Antonio Skármeta (1940–2024)
Author of The Postman
About the Author
Author Antonio Skármeta was born in Antofagasta, Chile on November 7, 1940. He studied literature and philosophy in Chile and at Columbia University. He taught literature at the University of Chile from 1967 to 1973. He left his country in 1973 because he was profoundly affected by his country's show more political travail. After the collapse of Pinochet's military dictatorship, Skármeta returned to Chile and hosted a television program on literature and the arts. He served as the Chilean ambassador in Germany from 2000 to 2003. He has written several novels including Ardiente Paciencia, which inspired the 1994 Academy Award-winning movie Il Postino (The Postman); The Insurrection, about the Nicaraguan Revolution just before Somoza's fall; and Chileno!, a young adult book drawing on Skármeta 's own experience of exile. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
Image credit: Antonio Skármeta en París (Francia), en 2013
Works by Antonio Skármeta
SKA El baile de la victoria 2 copies
La velocidad del amor 1989 1 copy
FRISPARK 1 copy
O carteiro e poéta 1 copy
Cuentos de Cabecera 9 1 copy
SKA El cartero de Neruda 1 copy
NUM PAÍS ESTRANHO 1 copy
O CARTEIRO E O POETA. 1 copy
නෙරූදාගේ ලියුම්කාරයා 1 copy
Associated Works
Tagged
Common Knowledge
- Legal name
- Skármeta Vranicic, Esteban Antonio
- Other names
- Skármeta Vranicic, Esteban Antonio (birth name)
- Birthdate
- 1940-11-07
- Date of death
- 2024-10-15
- Gender
- male
- Education
- Instituto Nacional de Chile, Santiago
Universidad de Chile (Bx|Philosophy)
Columbia University (Mx|Literature) - Occupations
- writer
teacher - Awards and honors
- National Literature Prize [Chile], 2014
- Relationships
- García Lorca, Francisco (teacher)
Sobejano, Gonzalo (teacher, mentor) - Nationality
- Chile
- Birthplace
- Antofagasta, Chile
- Places of residence
- Santiago, Chile
Berlin, Germany
Buenos Aires, Argentina - Place of death
- Santiago, Chile
- Map Location
- Chile
Members
Reviews
Antonio Skármeta is perhaps best known for his book, Burning Patience, about the life of his fellow Chilean writer and poet, Pablo Neruda that was adapted into the film, Il Postino. This recently-translated collection of short stories shares in common with that book a deeply personal sense of the joys and trials of life; each little pain and indignity fictionalised with intensity. Skármeta likes metaphors and uses them with abandon. His sentences run on and clauses pile one on top of show more another to create a breathless register that feels almost phantasmagorical. He draws vivid pictures of stark landscapes: empty beaches, roads, rooms thick with tensions. Each of these stories, though, is about intensely personal emotion: a family dispute in 'Fish', personal appearances, shame, and embarrassment in 'Ballad for a Fat Man', a writer rocketing between anxiety and joy in ‘The Young Man with a Story’ and deep sadness in ‘Borges’. This collection of thirteen stories can feel almost too much if you read them all at once – they are better savoured, one by one. I don’t know how much I lose by reading Skármeta's work in translation, but there’s a truly playful and inventive element to his use of language, which makes them a pleasure to read. show less
In questi giorni un po' così del dopo referendum Brexit, oggi che le destre avanzano ovunque, spesso mentendo e distorcendo la realtà, e tutta l'informazione ci spinge a usare la pancia invece che il cervello, mi è capitato in mano questo bel romanzo di Antonio Skarmeta: la storia di un altro referendum andato al contrario di ciò che era nelle intenzioni di chi l'aveva promosso, in questo caso il famigerato dittatore Augusto Pinochet. La storia quindi di come, con soli 15 minuti a show more disposizione per portare avanti la campagna del no, senza mezzi, con gli amici e i parenti più prossimi che spariscono - e a volte vengono ritrovati cadaveri -, continuamente spiati e minacciati del regime, un pugno di uomini abbia trovato la forza di dispiegare le ali della fantasia, abbia ricordato l'allegria perduta, e abbia liberato il Cile dal grigio della dittatura per ridargli i colori dell'arcobaleno: in un paese libero ciascuno può pensarla a modo suo, ma avere allo stesso tempo in mente una causa comune. show less
Energetic, passionate, and bold, The Days of the Rainbow is a dramatisation of the 1988 Chilean national plebiscite that ended General Pinochet's fifteen-year dictatorship.
It features a relatively small cast of characters, alternating chapters between the viewpoints of Nico Santos, a high schooler whose father is "disappeared", and Adrián de Bettini, an advertising agent who is hired to lead the campaign for anti-Pinochet vote. This gives a good view of both the personal and the political, show more the micro and the macro—the fear and loneliness of a boy left fatherless, the pressure and paranoia of leading the opposition vote in a plebiscite called by a military dictatorship. Can a fifteen minute ad spot really overturn fifteen years of terror and oppression?
Well, you already know the ending. But what's entertaining is the journey. It's such an unlikely story, but it's true; a dictatorship falling prey to its own hubris, its own desire to legitimise itself as a democracy and dying in the end from that selfsame democratic impulse, the will of the people. There's a sense of immediacy to Skármeta's prose which is electrifying. This is at once a love letter to Santiago, a parable about the fragility and power of democracy, and a portrait of the chaotic and hopeful days that spelled the downfall of Pinochet.
____________________
Global Challenge: Chile show less
It features a relatively small cast of characters, alternating chapters between the viewpoints of Nico Santos, a high schooler whose father is "disappeared", and Adrián de Bettini, an advertising agent who is hired to lead the campaign for anti-Pinochet vote. This gives a good view of both the personal and the political, show more the micro and the macro—the fear and loneliness of a boy left fatherless, the pressure and paranoia of leading the opposition vote in a plebiscite called by a military dictatorship. Can a fifteen minute ad spot really overturn fifteen years of terror and oppression?
Well, you already know the ending. But what's entertaining is the journey. It's such an unlikely story, but it's true; a dictatorship falling prey to its own hubris, its own desire to legitimise itself as a democracy and dying in the end from that selfsame democratic impulse, the will of the people. There's a sense of immediacy to Skármeta's prose which is electrifying. This is at once a love letter to Santiago, a parable about the fragility and power of democracy, and a portrait of the chaotic and hopeful days that spelled the downfall of Pinochet.
If the No won...
Actually, he couldn't conceive of a future beyond the No. It felt weird to think that this was only one step on the way to something bigger. This insignificance, his rainbow, his handful of images, Alarcón's waltz, deep down, they were... everything.
The crowning moment of his life.
Let others worry about the future. He—he raised a fist and kept it in the air when an acquaintance greeted him from the other side of the line—wanted only to enjoy the present. The eternity of this precise moment.
We only need for the No to win.
____________________
Global Challenge: Chile show less
I saw this charming movie years ago and wanted to read the book, which is equally charming, though a little gritty. The unlikely friendship between Pablo Neruda and his postman, a young, lazy, dreamy youth ripe for the poetry experience is recounted in this fictional story. Mario Jimenez is a little star-struck by his client's fame, but also is buring up with love for beautiful Beatriz and needs the poet's help and advice. Without even trying, Mario spins out metaphor after metaphor show more recounting his love for the beautiful girl whose heart he is trying to win (and whose mother he is trying to avoid). Pablo tutors him in the language of poetry, turning his raw material into verse and cheering him on. Meanwhile, the great poet is contending with his Nobel prize nomination and Chile's need for him to become politically active. Inititally a nominee for President, he leaves the seaside town for awhile, until Allende emerges as the favored candidate; Neruda is later his ambassador to France, coming home in time for the revolution that assassinates his friend and puts him under house arrest. During this time, Mario is steadfastly loyal, helping Neruda as Neruda once helped him. A sensual love story, a testimony to the power of words, and a friendship narrative for the ages. show less
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Statistics
- Works
- 56
- Also by
- 6
- Members
- 2,633
- Popularity
- #9,753
- Rating
- 3.7
- Reviews
- 78
- ISBNs
- 308
- Languages
- 17
- Favorited
- 3
