Yo, Yo y Yo by Juan Filloy

 


Yo, Yo y Yo was first published by the author in a private edition in 1971 when he was age seventy-seven. As you can see, as with all his many novels, the title consists of seven letters. Yo, Yo y Yo is a rare literary treat. We're given a preface and seven hilarious "monodialogues" in which Juan Filloy displays a sumptuous use of language and Rabelaisian humor rare in Argentine literature. The novel is comprised of the following chapters: Me and the architect, Me and the Motherland., Me and the anonymous, Me and Walt Disney, Me and the underworld, Me and the intruders, Me and oratory.

Since no English translation exists, I had to do my own translation (one of the ways I'm learning Spanish). With this in mind, I think it best if I focus on the preface and specific chapters and link my comments to direct quotes. Here goes:

Preface (Exordio)
We're given several truths about how things stand in our modern world. This preface surely serves as something of a warning. The author's provocative exordium compressed (by me) in several quick strokes:

All men and women suffer from a collective neurosis and we're alienated both from our own inner nature and those people and things around us. Yet we remain placid, perhaps out of laziness or because we're bound to sex and our own lack of courage and sanity. But alas! if someone rings the bell of our phobias and manias, then the psychic tremor occurs.

“Every paranoid is the lonely monk in a devilish convent.” I don't know exactly what the author (perhaps Juan Filloy, perhaps Yo, Yo y Yo or perhaps a combination of all) is getting at here, but it certainly sounds intriguing.

Lastly, as good, willing patients, we should follow the advice on the label of the prescription vial (the sign off to this preface): to maintain good health, do not read more than one monodialogue per day.

Me and the Architect (Yo y el arquitecto)
In conversation with an architect, the narrator, a gent I'll refer to as Yo3, launches a tirade against the coarseness and stupidity of modern day humans and what passes for society and (ha, ha) civilization.

“Ah, from that early man, homo simplex, a primitive and hairy being that did not tremble at anything, we have come to this vibrating filth with emaciated health that is our current day homo patheticus.”

Yo3 goes on to point the finger at one prime culprit accelerating the downfall of the mountain of clowns and dolts that pass for humans: architecture, both the construction of individual dwellings (homes, apartments, duplexes) and the planning (ha! complete joke) and development of cities, an unmitigated series of botches and screw ups where inhabiting a space supplants the act of living.

And what happens when Yo3 outlines his plan for the type of house he himself would like the architect to build for him so he can serve as a model in the art of living? In the architect's own words: “What you need is an insane asylum, an expressionist madhouse. Let someone else do it!”

Me and the Motherland (Yo y la Madre Patria)
Yo3 doesn't hold back. He goes on the attack when it comes to Spain and Spain's relationship to Latin America. Here are two juicy quotes:

“The behavior of the mother country regarding the intellectual sovereignty of Latin America is tendentious and vexatious. Since she has definitively lost all political preeminence over Latin America, her boasting pushes her to haughtily maintain her presumed spiritual seniority.”

“Latin America is the great dump!”

Me and Walt Disney (Yo y Walt Disney)
For me, this section of Juan Filloy's novel was a hoot and a half, reminding me of philosopher Theodor W. Adorno's famously proclaiming Walt Disney being the most dangerous man in America. Oh, yes, Adorno loathed the way commercial interests standardize artistic and aesthetic enjoyment by pressing low-level conformity on an entire population for the purpose of maximizing sales and profits. Yo3 would be in wholehearted agreement.

In this chapter, Yo3 pays a visit to a psychotherapist and asks to be given drugs so the doctor can record his artificially induced dream. You see, Walt Disney always figures in Yo3's dreams with obsessive stubbornness and Yo3 would like, with the help of the doctor, to decipher the hidden message. The doctor agrees. Yo3 is given the necessary drugs and, under the influence, begins his rant against Walt Disney (a slam that takes up a full twenty pages in the novel). Here are a few snatches:

"The comic is the contradictory result between what is expected and what is produced. This never happens in his films. We always known in advance what will happen. It amounts to the overflow of the grotesque; it's the apotheosis of the absurd. And the morals imposed by the Yankee national committee, the Yankee mindset which controls the ethics of public entertainment."

"I feel compelled to clarify. A taboo has been constructed around Walt Disney. This unanimous praise is catastrophic. The few of us who disagree - two or three for every million - must suffer the earthquake of a vehemence that is very similar to the cheers of a crowd of rock music fans. What a stupendous phenomenon is the hubbub of enthusiasm!"

"And there's that taboo. Walt Disney is surrounded by the roar of the crowd which is in stark contrast to the modesty of the connoisseurs. He's supported by fiery arguments that fatten without nourishing. Few can discriminate and win when going up against the superior power of other, more ingenious and subtle competitors. Nobody will legitimize other cartoons that have aesthetic quality and an undeniable grace. It's hard to persuade Coca-Cola fans that there are superior concoctions. They aggressively reject logical and reasoned arguments. They are a rabble of mediocres who rally in the defense of everything mediocre."

"I am a man of exuberant imagination. I don't need anyone to imagine for me. Sure, I accept some creations of fantasy, some aspects of illusion as ways to fire my imagination; however, my imagination refuses to adapt to the many aspects of commercialism or to that directed by religious or political image-makers."

I've just touched on several aspects of Filloy's novel. Did I mention Rabelaisian humor? Yo, Yo y Yo will prove a delightful, comic romp written by one of the most overlooked of Latin American authors. Highly recommended.


Argentine author Juan Filloy, 1894-2000 (yes, he lived to be 106)