They say that envy is the national Spanish sin (avarice would be the Catalan one). This week I’ve used my evenings to read, out of envy, María Dueñas’s best-selling novel El tiempo entre costuras (2009). Why the envy? Well, Dueñas is one of us: a teacher at the English Department of the Universidad de Murcia. [I haven’t been able to understand, though, from the Department’s website what she teaches and does research on. Most news reports refer to her as a teacher of ‘Filología Inglesa.’ Peculiar.] Yes, most teachers of (English) Literature are frustrated writers who end up acknowledging that it’s always much better to teach good books than to write trashy ones, particularly for readers. There are many exceptions, of course. David Lodge used to be an outstanding academic and now he’s a very successful novelist. One of my neighbours on the floor above –Spanish Department– is the illustrious Carme Riera, professor, poet and novelist. She’s the kind who writes excellent academic work and gets invited to attend conferences celebrated on her honour as a writer. One of its kind, really.
I myself do not write fiction and hardly ever have, feeling always inclined to writing essays, even as a little girl. What kills me about Dueñas’s case, at any rate, are two overlapping matters: how she found the time to write 640 pages (this also applies to writing essays), and why isn’t her quite average novel much better. El tiempo entre costuras is an immense popular phenomenon that has made Dueñas only second to Ken Follett in the Spanish middlebrow territory with this, her first novel. She’s already sold more than one million copies, enough to consider, as a friend from the University of Murcia told me, retiring from teaching at 47 (that’s slightly older than myself, and possibly the source of my deep envy!!). The TV series by Antena 3 with –of course!– Adriana Ugarte (La Señora) as the spy-cum-seamstress heroine will be soon released and, I’m sure, will dramatically increase the sales of the book. Its appeal, to be frank, is quite easy to understand: this is a novel about a likeable, pretty heroine who moves from Madrid to Tetuán and back to Madrid, between the Republic, the Civil War and its aftermath. Sira Quiroga undergoes quite a personal and professional transformation, which includes not just her work as a couturier but also as an improvised spy for the Brits during WWII.
This is the kind of book that, because it’s easy to read, seems easy to manufacture. Well, if it were there would be 1,000 María Dueñas, and that’s not the case –in which I find some comfort. Or not. A colleague who teaches creative writing informs me that a novel like this one –cliché-ridden, with the seams showing particularly where historical information and characters are introduced and with an unlikely first person narrator– can be managed in two months (research apart). Maybe she’s stretching the point but my own point is that I don’t know any university teacher who has two solid months for writing a year, not even counting August. Unless you cut yourself off email and escape from all teaching duties in July, which used to be the case, not anymore. A friend and novelist, Carme Torras, explained to me that she puts aside one day a week for her writing, plus the holidays. I have no idea what method Dueñas follows and no journalist has asked her.
The other matter is the quality. A friend who specialises in detective fiction, Isabel Santaulària, tells me that given the window of opportunity (the two famous months) we might put thread to the needle and write a publishable novel. Publishable, perhaps, to be proud of I doubt it. Happy, lucky Dueñas seems very proud indeed of her work and suitably baffled by its success, and I understand that very well –how could I not? Yet, I would not have put my name on the cover of that novel or a similar one for I would not want others to think of me what I think of Dueñas: that her novel will not do.
This is envy for you.