In October and November 2022, Juan Gabriel Vásquez was invited to give lectures at the prestigious Weidenfeld Chair of Comparative European Literature at the University of Oxford, which has previously hosted Mario Vargas Llosa, George Steiner, Umberto Eco, Javier Cercas, and Ali Smith.

In the four presentations collected in this book, Vásquez explores whether literary fiction provides a way of understanding life that is not found in any other cognitive or creative field; whether literature can translate, interpret, and therefore illuminate the world; whether it has the unique ability to clarify the complexity of human experience – the mystery of each life, our connection to the past, our tense relationship with politics – and to transform that interpretation into knowledge.

Essays that ask us to redefine the role of fiction, to understand its mechanisms, and the reasons why it is needed more than ever, while simultaneously demonstrating the great intellectual stature and mastery of the award-winning author.