A review of Daniel Chac\u00f3n’s Kafka in a Skirt: Stories from the Wall<\/em><\/p>\n

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Chac\u00f3n throws a burlap sack over the reader\u2019s head then spins the captive around while tossing out verbal hints, defining up and down, left and right, inside and outside, plus a recommended reading taxonomy. Then, the bag is whipped off, the reader\u2019s mind still reeling, and Chac\u00f3n walks away with the suggestion, \u201cDo whatever you want.\u201d And that\u2019s just \u201cthe Hidden<\/em> order of things,\u201d a second chapter-ette introduction to the short story collection whose table of contents lists every story\u2019s page number as \u201c000.\u201d Are you with me so far?<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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Good, because there\u2019s much for readers to sink their teeth into here. These stories are intricately freighted with layered, vivid iconography: insiders, outsiders, haves, have-nots; borders enforced and transgressed; time spent and recalled. Chac\u00f3n dismantles the hardware of time, place, consciousness, and culture then reassembles the components with a curious, often inverted polarity. The result is a high-fidelity picture of bare emotions, explosive transactions, and symbolic reversals, in a Chicano-lensed portraiture. <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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It\u2019s not an easy read. But really, Chac\u00f3n isn\u2019t so much unconventional as anti<\/em>-convention: never mind punctuation and, in many passages, English: if you want the story, then you must fight your way in and take it. A casual reader can strip mine the collection and have an adequately rewarding face-value experience, but the jackpot comes from a deep-drill into the bedrock of Chac\u00f3n\u2019s reconstructed reality.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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For example, in the semiotic hall of mirrors that is \u201clady of the silver lake,\u201d Chac\u00f3n stiff-arms the reader with a Cormac McCarthy-like bare bones punctuation and rudimentary Spanish interspersed with ragged Spanglish. The story arc is an ever-broadening misunderstanding clotted by layers of disparate perception. Misha, the rootless protagonist suspended between Russia and Mexico, lands in L.A. unable to sort out the polyglot, both cultural and linguistic. The common denominator of language becomes entangled with dissimilar cultural valuation: they all speak Spanish but the LatinX resent Misha not addressing them in English, while he can\u2019t understand their resistance to Spanish. Nothing is as it seems when L.A. appears to Misha as a Hollywood film come to life, to Nacho as an X-rated video game, but ultimately, the never-named \u201clady\u201d hurdles them both with a feminist power move. There\u2019s a dreamlike intimation of maternal prostitution (\u201cMisha, go play some more\u201d) which may or may not be the cause of Misha\u2019s and the lady\u2019s incongruent connotations of the term \u201cChicana\u201d that torpedoes their unlikely connection.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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A story pitched even higher and tighter at the batter\u2019s head is \u201cThe Enchanted Tiki Room.\u201d Chac\u00f3n fractures the mirror of introspection\u2014a bit clumsily, as \u201che\u201d in one sentence abruptly morphs into \u201cthe man\u201d\u2014and in the shards Chac\u00f3n conjures an innovative triple simultaneity of past, present, and future. It\u2019s a clever diachronic move that fuses the Bills\u2019s singular consciousnesses into a revealing \u201cnow\u201d forged from a vivid, trifold then.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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There\u2019s more, much more to test-drive in this compact collection. The writing attains a Sherman Alexie-ish caprice of time, place, and semiotics, and without a doubt, Chac\u00f3n masters the art of pacing, imagery, and deft metaphor. Still, one wonders if he mistrusts the reader or perhaps even himself as writer: the second \u201cchapter\u201d spoof pulls the punch of what could be a bold cultural resistance a la Rigoberto Menchu, or a Salman Rushdie outright defiance. The signification of \u201cthe hidden order <\/em>of things\u201d is like a municipally sanctioned graffiti space: if it\u2019s not transgressive, is it really graffiti? If Chac\u00f3n forewarns the gabacho<\/em> reader, is the revolutionary authority compromised? <\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

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That\u2019s just one more elusive uncertainty to be pondered in this challenging but rewarding collection, best read and reread on Chac\u00f3n\u2019s terms, embracing his kaleidoscopic vision. \u201cFor our sake and yours,\u201d urged Nobel laureate Toni Morrison, \u201cforget your name in the street; tell us what the world has been to you in the dark places and in the light.\u201d That\u2019s exactly what Chac\u00f3n has done here, and if readers can hang with that, these stories soar.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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