{"id":1523,"date":"2020-06-30T12:10:05","date_gmt":"2020-06-30T11:10:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/?p=1523"},"modified":"2020-06-30T12:10:05","modified_gmt":"2020-06-30T11:10:05","slug":"margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: Margarita Garc\u00eda Robayo, Holiday Heart"},"content":{"rendered":"

Translated from Spanish (Colombia) by Charlotte Coombe (Charco Press, 2020)<\/h3>\n

*Details of the virtual launch of Holiday Heart <\/em>at the end of this post (or click here<\/a> if you can’t wait) \u2013 it\u2019s going to be fabulous \u2013 and free!*<\/h4>\n

Meet Pablo and Luc\u00eda, two extremely unlikeable protagonists whose marriage is breaking down in the wake of Pablo\u2019s infidelity. Although this, like everything else in Margarita Garc\u00eda Robayo\u2019s universe, is a seemingly simple situation which belies deeper emotions and greater complexities that we are invited to scrutinise, however uncomfortable it makes us.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Just as in Garc\u00eda Robayo\u2019s previous collection Fish Soup<\/em><\/a>, the characters in Holiday Heart <\/em>always disappoint: they never do the thing you hope they will do, the thing that might redeem them. Pablo and Luc\u00eda are quite deliberately antagonistic towards one another, and towards almost everyone else around them. Even their twin children Tommy and Rosa are not spared from this: in the first few pages the twins are described as \u201clike two organs, easily removed\u201d, Tommy\u2019s irritating habit of responding to all questions with an apathetic shrug is introduced, and Rosa\u2019s yawning mouth is \u201cwide enough to fit a clenched fist inside.\u201d Maternal tenderness this is not: gestating twins was, according to Luc\u00eda, akin to aliens taking up residence in her body. As for Pablo, he feels excluded from Luc\u00eda\u2019s parasitic relationship with their children, but finds an outlet for his self-pity in energetic sex with a neighbour he doesn\u2019t even like.<\/p>\n

So how did Luc\u00eda and Pablo make it this far? Depressingly, because they just couldn\u2019t be bothered to do otherwise. Their relationship amounts to nothing more than an accumulation of time which has made them strangers to one another: \u201cThe first symptom is disinterest, something miniscule that then becomes normal, and then both people stop wondering why they\u2019re still there, oozing with indifference towards one another, agreeing with what the other says as a formality: the time long gone when what they said seemed interesting. Or worth listening to.\u201d Neither Luc\u00eda nor Pablo can move beyond where they are, even as they believe in the impermanence of everything; their relationship represents no more than \u201cpiles of dead time, which nobody has bothered to clear away.\u201d So don\u2019t be fooled by the deceptively romantic title: a \u201choliday heart\u201d is not a summer fling, but a life-threatening illness. The Spanish title, Tiempo muerto <\/em>(\u201cdead time\u201d) focuses on this notion of relationships as simply an accumulation of time spent together \u2013 wasted time, time that is over. The English title is the one Garc\u00eda Robayo had originally wanted to give Tiempo muerto<\/em>, and works brilliantly; not only does its artful frivolity hint that nothing is as it seems beneath the family\u2019s facade of success and happiness, but its focus on Pablo\u2019s condition \u2013 the single event that crystallises all of this \u201cdead time\u201d \u2013 shows how everything is brought to a head and the veneer cracks irreparably.<\/p>\n

Luc\u00eda and Pablo are caught in the in-between space: they left Colombia to move to the US in pursuit of the American Dream, but its sad and sordid reality is mercilessly exposed (even the fruit is too bright and shiny to be real). They are outsiders there and now belong nowhere: they have rejected their working class origins, but have never ascended the social ladder in the way they hoped; they are stagnating in their location, in their social status, and in their marriage. Middle-aged, middle-class and mediocre, Pablo and Luc\u00eda\u2019s most irredeemable characteristic is that they are, quite simply, racist. It\u2019s uncomfortable at times: I winced at a particular word, which I can\u2019t even being myself to write here. But such words exist, and are used, and if we don\u2019t<\/em> feel uncomfortable reading them then I think we need to ask ourselves why. That itself is one of Garc\u00eda Robayo\u2019s particular talents: she holds a mirror up to her readers, makes us ask how complicit we are in the perpetuation of these loathsome attitudes even as we denounce them. For this is not the overt and brutal racism that makes headlines; rather, this is the insidious everyday racism that allows those vile events to happen by perpetuating a status quo that needs a radical shift. It\u2019s the perspective that is so unsettling: this is not a book that gives voice to black characters \u2013 in fact those who feature are portrayed negatively, because we see the story through the eyes of people who have already judged them. It\u2019s disturbing, and it\u2019s meant to disturb, because it\u2019s all too real and recognisable. I was reminded of images in the news five years ago, of groups of Latina women holding placards stating that \u201cthe silent majority stands with Trump\u201d. I found this perhaps even more chilling than the rallies \u2013 this man despised the \u201csilent majority\u201d for their race, their gender, their class \u2013 and yet they lifted him on their shoulders to become a volatile and divisive world leader. Harmful views expressed publicly can be taken down publicly; it\u2019s the silent ones that go unnoticed, and these are the ones Garc\u00eda Robayo tackles. The real disease is not Pablo\u2019s \u201choliday heart\u201d, but rather the transmission of these attitudes to the next generation: Rosa and Tommy are as apathetic and depraved as their parents \u2013 rejecting Luc\u00eda\u2019s attempt to spend some time with her, Rosa doesn\u2019t want her mother to read, but rather to die, or at least to get very sick, and Tommy screams in public that he doesn\u2019t like black people. I cringed reading these things, but I think that\u2019s the point.<\/p>\n

In a recent interview<\/a>, director Carolina Orloff talked about Charco\u2019s efforts to pair authors with the right translator for their work, and nowhere was this more evident than in Fish Soup<\/em>. Coombe\u2019s connection with Garc\u00eda Robayo\u2019s narrative voice continues in Holiday Heart<\/em>: she explores a wide range of slang both contemporary and (for purposes of characterisation) out-dated, and maintains the delicate balance of Garc\u00eda Robayo\u2019s prose, which switches seamlessly from the understated to the exuberant, the base to the profound. Holiday Heart <\/em>is acute, provocative, concise and raw, and is a short and powerful novel about many things \u2013 time, relationships, identity, infidelity, apathy, parenthood, class, race, gender \u2013 but above all it is a warning: do not be complacent, do not accumulate \u201cdead time\u201d, and do not accept harmful attitudes and stereotypes just because they exist. It offers, like one of the housekeeper\u2019s foot massages, \u201ca combination of pleasure and revulsion\u201d, an opportunity to look inside ourselves and think, with every reaction we have \u2013 what would Pablo and Luc\u00eda do? And then do the opposite.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t miss: the (online) launch of Holiday Heart<\/em> on 7th<\/sup> July! I\u2019ll be talking to Margarita Garc\u00eda Robayo and Charlotte Coombe about writing and translating this gem of a novella, and you can book your (free) virtual ticket here<\/a>.<\/h3>\n
Review copy of Holiday Heart <\/em>provided by Charco Press<\/h6>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Translated from Spanish (Colombia) by Charlotte Coombe (Charco Press, 2020) *Details of the virtual launch of Holiday Heart at the end of this post (or click here if you can’t wait) \u2013 it\u2019s going to be fabulous \u2013 and free!* Meet Pablo and Luc\u00eda, two extremely unlikeable protagonists whose marriage is breaking down in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[195,199,233,415,587],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nReview: Margarita Garc\u00eda Robayo, Holiday Heart - Translating Women<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Review: Margarita Garc\u00eda Robayo, Holiday Heart - Translating Women\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Translated from Spanish (Colombia) by Charlotte Coombe (Charco Press, 2020) *Details of the virtual launch of Holiday Heart at the end of this post (or click here if you can’t wait) \u2013 it\u2019s going to be fabulous \u2013 and free!* Meet Pablo and Luc\u00eda, two extremely unlikeable protagonists whose marriage is breaking down in the […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Translating Women\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-06-30T11:10:05+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blogs.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/files\/2020\/07\/holiday-heart.png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Mark\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Mark\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"6 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/\",\"name\":\"Review: Margarita Garc\u00eda Robayo, Holiday Heart - Translating Women\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/601\/2020\/07\/holiday-heart.png\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-06-30T11:10:05+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2020-06-30T11:10:05+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/#\/schema\/person\/f55c794873afd5892e3c96ddf775f5b2\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/601\/2020\/07\/holiday-heart.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/601\/2020\/07\/holiday-heart.png\",\"width\":2500,\"height\":3777},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Review: Margarita Garc\u00eda Robayo, Holiday Heart\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/\",\"name\":\"Translating Women\",\"description\":\"INTERNATIONAL | INTERSECTIONAL | ACTIVIST | FEMINIST\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/#\/schema\/person\/f55c794873afd5892e3c96ddf775f5b2\",\"name\":\"Mark\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c8bc2e4b4cd54966c634a0cda0b58382?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c8bc2e4b4cd54966c634a0cda0b58382?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Mark\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/university-of-exeter-new.onyx-sites.io\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/author\/rxizfitwrt\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Review: Margarita Garc\u00eda Robayo, Holiday Heart - Translating Women","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Review: Margarita Garc\u00eda Robayo, Holiday Heart - Translating Women","og_description":"Translated from Spanish (Colombia) by Charlotte Coombe (Charco Press, 2020) *Details of the virtual launch of Holiday Heart at the end of this post (or click here if you can’t wait) \u2013 it\u2019s going to be fabulous \u2013 and free!* Meet Pablo and Luc\u00eda, two extremely unlikeable protagonists whose marriage is breaking down in the […]","og_url":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/","og_site_name":"Translating Women","article_published_time":"2020-06-30T11:10:05+00:00","og_image":[{"url":"http:\/\/blogs.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/files\/2020\/07\/holiday-heart.png"}],"author":"Mark","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Mark","Est. reading time":"6 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/","url":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/","name":"Review: Margarita Garc\u00eda Robayo, Holiday Heart - Translating Women","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/601\/2020\/07\/holiday-heart.png","datePublished":"2020-06-30T11:10:05+00:00","dateModified":"2020-06-30T11:10:05+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/#\/schema\/person\/f55c794873afd5892e3c96ddf775f5b2"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/601\/2020\/07\/holiday-heart.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/601\/2020\/07\/holiday-heart.png","width":2500,"height":3777},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/2020\/06\/30\/margarita-garcia-robayo-holiday-heart\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Review: Margarita Garc\u00eda Robayo, Holiday Heart"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/#website","url":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/","name":"Translating Women","description":"INTERNATIONAL | INTERSECTIONAL | ACTIVIST | FEMINIST","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/#\/schema\/person\/f55c794873afd5892e3c96ddf775f5b2","name":"Mark","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c8bc2e4b4cd54966c634a0cda0b58382?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/c8bc2e4b4cd54966c634a0cda0b58382?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Mark"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/university-of-exeter-new.onyx-sites.io"],"url":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/author\/rxizfitwrt\/"}]}},"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1523"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1523\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/translatingwomen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}