The Robot

by Roberto Bolaño

translated by Laura Healy



I remember Plato told me
and I didn’t pay attention.
Now I’m in death’s nightclub
and there’s nothing I can do:
space is a paradox.
Nothing can happen here
and yet here I am.
Just a robot
with an unspecified mission.
An eternal work of art.

El Robot

Recuerdo que Platón me lo decía
y no presté atención.
Ahora estoy en la discoteca de la muerte
y no hay nada que pueda hacer:
el espacio es una paradoja.
Aquí no puede pasar nada
y sin embargo estoy yo.
Apenas un robot
con una misión sin especificar.
Una obra de arte eterna.



SOURCE: Bolaño, Roberto. “The Robot,” in The Unknown University, complete poetry in Spanish with English translations by Laura Healy (New York: New Directions, 2013), Part One, Nothing Bad Will Happen to Me, p. 263; “El Robot,” p. 262. (835 pp.)


Macedonio Fernández
poem by Roberto Bolaño

Science fiction poems
by Roberto Bolaño

Ferdydurke in Catalan
by Roberto Bolaño

Mi vida en los tubos de supervivencia /
My Life in the Tubes of Survival

by Roberto Bolaño

Review: Roberto Bolaño’s ‘The Spirit of Science Fiction’
by Ralph Dumain

The Pointless 'Illogic of Kassel': A Review
by R. Dumain

An Ars Poetica? (excerpts) by Sergio Pitol

Jorge Luis Borges: Selected Study Materials on the Web

Karel Čapek’s R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots), 1920-2021
Guide compiled by Ralph Dumain

Science Fiction & Utopia Research Resources: A Selective Work in Progress

‘World Literature’: A Bibliography

Offsite:

Roberto Bolaño - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Borges, Bolaño and the Return of the Epic
by Aura Estrada, trans. T. G. Huntington


Home Page | Site Map | What's New | Coming Attractions | Book News
Bibliography | Mini-Bibliographies | Study Guides | Special Sections
My Writings | Other Authors' Texts | Philosophical Quotations
Blogs | Images & Sounds | External Links

CONTACT Ralph Dumain

Uploaded 4 August 2022

Site ©1999-2023 Ralph Dumain