¿Cómo perdiste el brazo, Balchowsky? by Toni Orensanz
A young pianist from Chicago enlists in the International Brigades and travels to Spain during the Civil War to fight against fascism, where he will lose his right arm. Back in the United States, his will be a story of self-improvement that will make him a legend of Chicago's artistic bohemia, a prodigious storyteller and a pioneer of the counterculture, which he will tell us, as if from a book of chivalry. in question, the American history of the second half of the 20th century. “He was a survivor who clung to life. A walking lesson in resistance and self-improvement. A loser among losers for whom nothing ended up going well, but everyone was fond of him.
An idealist whom life viciously mistreated, forced to discover too soon that life "was serious" and who, despite this, persisted in living it until he couldn't take it anymore. Without resentment. Spiritual mentor and savior guru for many, although he did not know how to redeem himself, like the good messiahs. An essentially free man with a certain candor. A good guy. One Love. A deluded idealist. A master of the streets. The one-armed pianist. That nice sinner. The king of the alleys ».
