THE BALLAD OF THE SAD CAFE
'Brilliant ... a panorama of a remarkable talent ... McCullers's finest stories' The New York Times
Few writers have expressed loneliness, the need for human understanding and the search for love with such power and poetic sensibility as the American writer Carson McCullers, and The Ballad of the Sad Café collects her best-loved novella together with six short stories, published in Penguin Modern Classics.
Miss Amelia Evans, tall, strong and nobody's fool, runs a small-town store. Except for a disastrous marriage that lasted just ten days, she has always lived alone. Then Cousin Lymon appears from nowhere, a strutting hunchback who steals Miss Amelia's heart. Together they transform the store into a lively, popular café where the locals come to drink and gossip. But when her rejected and dangerous ex-husband Marvin Macy returns, the result is a bizarre love triangle that brings with it violence, hatred and betrayal. Among other fine works, the collection also includes 'Wunderkind', McCullers's first published story written when she was only seventeen, about a musical prodigy who suddenly realizes she will not go on to become a great pianist.
MODERN CLASSICS
Carson McCullers was born in 1917. She is the critically acclaimed author of several popular novels in the 1940s and '50s, including The Member of the Wedding 1946 . Her novels frequently depicted life in small towns of the southeastern United States and were marked by themes of loneliness and spiritual isolation. McCullers suffered from ill health most of her adult life, including a series of strokes that began when she was in her 20s; she died at the age of 50. The Member of the Wedding was dramatized for the stage in the 1950s and filmed in 1952 and 1997. Other films based on her books are Reflections in a Golden Eye 1967, with Elizabeth Taylor and Marlon Brando , The Heart is a Lonely Hunter 1968, starring Alan Arkin and The Ballad of the Sad Café 1991 .
Edad recomendada: Adultos.
MCCULLERS CARSON
Carson McCullers, nacida Lula Carson Smith en 1917 en Columbus, Georgia, fue una destacada escritora estadounidense. A los 23 años alcanzó la fama con su primera novela, El corazón es un cazador solitario, donde exploró temas como la soledad, la incomunicación y la vida de los marginados en el sur de EE. UU.
A lo largo de su carrera escribió novelas, cuentos, obras de teatro y ensayos, destacándose también Reflejos en un ojo dorado y La balada del café triste. Su estilo, cercano al gótico sureño, se caracteriza por personajes excéntricos y una profunda sensibilidad emocional.
McCullers vivió una vida marcada por la enfermedad y el dolor físico, pero nunca dejó de escribir. Falleció en 1967 a los 50 años, dejando un legado literario que sigue conmoviendo por su humanidad y profundidad.
