Malva: The unknown story of Pablo Neruda's only child, told from the afterlife

(Paperback)

Available Formats

Publishing Details

Classifications

Physical Properties

Description

Winner of the Fintro Prize for Literature
"Cleverly unravels the myth surrounding Neruda without knocking him off his pedestal, written in sparkling language." JAN
Hagar Peeters, a prize-winning Dutch poet, gives voice to Pablo Neruda's only daughter, Malva, who was terminally ill and abandoned to foster parents in Holland, where she died at the age of eight during WWII. Malva tries to discover how Neruda, the flawless hero of the downtrodden, could deny her existence and how his many biographers could write her and her mother out of history. Only in death can she share her story through her chosen ghostwriter, Peeters, whose own father was a journalist in Chile when Neruda died.
Witty and profound, Malva is a journey backward through history and the Chilean coup, seeing Neruda's mysterious death and the moments that defined him through his daughter's eyes. In her omniscient perspective, Malva is accompanied by other forgotten childrenincluding Daniel Miller; Eduard Einstein; and Lucia, the schizophrenic daughter of James Joyceas she tells her biographer of her small but not insignificant life. Malva transports readers from South America and Civil War Spain to worlds of grace and beauty.
Hagar Peeters (b. 1972) has published several volumes of poetry: Enough Poems Written About Love Today (1999), Suitcases of Sea Air (2003), Runner of Light (2008) and

Maturity

(2011). She has won awards including the J.C. Bloem Poetry Prize, the Jo Peters Poetry Prize and the Poetry Day Prize, and was shortlisted for Dutch Poet Laureate.

Reviews

Peeters impresses with poetic prose full of magical realism, biographical details and psychological insight.
Opzij
There are many parallels between the mute Malva and the language-and literature-loving Peeters in this father-daughter book full of yearning for recognition.
De Limburger
An incandescent and evocative debut.
Trouw
Intoxicating language saturated with warm hues thats allowed to rustle like a veiled wedding dress, and you have a lavish novel by a gifted poet.
De Morgen
Marvelous surrealist novel (...), strongly reminiscent of Allende and Marquez (...), a fascinating patchwork of fiction and history.
De Telegraaf
It only takes half a page to realize that the poet Hagar Peeters is also a novelist of exceptional ability.
NRC Handelsblad, 4-stars
Peeters cleverly unravels the myth surrounding Neruda without knocking him off his pedestal. An original biographical novel. Written, as befits a poet, in sparkling language.
JAN
This phantasmagoric novel by the celebrated Dutch poet Peeters (Maturity, 2011, etc.) is a strange experience, poetic in word and verse [...]Malva's voice is intriguing, having evolved beyond revenge or anger into a deeper acceptance. An evocative portrait of a lost girl demanding agency even in the face of death itself.
Kirkus Reviews
Malvais a hypnotically poetic novel, in Peeterss original Dutch as much as in the translation by Vivien Glass. The afterlife has granted the disabled eight-year-old Malva Marina a precociously eloquent kind of wisdom and a wicked sense of humor.Mute and powerless during her brief earthly existence, shes now chatty and happily omniscient. She barely seems to hold a grudge against her absent, famous father. But shes also ruthless when it comes to his contradictions.
Public Books
The book is as lush with speculative literary history as it is with lyrical prose,picking its way through the sticky webs of family dynamics and revolutionary politics with a focus on neglected figures. [...] As Malva reclaims her fathers pen to tell her story of abandonment, the novel probes the question of how to make sense of Nerudas political outspokenness in light of his silence on the subject of his own mute daughter,revisiting his poetry to find where Malva might fit among all the omissions. Malvais as much a triumphant meditation on disability as it is a fiercely revisionist biography. [...] Peeters misses no chance to show her poetic strength.
Grant Schatzman, World Literature Today
The writing is lyrical, sensuous, animated by Latin passion and flights of the imagination. [] This style sets Malva apart. [ Malva] is a spy ensconced inside [Nerudas] brain, rounding out what we know of him with her own interpretation of his thoughts and motivations, occasionally erupting in anger, more often hurt, yet forgiving. Much as we may love Nerudas poetry, it is chastening to find out that the idol has feet of clay.
Hester Velmans, Full Stop

Author Bio

Hagar Peeters (b. 1972) has published several volumes of poetry: Enough Poems Written About Love Today (1999), Suitcases of Sea Air (2003), Runner of Light (2008) and Maturity (2011). She has won awards including the J.C. Bloem Poetry Prize, the Jo Peters Poetry Prize and the Poetry Day Prize, and was shortlisted for the position of Dutch Poet Laureate. Malva, her debut novel, was awarded the 2016 Fintro Prize for Literature (formerly the Golden Book Owl).