If tango is not in your blood, you probably don't know what the word milonga means. That's why you title Milonga of passionate shadows it can turn you away from the new "Laguna" book, or it can draw you in to find out what it is. Especially since it says in the subtitle And that's tango.
Elem: Milonga is an Argentinian folk music composition similar to tango, and is one of the 24 terms related to tango that the book Milonga of passionate shadows present Ksenia Bilbia and Branko Andjić on the examples of as many Spanish-American stories by excellent writers loved by many of us - from Julio Cortázar and Jorge Luis Borges to Ana Maria Shua and Luisa Valenzuela.
The book is therefore for enjoyment. It is full of passion, music, encounters, sadness and many, many good stories. Those that are appropriated and remembered. This is a book about the soul of tango.
Cabaseo, such a delicate movement
It starts with Cabbage. It is, the authors explain in the introductory text, "a discreet nod of the head, a movement that best evokes the secretive multi-layered nature of tango and with which the lady confirms that she will accept the invitation to dance and that the gentleman will not be exposed to public rejection. Of course, considering that we are in the twenty-first century and that feminism has done something for gender equality in recent decades, some of the storytellers in this anthology also give an alternative story of seduction, which is reflected in the term femitang. The book ends with the term bandoneon, an extravagant instrument without whose magic tango is unimaginable".
And this is how the Argentine writer Luisa Valenzuela describes cabeseo in a story Tango:
"The one on the left, a little hidden behind the pillar, nods my head. It's such a delicate movement, as if he barely, lightly, lowers his ear to his own shoulder and listens to him. I like him. I like the man. I smile openly at him and he just now gets up and approaches. One cannot ask for excessive boldness. None of those present here would dare to be rebuffed face to face, no one is ready to return to his place rejected, followed by the mocking smiles of the others. This one knows that he has me, so he approaches me with long steps and up close I don't like him that much anymore, he is quite old and has an unpleasant demeanor."
About the unsaid
Want more? Julio Cortazar in the story Heaven's Gate he writes about transcendence, about what is unsaid that cannot be seen, what is felt between movement and floating between two people who share eternity, a game that immerses you in the world of emotions and intuition.
Borges' story The man from the pink corner the authors of this collection explain the smackers, they are guapo and compadrito, which was a symbol of masculinity in Buenos Aires at the end of the 19th and the beginning of the last century. "I played with a girl who followed me as if she was reading my thoughts. Tango did what he wanted to us and carried us, and lost us, and led us again and found us again," he writes in this story.
And so. All the same tango madness in all 24 stories. The unforgettable, which is not found anywhere else except in tango
PS I know that some consider this book by Ksenija Bilbije and Branko Andjić a textbook. I agree, it certainly is.
