Joesph Walser’s machine by Gonçalo M. Tavares

Joesph Walser’s machine by Gonçalo M Tavares

Portuguese Literature

Orignal title -A Máquina de Joseph Walser

Translator – Rhett McNeil

Source – personal copy

I am going to try and focus mainly on Portuguese writing this Spanish/Portuguese lit month. As for me, I felt it has been a country in Europe that, as a blog, I haven’t focused on or reviewed enough books from over the time I have blogged. But also, it is a country that isn’t mentioned much. I got a couple of novels from Gonçalo M Tavares. When I first came across him, I read Jerusalem, another book from this series of books he called his Kingdom series. They are all set in an unnamed country of vaguely Germanic country. His fellow Portuguese writer Jose Saramago said he would win the Nobel prize. His books have inspired plays art, videos and operas. I didn’t get around to reviewing Jerusalem, but I will get it reviewed at some point, as his other books are hard to get hold of now.

“No one wears shoes like that anymore.”

How many times had Joseph Walser heard that phrase in the last two weeks? What was going on? He had worn these shoes, or similar ones, for years. No one had ever bothered him about them before. No one had ever before cared about his shoes in the least, neither their color nor shape. Why now?

“I don’t care about your shoes or your ideas, do you understand, my dear Walser? What I told you yesterday isn’t important to me, but it is extremely important to you. Can you see the difference?

Can you see the difference that exists between the two of us?

Between my shoes and your shoes, between my ideas and your ideas? I’m not interested in your shoes and I’m not interested in your ideas. But you’re interested in my ideas; that’s the difference between us, you see

His shoes this made me smile as for me they always say oh your laces is loose as it is alway undone

The book opens with the lines that he was a strange man. That strange man was the lead character of the novel Joseph Walser a man living in an unnamed city. He is a man of routine and habits. But also the style of Joesph’s shoes, which are an older style. He is a man that stands out in a crowd. But what happens when the city he lives in is suddenly invaded? How will this man of routine be? As the world around him dissolves and the people and world he knows to start to change, he just wants to follow the routine of working on his machine and then, in the evening, play a game with people he knows. The chapters see little by little how he copes as one more thing is thrown in his way and in the way of his routine. What happens when a character stepping out of a lowry is stuck in a war?

Joseph Walser went out every Saturday night to Fluzst M.s house, where he played dice for low-stakes bets with three other work-mates. The five men all worked at the same factory. They were all low-level employees and made average wages. Over the years their passion for games of chance had brought them together. There was no exceptional friendship among them, but they rarely missed a Saturday. The amounts being bet in the game could be considered small, when compared with other underground games around the city, but in proportion to their wages the amounts were large. All five men were married; for the players, their wives were the most difficult thing about their gambling. There wasn’t a single wife who didn’t complain about her husband losing a certain amount of money in the game.

More of his routiune life here

Now, I have read this through my eyes. I am going through the process of a late diagnosis of Autism, having done several tests and scored high in them. So autism is in my mind at the moment, and when I read about Joesph Walser, it was like, yes, this guy is so autistic his life is led by a routine, but it seeing how he copes, which he does, but you can always see he may be on the verge of melting down as the world he knows collapse around him. This is a nod to how that war machine interferes with a man-machine in Joseph’s daily routine. Add to that his collection the hyperfocus a lot of autistic people have. Outside as ever, I connect with the book I am reading. This is just how I read. Connections over the distance between different worlds and lives give me the greatest pleasure. Still, that thread that runs between the fictional world and mine really connects me with literature in translation, which is, of course, my area of hyperfocus.I imagined Waslser as a lowry-like matchstick man marching through his city to his machine every day, and how would that connect to the horror of an invasion happening? Have you read any books from Tavares?

Winston’s Score B is a vital book with an exciting but mundane character’s reaction when his routine world is smashed and changed. Need to read more of this series.