Let me issue a caveat on the translation of my countryman Onetti's finest book, which I originally read in Spanish. Rendering the invented word "Juntacadáveres" as "Body Snatcher" doesn't really make sense, since it seems to hint at a grave robber or something like that. "Corpse collector" would be a much better translation, the nickname referring to a man who runs a brothel full of old, ugly, depressing prostitutes. I cannot comment on the rest of the translator's work, since I haven't read it, but if the very title is badly translated, how good can the book itself be?

This said, I highly recommend this book, whose grim, surreal atmosphere will appeal to readers in search of unconventional, well-crafted writing.

I read this book just after completing Kerouac's "on the road" - but when I finished Body Snatcher I said to myself "To hell with beat culture - this is real literature". I was just stunned by the class of Onetti's writing. He is in the class of Marquez and creates a fantastic canvas like Marquez. The topic of the book is very simple and the whole story is set up in a town where life is drag and prosaic but Onetti brings a strange tone of suspense which will keep you hooked to the book. When in any author tries to look into a topic from several view points and builds up the story in these view points -the story tends to become divergent in nature. Onetti never looses the tight control of the plot. I also admire the translation - I do not how far it is true to its Spanish version but it is definitely good piece of translation. Long time back I read a book called "Body Watching" by Desmond Morris, where he describes human behavior through pictures - Onetti can be described as the literary counter part of Morris. Every essential movement of every character is described without boring the reader. Of coarse you will not find the twist and beauty of the language that you find in authors like Steinbeck, Paul Auster but may be the Spanish version has those qualities - you never know. If you get a chance buy this book. I just pray to God that some body does the same justice with translation to Akutagawa and his writings.

This book was fist published in 1950 (yes, 50 years ago!) and although it has not achieved the "fame" as others latin american books that later exploded in the so called boom, ABL was the first in many things:

1) It created the concept of a new way to write. The mixture of reality and fiction and then this two again (but is this not magical realism?) permits the reader to ellaborate many a book within the book, as then a lot of writers did

2) Onetti is usually "benchmarked" with Faulkner. Yes, they both created their own space (Santa Maria) but there is where the similarities stop. Santa Maria is the first Macondo, the newest, paradoxically, way to be at leisure in its own territory.

3)Onetti's book was not an instant hit, but in certain circles , and thru viral marketing, ABL virtually dissappeared. The same happened later with other books, especially with the first edition of 100 years of Solitude.

Finally, ABL created the first step in the ladder of extraordinary works of art that came out of Latin America in the 50/60s, that, again, was badly depicted as a boom. It was more the creation of a new current, and a new way to say, new, and old things.

This book will allow you to fully understand this period, and it will open and broaden the way you read

Asi es, la vida breve, primer novela de Onetti es fundamental para entender de manera propicia el resto de sus novelas y cuentos desarrollados en la mitica ciudad de Santa Maria (La Yoknapathoupa de Faulkner o la Macondo de Marquez). Eso es clarisimo, pero aparte la vida breve es el proceso de creacion, la via crucis, el viaje por los infiernos que todo escritor emprende para salir de ellos con todo un mundo nuevo gestado en ellos.

As a Uruguayan reader and book-lover, I take offense at an editorial review by the Library Journal which, in spite of its literary name, doesn't seem to have bothered to check the accuracy of the information it gives about books' authors. F.Y.I., Juan Carlos Onetti was not Argentinian. He was Uruguayan, and ranks with his countrymen, the literary geniuses Horacio Quiroga, Eduardo Galeano and Felisberto Hernández, in originality and quality of craftmanship. I can only say how sorry I am to see erroneous information happily published online, to the confusion and misguiding of readers.

This is a grim, gloomy and creepy but strangely attractive novel, very much representative of sixties' angst and the feeling that spread over the world during that time: the void of existence. This stream produced very good -and very bad- books, some of the best being those of Camus and a few others. Onetti is certainly one of the least known -especially outside the Spanish-speaking world- and best writers of this generation.

"The Shipyard" is the miserable story of a defeat foretold, to paraphrase García-Márquez, whose style is so far away from that of Onetti. Larsen, a fiftysomething man, is back in the fictitious Uruguayan town of Santa María, after five years of exile imposed by the governor. He is workless and depressed, but nonetheless he has a plan: to become General Manager of the local shipyard, owned by one Jeremías Petrus, and marry this guy's dumb daughter. And so he proceeds with his plan, showing up everydat at work, where he only interacts with his two co-workers, two men with no history and no future who seem to dislike him but nevertheless share meals with him. There is really nothing to do at the shop, since the business has been bankrupt for a number of years. Petrus insists the shipyard will be back in business soon, but we readers know it will never happen.

Is this novel any good? I say yes. Of course, as a philosophical school Existentialism is condemned to failure, ... -if it's true that life has no possible meaning at all. The characters are unlikable, with the possible exception of Larsen himself in a strange fashion. There is really no plot and we all know right from the start that the novel can not have any happy ending. Where is then the strength of the book? Well, in that it is very well written. Onetti reveals himself as a truly good creator of moods, environments, images. He has the power of taking you right there and making you see, hear and smell the same as the characters. His prose is direct, straight and non-experimental, thank God, since his is no magical realism at all but pure, crude and rude realism. The interest of the reader is sustained by the curiosity to see what will become of poor but somehow brave Larsen. I would say that, as far as Existentialism was able to produce good writing, this is one of the best bets you have.

This is a Latin American classic read in most literature courses.
Best read in Spanish. The detailed use of words helps to better describe and understand the complete picture, the actions are relfected as a small part of what goes on.
Im no critic, just an interested reader and wish for all to take an interest in this book

It's a shame that Onetti's oeuvre is almost unknown outside the Spanish-speaking countries, maybe because it is the complete opposite of the much popular magic realism and the way we think about Latin-American literature in general. His most famous work, The Shipyard could have been written by an European author, and even its setting could be anywhere in the world, it is so out of time and place. There are no examples of tropical flora or fauna here, and the story is also opposed to the Marquez-like swirling of fascinating anecdotes and fantastic stories. It simply tells the story of Larsen a. k. a. Juntacadaveres, or Corpse Collector (who earned his name because he ran a brothel with ugly and old prostitutes) returning to his hated city, and get a job in a wrecked shipyard, out of service from years and then... nothing happens. Still this nothing is fascinatingly described in long, carefully written sentences. All the characters in the story are old, ugly and tired, they try to do something but halfway they realise that everything is worthless. They know that everything they do is only part of a farce just like running a factory that had been bankrupted long ago. There are no real dialogues here, the recurring phrase during this fake dialogues is He lied This may sound depressing and it is depressing, not recommended for those who hope the best days of their life are only coming. But it is also a great mirror to our behaviour, how we stick to things we know are not true, how we want to believe in things that are long gone.

I had to read this novel for my Spanish capstone class and we only had a week to do it. It starts off a bit slow and you have to remember whose point of view it is written in and he may or may not be telling the complete truth. The end is a bit suprising but i had to re read it several times to make sure i got it. all in all it was pretty good!