Mario Benedetti died yesterday

Murió Mario Benedetti http://www.bbc.co.uk/mundo/cultura_sociedad/2009/05/090517_2205_muerte_benedetti... (incl. video)

Uruguay mourns writer Benedetti http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8055181.stm

And http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/18/AR2009051802822....

I regret to say I have at this point nothing in my stacks....

ditto-The Truce souund interesting.

I do have something ("Gloria’s Saturday") here, in this:

http://www.librarything.com/work/329147/book/6909925

Bert, for what it's worth I think The Truce (La tregua) is a wonderful novel. It's one of the first latin American novels I ever read and perhaps have a soft spot for it because of that. Nothing I have read by Benedetti since has quite matched The Truce, though I have enjoyed his poetry too.

Yes, La tregua is a wonderful novel. It's the journal of an older man, a widower, who lives in Montevideo and meets a younger woman at the office. It's hard to describe it in a way that would, say, make you want to rush to the bookstore and buy it, but it's definitely worth your time. I've heard it's not easy to find in English, though, which is a shame. Maybe it will be reissued...

I saw the other day that a new edition of his short stories is available under the name The Rest is Jungle and Other Stories. I've got a couple of his other books on my shelf waiting to be read as well.