Alberto Manguel
(Argentina, 1948) is a writer of non-fiction, a journalist and a bibliophile. He obtained international renown with Diary of a Reader, A History of Reading and The Library at Night. Manguel spent his early childhood in Tel Aviv where his father was ambassador. He spoke German and English there and only learnt Spanish on his return to Argentina at the age of seven. Nine years later the blind writer Jorge Luis Borges asked him to read for him and so he developed his great love for literature. Meanwhile he has collected over 30,000 books. Right before the Dirty War he left for Europe where he started a major oeuvre on world literature. He exchanged Europe for Canada and in 2000 together with his books moved to Poitou-Charentes in France. He won numerous prizes for his work, the prestigious French Prix Médicis, among others. www.alberto.manguel.com
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Archive available for: Alberto Manguel
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Alberto Manguel: A Life of Reading
With: Alberto Manguel, Wim Brands
Argentina-born writer and world citizen Alberto Manguel counts as a passionate reader, who manages to convey his love for the written word with contagious enthusiasm. Writing is seduction, writing is an act of resistance, writing is the moment in which the author takes the initiative to enter into an intimate conversation with the reader. An act which is 6,000 years old already. Manguel possesses encyclopaedic knowledge of the history of the book. Which books have changed his life? And whence the urge to elaborate on his passion for the book so meticulously? Wim Brands (Dutch television show 'Boeken') in a tête-à-tête with the writer about his work and passion for literature. In English.
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VPRO De Avonden Live: Alberto Manguel
Interview with the famous Argentinian writer for the VPRO radio programme. Visitors are allowed to peek freely and listen in. In English.
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Forget it!
Writers commenting on the black pages in their country's history. How to deal with the painful questions of the past. Is it the task of writers to investigate them? And if so, are they doing a good job? Isn't forgetting and starting again with a clean slate more effective in order to get ahead? Hanaan as-Sjaykh wrote about the civil war in Lebanon, Alberto Manguel did the same about the dirty war in Argentina while Hans Goedkoop in his book De laatste man (The Last Man) sheds a new light on the Dutch East Indies of the police actions in the late 1940s. David Van Reybrouck talks to them. Musical intermezzo by Kenyan musician Ngwatilo Mawuyoo accompanied by Serigne Gueye and Mark Tuinstra. In English.
