chilean North” (2004). Mr Dorfman is a poet and a novelist, which comes back in his eloquent, lyrical writing about the issues that really matter in this part of the world. He is fascinated by, and at the same time fears the desert, the emptiness, yet finds there the world’s largest telescopes, the world’s largest Coppermine, and above all, Chile’s now abandoned nitrate ghost towns, one of the main themes of the book. The other theme is his personal quest to find what exactly happened to an old friend of him, who was executed under the dictatorship.
Mr Dorfman’s early background is one of an Allende supporter, and activist, who lived in exile during the Pinochet years. This aspect comes back frequently in the book, sometimes unnecessarily (as in the meeting with company representatives in the nitrate towns), but at other times it adds perspective. He has an impressive network of friends and acquaintances on whom he can call in every aspect of his journey, who open doors, and who provide an incredible amount of insight and experience. and which significantly adds to the value of Mr. Dorfmans account. Beautiful book.

Wow this book was great! It is a small, but powerful collection of first hand sources that document the fall of Chile's democratically elected Socialist government. The first half is better than the second half, as the latter is compromised of two speeches: one by President Allende's daughter and one by Fidel Castro. I would have given the book five stars if Castro's speech didn't fill up so much of the precious space in this less-than-100-page book. Nevertheless, please read this and consider it your doorway into this important part of 20th century American (as in the Americas) history.

Chilean-American author and human rights activist Ariel Dorfman is both a leading Latin American novelist and one of the most important cultural and political critics living in the United States. Among his many works is world-renowned play Death and the Maiden subsequently made into the 1994 film by director Roman Polanski starring Sigourney Weaver and Ben Kingsley.

With recently published Darwin’s Ghosts Mr. Dorfman has written a novel for our time. Penetrating, profound and highly stimulating, Darwin’s Ghosts grabbed me right from the first pages and kept me eagerly reading on – the story was so engrossing, almost to the point of hypnotic, I could hardly put the book down.

Here’s the opening: the tale’s narrator, American whiz kid Roy, short for Fitzroy, Foster recounts the defining event of his life back in 1981: on his fourteenth birthday, having just masturbated for the very first time (bye, bye boyhood), he joins his mom, dad and two younger brothers downstairs for a birthday celebration. His father wants to catch this special Polaroid moment with his new SX-70 and “click” takes a photo of his family all smiling for the camera. Perfect shot, only there’s a problem – Roy's head is not Roy's; it’s the head of a young man with black eyes, high cheekbones, snub nose, thick lips and bad Beatles haircut looking straight out at the photographer with one hell of a rebellious, inscrutable attitude.

Dad can’t believe his eyes. Must be a technical glitch (Mr. Foster is Vice President of Marketing for the Polaroid Company). He insists on another shot and yet another, this time a close up. “Click.” "Click." Same result. Roy snatches the close up photo from shocked Dad and the entire family peers at the stranger’s strange head atop Roy's familiar body.

Thus, in the rich tradition of Latin American magical realism, we have a tale of the fabulous, but not in a Colombian village, not in a suburb of Santiago, Chile, not in an Amazonian outpost, not in an ancient Mayan temple, but set in good old apple pie Yankee New England, Cambridge, Massachusetts to be specific.

So, the question arises – how will our affluent all-American family deal with an infusion of Latin American fabuloso instantly injected into their lives? Perhaps predictably, Mom and Dad’s initial reaction is entirely pragmatic, to investigate the strange phenomenon using the power of reason via medicine, science and especially technology.

As a sensible first step, Mr. Foster stacks up every camera in the house, not only other Polaroids but also a number from archrival Kodak. “Click” “Click” Click” “Click” “Click.” He then goes off to develop the photos himself and returns home to announce with glee, “It’s every photo from every camera. All brands are equally liable! Look, look, look!” Roy is not surprised his father’s first priority is Polaroid since his father is a company man through and through and his family has a history with famous Polaroid stretching back to his paternal grandfather.

The final, irrevocable decision is made jointly by Roy's parents: none of this is to be made public (ah, the ravenous media and even more ravenous researchers can't get their hands on our son Roy!). Other than several visits to be tested by X-ray machines and a plethora of other medical devises, Roy is to remain indoors since, after all, everyone nowadays owns a camera and there always looms the possibility of a stray photo.

But there’s one other critically important person in Roy’s confined orbit, the love of his life he discovered back when a member of the school swim team: Cameron aka Cam Wood. Cam is also a whiz kid, eventually studying physics and biology at MIT and graduating in a record three years.

Cam picks up more directly with Roy after college and both form a husband/wife detective team to hunt down answers to two key questions: 1) Who is Roy's strange visitor, and 2) What does he want? Actually, the love Roy and Cam have for each other gives the tale an epic, almost mythic quality, one of the more endearing, elegant aspects of the novel.

And herein lies much of the juice of Darwin’s Ghosts. The young couple’s investigations and research lead to a number of disturbing, despicable chapters in the treatment of indigenous peoples in centuries past, brutality and dehumanization focused particularly within the nineteenth century. One such atrocity – eleven tribespeople from Patagonia in southern Chile kidnapped in 1889 to be put on exhibit as a human zoo in Paris.

Those human zoos where the product of many, many decades of harsh, thuggish judgement made by people from the world and culture of Europe. Roy unearths one such culprit, the son of Captain Cook, a young man by the name of Georg Forster (gulp! – one letter away from his own name). Georg joined his father on a voyage around the world in 1772-1775 and described the Patagonians as filthy and degenerate before going on to say “the whole assemblage of their features that formed the most loathsome picture of misery and wretchedness to which human nature can possibly be reduced," and capped off his rant by accusing the Patagonians of being “insensible to the superiority of European civilization.”

As ruthless and cruel as this chapter of history, let me point out the tone of this well-written novel is not heavy-handed or overly preachy. In many respects Roy is well aware of the dangers of preaching since his mothers stressed the fact missionaries destroyed much of aboriginal cultures under the pretext of saving souls.

Reading Mr. Dorfman’s novel, I hear echoes of Eduardo Galeano’s Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent as well as a number of other works by the Uruguayan author who wrote in an attempt to rescue the kidnapped memory of Latin America. One particular quote stand out: “In 1492, the natives discovered they were Indians, discovered they lived in America, discovered they were naked, discovered that sin existed, discovered they owed allegiance to a King and Kingdom from another world and a God from another sky, and that this God had invented the guilty and dress, and had sent to be burnt alive whoever worships the sun, the moon, the earth and the rain that wets it.”

I link this Eduardo Galeano quote with the very first lines of Darwin’s Ghosts: “It came a bit after dawn, the dark condition that was to plague me, so sudden that I was unable at first to give it a name. How to know right away that it had been incubating inside some ancient zone of myself and my ancestors for one hundred years, begin to guess that it had infected the vast, blind world for far longer?”

To what extent are we as members of a highly technical, highly advanced civilization carrying the ghosts of other peoples, other cultures, other civilizations? To explore such questions, I recommend Ariel Dorfman’s well-researched, compelling, philosophical novel. I guarantee it will prove a reading experience that will stick with you for a long time.


19th century stupidity and cruelty in action - Indigenous tribespeople kidnapped and brought to Europe to be put on display as part of a human zoo

It is usually disappointing to read a book that was formerly banned. The sensitivities of the then authorities cause unrestrained headscratching today. Not so with How to Read Donald Duck, which was confiscated on its way into the USA in 1975, on the pretext of copyright infringement and unfair use. A real leftist attack, it is vibrant, wide-ranging and damning. Maybe too much. But it’s crystal clear why it was banned.

When I was growing up, I read and collected Superman comics. Unbeknownst to me, Donald Duck was at that the same time making the world safe for imperialism, racism, sexism and capitalism. In 1970 Chile, a newly elected leftist government allowed the left to express itself. Two of those voices, Ariel Dorfman and Armand Mattleart used the opportunity to decode, decrypt and expose the Disney invasion of Chilean society and culture throughout the 1960s. It was translated into 12 languages and circulated globally. Except in the USA. Publishers were afraid – of Walt Disney. But, as the book shows, so were his own employees.

I find a lot of Dorfman and Mattelart’s criticism unfair. They make much of how Disney characters are always out of worldly, societal context. They have no ancestors, friends or neighbors. Everything is always available, but nothing is ever manufactured. There are no laborers. They never age or progress in their lives. All true, but also true of the whole genre. Cartoon characters never age. It’s their advantage over humans. Archie will always be a teenager, even as he approaches 100. So while they studied a substantial corpus of one hundred Disney comics for their critique, they did not also examine any other comics. It shows.

As in all cartoons, the characters are stereotyped for easy recognition. So Donald Duck is always scrambling for cash (though never the rent), Mickey Mouse, ever the altruist, helps anyone with anything. Goofy is a doofus, and so on. This is not a weakness but a requirement, as readers don’t want to be surprised by some new aspect of a character’s persona. Characters need to be familiar, dependable and easy to understand. Disney gets no points docked for this.

They also accuse Disney of removing all references to history, then describe comics on ancient Rome and other eras. They accuse Walt Disney of having a romantic, nostalgic love of rural American life over city life, but the comics demonstrate the opportunities there over rural areas. So the criticism is not a lock on truth.

What is possibly surprising is the near total lack of females in Disney comics. Donald Duck is the uncle of Huey, Dewey and Louie, and the nephew of Scrooge McDuck. Three generations of males, without ever breathing mention of a mother, sister or wife. What females that appear are always minor in their personas as well as in the stories. Goofy and Pluto are far important than Minnie, every time.

Disney’s putdowns of other nationalities gets a little sickening. It’s not enough that they are infantile (“The world of Disney is a nineteenth century orphanage “). The noble savage, readily and gladly giving up his gold to Americans because it has no value to his society is a bit much. Especially when he trades it for soap bubble powder that makes his compatriots smile. Everyone else in the world is a caricature of a human, according to Disney. A joke of a person. His ducks are more human than the foreign humans, because of the great system they belong to – capitalism.

The authors say 75% of the sample was stories involving the search for gold, and the other 25% were about competing for fame and wealth in the big city. Disney is all about the money. Life is all about the money for Disney. That’s the message he focused on. It was all about bringing back the gold. The book demonstrates it clearly and dramatically with actual images from the comic books. They prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that Disney was promoting capitalism and imperialism to the rest of the world, in the guise of family-friendly comic books. They read like alt right propaganda, as much as the book reads like left wing propaganda. In other words, Dorfman and Mattelart are correct,

There is an interminable intro, not from the authors but from the translator, which adds much heat but little light. A lot of leftist 1970s jargon revealing essentially nothing, but delaying access to the Disney defrocking. It is dense and difficult, and skipping it is beneficial.

For the victim/readers of Disney comics, in Chile and elsewhere, it was all galling, insulting and revolting: “Reading Disney is like having one’s own exploited condition rammed with honey down one’s throat.” It was Walt Disney expressing that everywhere else is a “sh—hole country” while glorifying the unlimited opportunities in an aggressive liberal capitalist society. He was making America great at the expense of everyone else.

Even Superman was less blatant.

David Wineberg

FOR IMAGES, SEE THIS REVIEW AT https://medium.com/the-straight-dope/donald-duck-as-running-dog-lackey-7418029c7...

It takes a talented writer to pull off an extended maybe-it-is-maybe-it-isn't mindgame between two characters. And it takes something close to a genius to turn the tables, aim the mindgames at his readers, and leave us begging for more. This book reads as rapidly as a play or screenplay, but one written by an heir to Borges and Kafka. - Adam

How do I put this book into words?
I'm not going to give my typical review of 2 pros & 2 cons because it wouldn't even be worth it. I finished this book in a day and a half , probably the only great thing it had going for it was Ariel & Joaquin Dorfman's writing style. I really enjoyed the way things were described and when the main character is riding his bike, things around him are being told in almost a poetic way.
While the outline of the book had the potential of being developed into a great story, I found it very pieced together. For me, it basically jumped from one issue to the next then back to the original issue. There was not a good transition between scenes and the book lacked balance within the characters. I, also found the relationship between Heller and Salim a bit odd at times. Salim runs his hand on 15 year old Heller's arm, face, & hair, therefore making the obvious decision to go to a bar with this creepy man and sling back a few drinks the smart one?
I love mystery books but I felt like this book had an unintentional mysterious element to it and it never was solved. I believe that if this book was better thought out and more developed then it could potentially be better than it was. If you wanna read it, by all means do so because it was a quick read but if you have another book you wanna read then read that one first!½

There are many books dealing with vast and shadowy conspiracies, plots where everyone is a suspect, and mysteries where hints are dropped but there are no firm clues to speak of. Just look at the works of John le Carré for an example of these tropes done right. Konfidenz covers these familiar topics, but it is more than just another boilerplate example of the genre. Its willingness to confront the nature of fiction and the role of the author elevates it to something more, something worth reading.

When Konfidenz starts it is easy to write off what it is doing as a gimmick. Most of the text is dialogue, like a play without the stage direction, and eventually the author is introduced into the text as a character of sorts, commenting on the action thus far. Nothing special at first, especially considering that the drama of the main plot of espionage agents in Paris is periodically undercut by the author spelling out just how every situation could be a lie, a set-up for some other character in the story. These interjections kill all subtlety, hammering home what a clever reader was aware of pages earlier.

The book is no mere mystery-thriller, though. As the title suggests, this book is about putting your trust in something. Who do you trust in a work of fiction: The characters? Here the characters are anything but up-front, even at the end of the book it is unclear who can be trusted and who was telling lies. The author? Here the author introduces himself as an interested party, and a very unreliable one at that, more subject to the vicissitudes of the story than a controlling force. The book in total? A recurring theme of the book is that we accept stories that are interesting, that tell us something we want to hear, instead of the truth. With a theme like that it's impossible to have complete faith in any conclusion the novel introduces.

This lack of certainty is the novel's main strength- while other espionage thrillers are the literary equivalent of action movies, entertaining but lacking depth, Konfidenz raises questions about the nature of fiction and the nature of narratives. Is Konfidenz telling a distinct story, or stranding the reader in a morass from which there is no escape? Is it a creation of the author, or is the author just a conduit, another character through which the story has come into being? Can we know anything at the end of the book, or is it all a dream created in the shadow of numerous coup attempts, exiles, and hidden plots? Konfidenz isn't about answers, it's about questions, and in this genre that makes the book far more interesting than the competition. Gimmicky? Yes, but with a purpose.

Overall a standard tale made something more by the insertion of the author as a character and the focus on the nature of fiction. Normally I would give something like this four stars, but much to my surprise this entire work has almost completely evaporated from my mind only a couple months after having read it. I can barely remember what happened in it, and all the interesting nuances I discussed above aren't things I retained now that I'm rereading this review in July. This is probably in part due to the fact that I've been plowing though many books this year, but even so there are many other books I've read this year that have left a far stronger memory than Konfidenz. Unfortunately therefore I must rate this book only 3 stars, as an interesting curiosity that fails to make a lasting impression.

Konfidenz--a disorienting, sexually and politically intense book in a postmodern vein--feels to me like the kind of book NYRB puts out. The point of view shifts from chapter to chapter, and the idea of the "reliability" of a point of view does not really apply--which is certainly the author's intention. The author's maleness really comes through. I wasn't really won over until about halfway through, but I'd say it's worth reading.

I'm pretty sure that Dorfman intentionally makes it difficult to like his present self, like, he wants you to feel the distaste you feel as you read his life story as told by himself. Why? Maybe because he wants you to come to terms with the person he's presenting himself to be, and through the process of reading his book, he figures you'll grow as a person as well. I don't know, I want to say the subtitle should be "How I came to love my full-on bourgeois self" (in the parlance of the time when he co-wrote the Donald Duck book, which, by the way, is a remarkable and compelling cultural artifact).

I wrote a bunch of nasty margin notes because it's so hard not to feel offended, but I felt like Dorfman was in control of my own actions as I did so, like, those notes are exactly what he wanted me to write. I'm still trying to figure out why, though. What is his didactic mission here?

Most people associate September 11 with the World Trade Center tragedy. But before 2001 September 11 was already a day infamy for Latin America and Chile in particular. On that day in 1973, General Augusto Pinochet led a US-backed coup against the popularly elected government of Salvador Allende, and began his repressive 17-year dictatorship. An interesting and nostalgic collection.

Este libro tiene una análisis muy interesante acerca de todas aquellas características y situaciones que se vivieron en Estados Unidos durante la época de la guerra. Además, se muestra, mediante ejemplos de la caricatura del pato Donald, como con esta caricatura en Estado Unidos reforzaban en patriotismo y la idea de que el capitalismo es la mejor corriente económica para ganar dinero y ser feliz.

An interesting idea, but I found that the writing style made this novel very difficult to get into. (Perhaps this is the fault of the translation; I can't say.) I had thought this would be more of a mystery story, with Oriana's amnesia at the center of it. I did enjoy the surreal elements of this and the small things that show an accomplished writer at work (what's the plastic surgeon's name, after all?). Overall, though, I found the novel disappointing, especially toward the end.