Arturo Pérez-Reverte
Arturo Pérez-Reverte Gutiérrez, is a Spanish novelist and ex-journalist. He worked as a war reporter for twenty-one years (1973 - 1994). He started his journalistic career writing for the now-defunct newspaper Pueblo. Then, he jumped to news reporter for TVE, Spanish national channel. As a war journalist he traveled to several countries, covering many conflicts. He put this experience into his book 'Territorio Comanche', focusing on the years of Bosnian massacres. That was in 1994, but his debut as a fiction writer started in 1983, with 'El húsar', a historical novella inspired in the Napoleonic era.
Although his debut was not quite successful, in 1988, with 'The Fencing Master', he put his name as a serious writer of historic novels. That was confirmed in 1996, when was published the first book of his Captain Alatriste saga, which has been his trademark. After this book, he could leave definitely journalism for focusing on his career as a fiction writer. This saga, that happens in the years of the Spanish golden age, has seen, for now, seven volumes, where Pérez-Reverte shows, from his particular point of view, historical events from Spanish history in the 16th century.
Apart from these, he also penned another successful works like Dumas Club and Flanders Panel, titles that, among others, made Pérez-Reverte one of the most famous and bestseller authors of Spanish fiction of our era.
“Sabe qual é o problema? Encontramo-nos na última de três gerações que a História tem o capricho de repetir de quando em quando. A primeira precisa de um Deus, e inventa-o. A segunda ergue templos a esse Deus e tenta imitá-lo. E a terceira utiliza o mármore desses templos para construir prostíbulos onde adorar a sua própria cobiça, a sua luxúria e a sua baixeza. E é assim que aos deuses e aos heróis sucedem sempre, inevitavelmente, os medíocres, os cobardes e os imbecis.”
“E agora tinha a certeza de uma coisa vislumbrada ao princípio (...) que não há dois livros iguais porque nunca houve dois leitores iguais. E que cada livro lido é, como cada ser humano, um livro singular, uma história única e um mundo à parte.”
“Os livros são portas que te levam para a rua (...). Com eles aprendes, educas-te, viajas, sonhas, imaginas, vives outras vidas e multiplicas a tua por mil. Quem te oferece mais por menos (...)? E também servem para manter à distância muitas coisas negativas (...) Às vezes interrogo-me como conseguem superar as coisas, aquelas [pessoas] que não lêem.”
“He'd have given a rare incunabulum, in good condition, to punch the face of whoever was writing this ridiculus script.”
“El hombre..., cree ser el amante de una mujer, cuando en realidad es sólo su testigo.”
“En un mundo donde el horror se vende como arte, donde el arte nace ya con la pretensión de ser fotografiado, donde convivir con las imágenes del sufrimiento no tiene relación con la conciencia ni con la compasión, las fotos de guerra no sirven para nada.”
“Gracias a usted ya no puedo creer en las certidumbres de los que tienen una casa, una familia, unos amigos.”
“Nadie debería irse sin dejar una Troya ardiendo a sus espaldas.”
“En cuestiones de arte, el trabajo original del yo tiene más importancia social que la filantropía.”
“...conocía de sobra... los motivos simples por los que un hombre con las dosis adecuadas de fanatismo, rencor o ánimo de lucro mercenario podía matar indiscriminadamente.”
“El mundo nunca supo tanto de sí mismo y de su naturaleza como ahora, pero no le sirve de nada. Siempre hubo maremotos, fíjese. Lo que pasa es que antes no pretendíamos tener hoteles de lujo en primera línea de playa... El hombre crea eufemismos y cortinas de huo para negar las leyes de la naturaleza. También para negar la infame condición que le es propia. Y cada despertar le cesta los doscientos muertos de un avión que se cae, los doscientos mil de un tsunami o el millón de una guerra civil.”
“El hombre tortura y mata porque es lo suyo. Le gusta.”
“Pero el tiempo pasa, y dura. Y hay un momento en que todo se estanca. Los días dejan de contarse, la esperanza se desvanece... Es entonces cuando te conviertes en prisionero real. Profesional, por decirlo de algún modo. Un prisionero paciente.”
“Los filósofos griegos tenían razón al decir que la guerra era la madre de todas las cosas.”
“Mientras hay muerte - apuntó- hay esperanza.- ¿Es otra cita?- Es un chiste malo.”
“Bien mirado, el mundo ha dejado de pensar en la muerte. Creer que no vamos a morir nos hace débiles, y peores.”
“En la guerra sobrevives gracias a los accidentes del terreno. Eso deja un sentido especial del paisaje. ¿No le parece?”
“You don't choose your friends, they choose you, and you either reject them or you accept them without reservations.”
“Actually loneliness has a kind of fascination; it's a state of egotistical, inner grace that you can achieve only by standing guard on old, forgotten roads that no one travels anymore.”
“Because God and the devil could be one and the same thing, and everybody understood it in his own way.”
“You’ve just mentioned the price that has to be paid…Pride, freedom…Knowledge. Whether at the beginning or at the end, you have to pay for everything. Even courage, don’t you think? And don’t you think a lot of courage is needed to fight God?”
“The world is full of banks and rivers running between them, of men and women crossing bridges and fords, unaware of the consequences, not looking back or beneath their feet, and with no loose change for the boatman.”
“...the miser is counting his gold pieces, unaware of Death, who holds two clear symbols: an hourglass and a pitchfork.""Why a pitchfork and not a scythe?""Because Death reaps but the Devil harvests”
“he looked around at the books on the walls, at their dark, worn spines, and he seemed to hear a strange, distant murmur coming from them. each of the closed books was a door, and behind it stirred shadows, voices, sounds, heading toward him from a deep, dark place.”
“Never trust a man who reads only one book.”