La Hoja de Aire

San José, Costa Rica: Editorial Legado, 2000. 8th printing of the Legado ed. 55 pages; 24 cm. Mild wear from use; overall very good to vg(+). Paperback. ISBN: 9977993572; 9789977993577

In Spanish. Uncommon. First published in Chile in 1968, this short novel by the Costa Rican writer Joaquín Gutiérrez Mangel (1918–2000) carries a prologue by Pablo Neruda. It follows Alfonso, a Costa Rican who returns home from Mexico in search of his lost love, Teresa. The search fails, though the madness that grips him lets him keep pursuing it. The structure is circular and nested, a story within a story, and it opens at the end, with Alfonso’s meeting with Joaquín “Quincho” Gutiérrez, a character who shares the author’s name. Alfonso tells him his story and asks for help, and Joaquín “reminds” him that Teresa is dead. Beneath the private tragedy lies a portrait of a nation caught in hypocrisy and lies. Gutiérrez, best known for the children’s classic Cocorí, later directed the Quimantú publishing house under Chile’s Unidad Popular government and returned to Costa Rica after the 1973 coup.