A startling book-length essay, at once grand and intimate, from National Book Award finalist Nona Fern�ndez.
Voyager begins with Nona Fern�ndez accompanying her elderly mother to the doctor to seek an explanation for her frequent falls and inability to remember what preceded them. As the author stares at the image of her mother's brain scan, it occurs to her that the electrical signals shown on the screen resemble the night sky.
Inspired by the mission of the Voyager spacecrafts, Fern�ndez begins a process of observation and documentation. She describes a recent trip to the remote Atacama desert--one of the world's best spots for astronomical observation--to join people who, like her, hope to dispel the mythologized history of Chile's new democracy. Weaving together the story of her mother's illness with story of her country and of the cosmos itself, Fern�ndez braids astronomy and astrology, neuroscience and memory, family history and national history into this brief but intensely imagined autobiographical essay. Scrutinizing the mechanisms of personal, civic, and stellar memory, she insists on preserving the truth of what we've seen and experienced, and finding ways to recover what people and countries often prefer to forget.
In Voyager, Fern�ndez finds a new container for her profound and surreal reckonings with the past. One of the great chroniclers of our day, she has written a rich and resonant book.
Show moreA startling book-length essay, at once grand and intimate, from National Book Award finalist Nona Fern�ndez.
Voyager begins with Nona Fern�ndez accompanying her elderly mother to the doctor to seek an explanation for her frequent falls and inability to remember what preceded them. As the author stares at the image of her mother's brain scan, it occurs to her that the electrical signals shown on the screen resemble the night sky.
Inspired by the mission of the Voyager spacecrafts, Fern�ndez begins a process of observation and documentation. She describes a recent trip to the remote Atacama desert--one of the world's best spots for astronomical observation--to join people who, like her, hope to dispel the mythologized history of Chile's new democracy. Weaving together the story of her mother's illness with story of her country and of the cosmos itself, Fern�ndez braids astronomy and astrology, neuroscience and memory, family history and national history into this brief but intensely imagined autobiographical essay. Scrutinizing the mechanisms of personal, civic, and stellar memory, she insists on preserving the truth of what we've seen and experienced, and finding ways to recover what people and countries often prefer to forget.
In Voyager, Fern�ndez finds a new container for her profound and surreal reckonings with the past. One of the great chroniclers of our day, she has written a rich and resonant book.
Show moreNona Fernández was born in Santiago, Chile. She is an actress and writer, and has published two plays, a collection of short stories, and six novels, including Space Invaders and The Twilight Zone, which was a finalist for the National Book Award.
Natasha Wimmer is the translator of nine books by Roberto Bolaño, including The Savage Detectives and 2666. Her most recent translations are Nona Fernández's The Twilight Zone and Sudden Death by Álvaro Enrigue. She lives in Brooklyn, New York with her husband and two children.
"Another one-of-a-kind blend of the personal and political. . . .
Throughout, Fernández's focus is on the connections between lost
memories, black holes and history's 'ghosts.' . . . Chile -- and
readers everywhere -- should be grateful."--Anderson Tepper, The
New York Times Book Review
"Together, Space Invaders, The Twilight Zone, and Voyager function
like the twin probes collecting information with every sensor at
their disposal, while simultaneously telling a story that says:
This is who we were; this is what it was like. To record your
experiences and tell your story, regardless of scale, serves as a
reckoning with a past that so many have tried to bury."--Amanda
Paige Inman, The Nation "Comparing neural patterns' microscopic
rendering of memory to the designs and the stories we create/locate
in the universe's origins, Fernández opens a path through myth,
science, and history and their intersections."--Heather Bowlan,
Anarchist Review of Books "'Who are we? Where are we going? Where
do we come from?' In finding poetic answers to those queries,
Fernández documents the history of her homeland and aids her ailing
mother (whose epilepsy diagnosis brought additional complications),
all while musing on the intricacies of the universe. The result is
a moving reflection that's scientific, cerebral, and
spiritual."--Publishers Weekly "[Fernández] is an expert at weaving
seemingly disparate topics together, at finding their common
threads. . . . Wherever this great writer (and translator!) wants
to take us, I'm there."--Katie Yee, Literary Hub "In precise yet
elegant prose that shirks melodrama, Fernández renders crisp and
lingering images that orient us to the changing surroundings of the
book's steady orbit. . . . She circumvents the oversentimentality
that is so often the downfall of stories about family and memory,
by constructing a scope that expands and contracts like breath in
the body."--Claire Calderón, Los Angeles Review of Books
"Past atrocities still threaten our present. The answer, Fernández
suggests, is to document the ugliness and beauty of where we've
been without flinching--a message to anyone coming after. Hello,
here we are, don't forget us."--Morgan Graham, Chicago Review of
Books "[An] ambitious, often dazzling memoir. . . . Astronomy;
astrology; astrophysics; neuroscience -- each of these is
incorporated into a dizzying but sublime poetics that holds Voyager
together, like a constellation woven into the fabric of the night
sky."--Financial Times (UK) "Voyager is a captivating memoir that
not only offers a deeper understanding of one of Chile's most
acclaimed writers, but also a new insight into the history and
resilience of the Chilean people."--New Statesman (UK)
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