Best 100 novels in Spanish in the XXth century

[Cleanthess]

Cross-posted from our sister site the concocted woods:

In 2001 the Spanish newspaper El Pais published a list of the 100 best Spanish language fictional works of the 20th. Century. The selection favored Spanish writers over Latin American ones, but it offered a very good overview of the evolving canon at the time.

Of course, the choices from the 10 years just before the list was assembled were mostly misses rather than hits due to the brief time for a selection to emerge at that point. Also, Spanish language fiction of the 20th. Century before Borges with a few notable exceptions (e.g. Unamuno) is not that interesting.

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anexo:Lista_El_Mundo_de_las_100_mejores_novelas

Given those two criteria, I excised the 1993-2001 and pre-1944 selections, and this is the list that remained for the 50 years between 1944 and 1993 (twenty years ago):

Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges 1944
Nada, Carmen Laforet 1944
The President, Miguel Angel Asturias 1946
Men of Maize, Miguel Angel Asturias 1949
The Cypress Casts a Long Shadow, Miguel Delibes 1947
Five hours with Mario, Miguel Delibes 1966
The holy innocents, Miguel Delibes 1981
La cabeza del cordero, Francisco Ayala 1949
The adventures of Alfanhui, Rafael Sanchez Ferlosio 1951
The River: El Jarama, Rafael Sanchez Ferlosio 1955
Plaza del Castillo, Rafael Garcia Serrano 1951
The Beehive, Camilo Jose Cela 1951
San Camilo, 1936, Camilo Jose Cela 1969
Cypresses Believe in God, Jose Maria Gironella 1953
Pequeno teatro, Ana Maria Matute 1954
Good Intentions, Max Aub 1954
Pedro Paramo, Juan Rulfo 1955
Behind the Curtains, Carmen Martin Gaite 1957
Retahilas, Carmen Martin Gaite 1974
Los gozos y las sombras, Gonzalo Torrente Ballester 1957-1962
La saga/fuga de J.B., Gonzalo Torrente Ballester 1972
Requiem for a Spanish Peasant, Ramon J. Sender 1960
Las mocedades de Ulises, Alvaro Cunqueiro 1960
Truce, Mario Benedetti 1960
On Heroes and Tombs, Ernesto Sabato 1961
Time of Silence, Luis Martin Santos 1961
The Shipyard, Juan Carlos Onetti 1961
No One Writes to the Colonel, Gabriel Garcia Marquez 1961
One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez 1967
Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Gabriel Garcia Marquez 1981
Explosion in a Cathedral, Alejo Carpentier 1962
Bomarzo, Manuel Mujica Lainez 1962
Hopscotch, Julio Cortazar 1963
The Time of the Hero, Mario Vargas Llosa 1963
Conversation in the Cathedral, Mario Vargas Llosa 1969
Jose Trigo, Fernando del Paso 1966
Marks of Identity, Juan Goytisolo 1966
Paradiso, Jose Lezama Lima 1966
Return to Region, Juan Benet 1967
Three Trapped Tigers, Guillermo Cabrera Infante 1967
Infante's Inferno , Guillermo Cabrera Infante 1979
El dia que murio Marilyn, Terenci Moix 1969
No digas que fue un sueno, Terenci Moix 1986
The Obscene Bird of Night, Jose Donoso 1970
La oscura historia de la prima Montse, Juan Marse 1970
Perpetual Motion, Augusto Monterroso 1972
Agatha Cat's Eyes, Jose Caballero Bonald 1974
I, the Supreme, Augusto Roa Bastos 1974
The Nymphs, Francisco Umbral 1975
A Mortal Spring, Francisco Umbral 1975
The Legend of the Visionary Caesar, Francisco Umbral 1992
The Maravillas District, Rosa Chacel 1976
Kiss of the Spider Woman, Manuel Puig 1976
Extramuros, Jesus Fernandez Santos 1978
The South Seas, Manuel Vazquez Montalban 1979
Galindez, Manuel Vazquez Montalban 1990
Volaverunt, Antonio Larreta 1980
The Ages of Lulu, Almudena Grandes 1980
Martin Romana, Alfredo Bryce Echenique 1981
Octubre, octubre, Jose Luis Sampedro 1981
The Etruscan Smile, Jose Luis Sampedro 1985
Museo de cera, Jorge Edwards 1981
Belver Yin, Jesus Ferrero 1981
The House of the Spirits, Isabel Allende 1982
Tower Struck by Lightning, Fernando Arrabal 1983
Tiempo nublado, Octavio Paz 1983
Voyage to Nowhere, Fernando Fernan Gomez 1985
Burning Patience, Antonio Skarmeta 1985
The City of Marvels, Eduardo Mendoza 1986
The Fencing Master, Arturo Perez-Reverte 1988
Juegos de la edad tardia, Luis Landero 1989
Like water for Chocolate, Laura Esquivel 1989
El camino del corazon, Fernando Sanchez Drago 1990
The Polish Horseman, Antonio Munoz Molina 1991
A Heart So White, Javier Marias 1992

 

[Daniel del Real]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

Interesting list with so many flaws on it, starting with the excess of Spaniard writers, many of them of whom I have no idea who they are:

Ramón Pérez de Ayala
Felipe Trigo
Agustín de Foxá
Arturo Barea
Ignacio Agustí
Rafael García Serrano
Luis Martín Santos
Rosa Chacel
Jesús Fernández Santos
Jesús Ferrero
Fernando Arrabal
Fernando Fernán Gómez
Fernando Sánchez Dragó
Juan Manuel de Prada

Then the writers I know and they shouldn't be there at all: Grandes, Echenique,Allende, Arturo Pérez-Reverte, Laura Esquivel.

I think they also exaggerated with the number of titles by authors like Francisco Umbral, Pío Baroja & Terenci Moix

Here are the list of works from the list I've read, most of them undisputed:

Los cuatro jinetes del Apocalipsis (entertaining novel but weak and full of bad characterizations, wouldn't out it in the list)
Tirano Banderas
La tía Tula
La familia de Pascual Duarte
La colmena
Ficciones
La sombra del ciprés es alargada
Cinco horas con Mario
Los santos inocentes
Pedro Páramo
La Tregua
Sobre héroes y tumbas
El coronel no tiene quien le escriba (I'd rather have El Amor en los Tiempos del Cólera here)
Cien años de soledad
Crónica de una muerte anunciada
Rayuela
Lituma en los Andes (Good novel but La Guerra del Fin del Mundo is way superior)
Señas de identidad
La oscura historia de la prima Montse
Corazón tan blanco

Finally, here are some novels to replace the Spaniards nobodies:

Adolfo Bioy Casares, La Invención de Morel
Alvaro Mutis, Tribulaciones de Malroq el Gaviero
Carlos Fuentes, La Región más Transparente
Carlos Fuentes, La Muerte de Artemio Cruz
Eliseo Alberto, La Eternidad por Fin Comienza un Lunes
Enrique Vila-Matas, Una Casa para Siempre
Ernesto Sábato, El Túnel
José Emilio Pacheco, Las Batallas en el Desierto
Fernando del Paso, Noticias del Imperio
José Revueltas, El Luto Humano
Juan Carlos Onetti, Juntacadáveres
Mariano Azuela, Los de Abajo
Ricardo Güiraldes, Don Segundo Sombra
Roberto Bolaño, Los Detectives Salvajes
Rómulo Gallegos, Doña Bárbara

 

[kpjayan]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

I've read only 13 of them .. That's bad, I guess.

Daniel : I liked "Like Water for Chocolate" when I read that years ago. But this list has Isabel Allende as well.

 

[Cleanthess]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

Senor del Real, thank for your insightful comments on the list. I can find almost nothing to disagree with on your remarks.

Luis Martin Santos' Tiempo de Silencio is an important novel, if a bit obscure outside of Spain; it mixed a traditional bleak costumbrista plot with a baroque prose style, something that was very innovative in Spain at the time it was first published. I kinda like Almudena Grandes' fiction, but I'd admit that this is a very personal (lack of) taste. Pio Baroja (together with Unamuno) is my favorite fiction writer from Spain for the 1900-1944 period.

As for the nobodies, Fernan Gomez is a famous actor and director (he won Berlin's Silver Bear a couple of times). He performed the father role on Victor Erice's El Espiritu de La Colmena and the role of the dropout artist Manolo on Belle Epoque. He was married to famous singer Maria Dolores Pradera, and wrote a very good play, Las Bicicletas son para el Verano. However, when it comes to him writing one of the best novels of last Century: no way.

You also raise a very interesting point, what novels should replace the padding, token Spanish novels on the list? I'll limit myself to the 1944-1993 time frame. Your own proposed list is a great starting point. I have not read Jose Revueltas, Eliseo Alberto or the specific book by Vila-Matas you list (more books to add to my TBR pile, I guess). I have not read Cesar Aira or the Goytisolo brothers either, so I cannot include their works. I'd like to add to the ongoing list:

Leopoldo Marechal, Adam Buenosayres 1948
Alejo Carpentier, The Lost Steps 1953
Jose Maria Arguedas, Deep Rivers 1958
Augusto Roa-Bastos, Son of Man 1960
Salvador Elizondo, Farabeuf 1965
Manuel Puig, Betrayed by Rita Hayworth 1968
Manuel Puig, Boquitas pintadas 1969
Manuel Puig, The Buenos Aires Affair 1973
Severo Sarduy, Maitreya 1978
Ricardo Piglia, Artificial Respiration 1980
Juan Benet, Saul Before Samuel , 1980
German Espinosa, La Tejedora de Coronas 1982
Juan Jose Saer, The Witness 1983
Juan Jose Saer, Glosa 1985
Antonio Munoz Molina, El invierno en Lisboa 1987
Fogwill, Muchacha punk 1992

This site provides a very interesting, if loooong, list of the best of Spanish Language Fiction of all times:
http://www.scaruffi.com/fiction/beste.html

And this blog provides a well thought out analysis for the 20th Century works:
http://blogs.brown.edu/ciudad_literaria/2006/02/14/las-mejores-novelas-espanolas-del-siglo-xx/

 

[Daniel del Real]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

That is also a great selection of works Cleanthess, a list that includes many of my omissions and pending reads regarding Spanish written literature.

Haven't read a single word from :Leopoldo Marechal, Jose Maria Arguedas,Augusto Roa-Bastos, Salvador Elizondo, Manuel Puig, Severo Sarduy, Juan Benet, Juan Jose Saer & Fogwill

From these huge names only one novel:
Alejo Carpentier, El Reino de Este Mundo
Ricardo Piglia, La Ciudad Ausente
Antonio Munoz Molina, El Viento de la Luna


And to be honest, I have no idea who is German Espinosa, La Tejedora de Coronas 1982

Lot of homework to do for me!

 

[Daniel del Real]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

I've read only 13 of them .. That's bad, I guess.

Daniel : I liked "Like Water for Chocolate" when I read that years ago. But this list has Isabel Allende as well.

That is a very decent number of works. I mean, Spanish is my mother tongue and I've only read 20!

 

[kpjayan]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

Manuel Puig, Betrayed by Rita Hayworth 1968
Manuel Puig, Boquitas pintadas 1969
Manuel Puig, The Buenos Aires Affair 1973

I am not too convinced about this. To me if I have to pick Manuel Puig, I will restrict myself to "Kiss of the Spiderwoman" and "Eternal Curse on the Readers of these Pages". I haven't read "Buenos Aires Affair", I must confess.

 

[Hamlet]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

I think a million little things that go into why you want to read an author, work, something, anything! I think it's even subconscious, touchy-feely, the right time or the right notes are being sounded for you. So, it's with interest that I pick up on recommendations on web sites such as this, I do it, we all do ~ you must read, he's the best, this is the best novel, his very best you know, but the personal predominates.

A fellow student at college a few years back and I were drinking coffee, shooting the breeze between lectures and I mentioned I read quite a lot, and she suddenly burst into one of those you must read x by so and so.... and my immediate reaction was, why, why must I read x by so and so!

I still haven't read x by so and so and probably never will!

 

[Daniel del Real]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

What's tough is when that insistence is acompanied by actual books for you to borrow. I was at lunch with a Spanish professor recently and we started talking books. She raved about Isabel Allende's work (you heard me right, Daniel). I mentioned that I had read Allende's first novel years ago. The professor explained she had more of the author's books that she'd be happy to lend me. I quickly countered by describing how high my to-be-read pile was and I thought I was in the clear. Came back from lunch later on to find a copy of Daughter of Fortune on my office desk with a post-it note saying, "Enjoy!".

Very nice gesture on her part, but when you have so many books you're dying to read, it's tough to spend time on books you're reading more out of obligation than anything else.

Many people could hate me for this comment, but I don't know why Allende is too appealing for women. For me, it just doesn't work at all. Chick lit perhaps?

 

[Stiffelio]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

Interesting thread, which I haven't had time to post to before. I basically concur with most of the comments made by Daniel and by Cleanthess regarding the original list, which is of course markedly Ibero-centric, and with their proposed alternative choices.

Puig is a must in any best-of list. I agree with Cleanthess on the three Puig novels he chose: they are the first three and the best he ever wrote. Kiss of the Spiderwoman was perhaps the novel that made him known worldwide, i.e. in to the non-exclusively-Spanish reading world, and it's a great novel but not as good as the other three. Betrayed by Rita Hayworth and Boquitas Pintadas (oddly translated as Heartbreak Tango) are two masterpieces and the two novels that transformed the style of writing in Spanish. The way Puig caught the 'voice' of the small town folk, that wasn't done before. He was much influenced by the movies he saw in the Buenos Aires province town of Villegas, where he was brought up. Puig himself has been very influential on the majority of writers from the following generation. His influence even crossed some unlikely borders (he is much admired by Murakami, for instance).


From Adolfo Bioy Casares I would add El Sueño de los Héroes (Dream of Heroes), probably not as innovative as La Invención de Morel but, IMO, a much better written novel. Since we are just talking novels, I cannot include anything by Bioy's brilliant wife Silvina Ocampo, a true genius in the short-story form and as a poet.

Other novels from these decades I would happily include, and I'll stick to Argentine writers for the time being, are:

Manuel Mujica Láinez: La Casa (1954)
Antonio Di Benedetto: Zama (1956); El Silenciero (1964); Los Suicidas (1969)
Silvina Bullrich: Los Burgueses (1964). Bullrich was an excellent writer who reached best-seller status and perhaps her later work suffered because of it.
Sara Gallardo: Los Galgos, Los Galgos (1968)
Marcos Aguinis: La Cruz Invertida (1970)
Abel Posse: Los Perros del Paraíso (1983 - Rómulo Gallegos Prize)
César Aira: Ema, la Cautiva (1981)

I should have included Roberto Arlt as one of the most prominent Argentine writers of the early twentieth century but most of his work was published in the 20s.

 

[Daniel del Real]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

Puig is a must in any best-of list. I agree with Cleanthess on the three Puig novels he chose: they are the first three and the best he ever wrote. Kiss of the Spiderwoman was perhaps the novel that made him known worldwide, i.e. in to the non-exclusively-Spanish reading world, and it's a great novel but not as good as the other three. Betrayed by Rita Hayworth and Boquitas Pintadas (oddly translated as Heartbreak Tango) are two masterpieces and the two novels that transformed the style of writing in Spanish. The way Puig caught the 'voice' of the small town folk, that wasn't done before. He was much influenced by the movies he saw in the Buenos Aires province town of Villegas, where he was brought up. Puig himself has been very influential on the majority of writers from the following generation. His influence even crossed some unlikely borders (he is much admired by Murakami, for instance).

When you say Puig caught the voice of the small town folk, it sounds pretty similar than what Roberto Arlt did earlier. Do you find some similarities between them, in their language basically (I'm sure their themes are totally different)? This comes from someone who has read Arlt but not Puig. What novel would you recommend to start with thim? I'm tempted by La Traición de Rita Hayworth.

 

[Stiffelio]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

When you say Puig caught the voice of the small town folk, it sounds pretty similar than what Roberto Arlt did earlier. Do you find some similarities between them, in their language basically (I'm sure their themes are totally different)? This comes from someone who has read Arlt but not Puig. What novel would you recommend to start with thim? I'm tempted by La Traición de Rita Hayworth.

I don't find stylistic similarities between Arlt and Puig, let alone thematic ones. Although Arlt's stories and characters are mostly associated with the working classes, his language was still pretty "formal" and literary and the structure of his novels was straightforward. Puig turned all that upside down. He delved into his characters dreams and thoughts and made them speak out in a sort of "feuilleton" manner (Boquitas Pintadas is purposely subtitled "un folletín"). As I said, Puig was heavily influenced by the cinema, the "white telephone" cinema of the 50s, with flamboyant matinée idols and divas, that the girls and boys dreamed about. Arlt's characters are urban as opposed to Puig's being provincial. The structure of Puig's novels could be thought of as movie-like. Puig's dialogues are often times made of telephone conversations, letters, flow of consciousness, etc.

I hope you read Puig some day so you can tell me what you think of him. I myself have not read all of his novels but they're recently been reissued so I'll read them soon.

Id' recommend Traición...., then Boquitas.... then The Buenos Aires Affair, which is much darker in tone and subject matter.

 

[Daniel del Real]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

Thank you Stiffelio. I've been landing a lot in Europe lately and now I have an urge to return to Latin American reads. Puig will be for sure in that list.

 

[Hamlet]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

If you read all of the authors listed in this thread, you'd either go blind or insane. Or both perhaps.

Those who have created such lists must therefore either be blind or insane, or, dare I say, have read very little of what's on them. In which case, ta-dah... they've no business creating a list in the first place because they don't know which author are worth consideration.

Unless the list is just copied straight out of some index or other.

 

[Heteronym]

I've read only:

Ficciones, Jorge Luis Borges 1944
The President, Miguel Angel Asturias 1946
Pedro Paramo, Juan Rulfo 1955
La saga/fuga de J.B., Gonzalo Torrente Ballester 1972
No One Writes to the Colonel, Gabriel Garcia Marquez 1961
One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia Marquez 1967
Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Gabriel Garcia Marquez 1981
The Time of the Hero, Mario Vargas Llosa 1963
Conversation in the Cathedral, Mario Vargas Llosa 1969

 

[Settembrini]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

Interesting list with so many flaws on it, starting with the excess of Spaniard writers, many of them of whom I have no idea who they are:

Agustín de Foxá
Fernando Sánchez Dragó

Two cool guys.

Finally, here are some novels to replace the Spaniards nobodies:

Roberto Bolaño, Los Detectives Salvajes

Oh, come on!

 

[Cleanthess]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

So, in that great blog Caravana de Recuerdos, I recently found this list of the best recent Spanish language fiction, based on a book by Ignacio Echevarria, who admits, in the preface to the book where this list comes from, that these are only very interesting books he happened to read and would like to recommend, and that there is no canon-making intention on his part, since there are many great books and authors (and entire countries) missing.

Anyway, I did some checking of Echevarria's list, and some of the books that DDR, Stiffelio and me suggested as missing from the list posted earlier on this thread, are included in Echevarria's. (By the way thank you Stiffelio for introducing me to Benedetto, I'm greatly enjoying Zama). From the new list's minor writers I heartily recommend short story writer Cristina Fernandez Cubas, her short stories are great, Cortazian tales!.

Comparing the 2 lists, some common 'basic' books emerge:

Jorge Luis Borges' Short Stories
Camilo José Cela's La colmena [The Beehive]
Juan Rulfo's Pedro Páramo [Pedro Páramo]
Ramón J. Sender's Réquiem por un campesino español [Requiem for a Spanish Peasant] (go figure!)
Ernesto Sabato's Sobre héroes y tumbas [On Heroes and Tombs]
Luis Martín-Santos' Tiempo de silencio [Time of Silence]
Julio Cortázar's Rayuela [Hopscotch]
Juan Benet's Volverás a Región [Return to Región]
Gabriel García Márquez's Cien años de soledad [One Hundred Years of Solitude]
Guillermo Cabrera Infante's Tres tristes tigres [Three Trapped Tigers]
Augusto Roa Bastos' Yo el Supremo [I, the Supreme]
Francisco Umbral's Mortal y rosa [A Mortal Spring]

http://caravanaderecuerdos.blogspot.com/2012/02/ignacio-echevarria-on-essential-books.html

The '50s
Juan Carlos Onetti's La vida breve [A Brief Life]
Jorge Luis Borges' La muerte y la brújula [Death and the Compass]
Camilo José Cela's La colmena [The Beehive]
Juan José Arreola's Confabulario [Confabulario and Other Inventions]
Alejo Carpentier's Los pasos perdidos [The Lost Steps]
Carmen Laforet's Siete novelas cortas
Adolfo Bioy Casares' El sueño de los héroes [Dream of Heroes]
Juan Rulfo's Pedro Páramo [Pedro Páramo]
Antonio Di Benedetto's Zama
Virgilio Piñera's Cuentos fríos [Cold Tales]
Rodolfo Walsh's Operación Masacre
José María Arguedas' Los ríos profundos [Deep Rivers]
Francisco Ayala's Muertes de perro [Death as a Way of Life]
Silvina Ocampo's La Furia

The '60s
Felisberto Hernández's La casa inundada
Ramón J. Sender's Réquiem por un campesino español [Requiem for a Spanish Peasant]
Armando López Salinas' La mina
Ernesto Sabato's Sobre héroes y tumbas [On Heroes and Tombs]
Carlos Fuentes' Aura [Aura]
Luis Martín-Santos' Tiempo de silencio [Time of Silence]
Miguel Delibes' Las ratas [Smoke on the Ground]
Julio Cortázar's Rayuela [Hopscotch]
Ignacio Aldecoa's Los pájaros de Baden-Baden
Juan Benet's Volverás a Región [Return to Región]
Gabriel García Márquez's Cien años de soledad [One Hundred Years of Solitude]
Jorge Luis Borges and Adolfo Bioy Casares' Crónicas de Bustos Domecq [Chronicles of Bustos Domecq]
Guillermo Cabrera Infante's Tres tristes tigres [Three Trapped Tigers]
José Revueltas' El apando
Osvaldo Lamborghini's El fiord

The '70s
Alfredo Bryce Echenique's Un mundo para Julius [A World for Julius: A Novel]
Juan Goytisolo's Reivindicación del conde don Julián [Count Julian]
Juan García Hortelano's El gran momento de Mary Tribune
Julio Ramón Ribeyro's La palabra del mudo
Manuel Puig's The Buenos Aires Affair [The Buenos Aires Affair]
Juan Marsé's Si te dicen que caí [The Fallen]
Augusto Roa Bastos' Yo el Supremo [I, the Supreme]
Juan Carlos Onetti's Cuentos completos
Francisco Umbral's Mortal y rosa [A Mortal Spring]
Eduardo Mendoza's La verdad sobre el caso Savolta [The Truth about the Savolta Case]
Mario Vargas Llosa's La tía Julia y el escribidor [Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter]
Jorge Ibargüengoitia's Las muertas [The Dead Girls]
Esther Tusquets' El mismo mar de todos los veranos [The Same Sea as Every Summer]
Carmen Martín Gaite's El cuarto de atrás [The Back Room]
Juan Iturralde's Días de llamas

The '80s
Elena Garro's Andamos huyendo Lola
Juan Benet's Saúl ante Samuel
Cristina Fernández Cubas' Mi hermana Elba
Ricardo Piglia's Respiración artificial [Artificial Respiration]
Juan Eduardo Zúñiga's Largo noviembre de Madrid
Luis Goytisolo's Antagonía
José Donoso's El jardín de al lado [The Garden Next Door]
Juan José Millas' El jardín vacío
Osvaldo Soriano's Cuarteles de invierno [Winter Quarters]
Juan José Saer's El entenado [The Witness]
Camilo José Cela's Mazurca para dos muertos [Mazurka for Two Dead Men]
Alejandro Gándara's La media distancia
Álvaro del Amo's Libreto
Rafael Sánchez Ferlosio's El testimonio de Yarfoz
Antonio Muñoz Molina's Beatus Ille [A Manuscript of Ashes]
Jesús Díaz's Las iniciales de la tierra [The Initials of the Earth]
Fernando del Paso's Noticias del Imperio [News from the Empire]
Javier Marías' Todas las almas [All Souls]
Álvaro Mutis' La última escala del Tramp Steamer [The Adventures of Maqroll: Four Novellas]

The '90s
Álvaro Pombo's El metro de platinio iridiado
César Aira's La liebre [The Hare]
Enrique Vila-Matas' Suicidios ejemplares
Sergio Pitol's La vida conyugal
Ray Loriga's Lo peor de todo
Rafael Chirbes' La buena letra
Javier Tomeo's La agonía de Proserpina
Severo Sarduy's Pájaros de la playa [Beach Birds]
Gustavo Martín Garzo's El lenguaje de las fuentes
Manuel Vázquez Montalbán's El estrangulador
Fernando Vallejo's La Virgen de los Sicarios [Our Lady of the Assassins]
Ignacio Martínez de Pisón's El fin de los buenos tiempos
Germán Marín's El Palacio de la Risa
Francisco Casavella's Un enano español se suicida en Las Vegas
Rodrigo Rey Rosa's Que me maten si...
Alejandro Rossi's La fábula de las regiones
Fogwill's Cantos de marineros en La Pampa
Ramón Buenaventura's El año que viene en Tánger
Roberto Bolaño's Los detectives salvajes [The Savage Detectives]
Rodrigo Fresán's La velocidad de las cosas
Juan Villoro's La casa pierde
Rafael Gumucio's Memorias prematuras
Luis Mateo Díez's La ruina del cielo

The '00s
Sergio Chejfec's Boca de lobo
Belén Gopegui's Lo real
Isaac Rosa's El vano ayer
Mercedes Cebrián's El malestar al alcance de todos
Horacio Castellanos Moya's Insensatez [Senselessness]
Roberto Bolaño's 2666 [2666]
Pedro Lemebel's Adiós, mariquita linda
Colectivo Todoazen's El año que tampoco hicimos la Revolución
Mario Levrero's La novela luminosa
Sergio Bizzio's Era el cielo
Roberto Brodsky's Bosque quemado
Alberto Fuguet's Missing (una investigación)
Luis Magrinyà's Cuentos de los 90
Francisco Ferrer Lerín's Familias como la mía

 

[Stiffelio]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

Thank you Cleanthess for Echevarría's list. It makes a lot more sense than the original one which started this thread. As he said, not everything on his list is 'canon setting' and for some writers I would have chosen other novels than those listed but it's still a good list. I must have read no more than a quarter of the books listed so it's good to have as a reference for future reading.

About Di Benedetto's Zama (which I recommended to you but shamefully haven't yet read!!), you should be happy to know that a film based on it will be made shortly. Lucrecia Martel, the talented Argentine director of La Ciénaga (The Swamp - 2001) fame, has just completed a financing deal for the project. Hopefully, it will be on the screens in 2014.

 

[Stiffelio]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

Let me add that I'm pleased to see Sergio Bizzio on the list. He's a very interesting writer. He's in his 50s and has been writing for a while but publishing with small houses. So I've just discovered him this year. He started off as a poet and scriptwriter for TV shows and films. He has also directed a couple of films. Era el Cielo is a gem of a novel; and so is Rabia (translated into English as Rage). On a gossipy note, Bizzio's partner is the very talented young writer and film director Lucia Puenzo.

 

[Daniel del Real]

Re: best 100 novels in Spanish in the last 25 years

Agree, it's a way better list than the initial. I'm have to do my own and announce my joy for seeing the name of Mexican writer José Revueltas. Brother of musician Silvestre Revueltas, José had this magnificent touch of grim and despair to add to the realism of the so-called "Novela de la Revolución". I think he gave a magnificent twist to this sub-genre and blended it also with traditions and myths. I recommend his novel El Luto Humano (not sure if it's translated).