Literatura infantil by Alejandro Zambra
Although this singular and unclassifiable book by Alejandro Zambra is titled Childhood Literature (Literatura infantil), it is worth noting that it includes a magnificent short story centered on foul language and a flat-out lysergic tale in which a man, in the midst of a therapeutic mushroom trip, tries to relearn the incredibly difficult art of crawling.
In the event that a child should accidentally stumble upon these pages, they should read them in the company of an adult—despite the fact that here, it is precisely the children who, in their own way, protect the adults from despondency, egocentrism, and the dictatorship of chronological time.
"Being a father consists of letting yourself be beaten until the day the defeat is real,"
Alejandro Zambra wrote in his celebrated novel Chilean Poet, an idea that reappears in this captivating book. Written "in a state of attachment" or "under the influence" of fatherhood, its starring theme is childhood—or how the birth and growth of a child not only modify the present and the future but also shake our ideas about the past.
