Un lugar llamado antaño

"Antaño is a place located in the center of the universe": this novel begins with this phrase. Once upon a time it is a mythical town located in the heart of Poland, a microcosm inhabited by unique and eccentric characters: Genowefa, Espiga, Misia, the Bad Man, Mr. Popielski, Micha, old Boski, Izydor, Florentynka, Ruta, Mrs. Papug, a rabbi who gives a strange Game, invading Cossacks, lost souls who believe they are alive, crazy old women who understand animals, wise dogs like Pepona, horses, cows, guardian angels and even God himself. A Place Called Once, Olga Tokarczuk's third novel, established her as an author of boundless imagination and a fundamental voice in contemporary Polish literature, and she launched it internationally, in an important first step that would lead to two awards awarded in 2018: the Man Booker International and above all the Nobel Prize. Perhaps we could define this novel as a cross between One Hundred Years of Solitude and a Chagall painting. There is realism, magic and magical realism in it. Through its pages parade the history of a century, two world wars, concentration camps... and several generations of human beings moved by passions, desires, doubts and fears. There are births, love affairs, friendship, violence, dignity, betrayals, aging and deaths. There are a thousand and one stories that are told and interwoven in short chapters, a succession of narratives that make up a choral and total novel, in which the heart of the human being, of the History of the world and of life, emerges.