There is a lot of beauty in the jungle-shrouded cliffs on the edge of the Pacific Ocean, but it is a deceptive beauty.
The wild nature looks beautiful on the outside, but up close it dawns on prey, injures, shortens, swallows, and only occasionally returns the one who took it, or its body.
Similar illusions are also expected for those who look sideways at the lives of humans in this remote part of Colombia.
The muscular bodies, the matter-of-fact everyday life, the folklore - this beauty is also immersed in poverty and cruelty.
Pilar Quintana best describes these in the novella "The Bitch" - her fifth book, but the first to be published in Hebrew (Hargul Publishing, Spanish: Michal Shalev).
Quintana's book, a native of Cali, Colombia, has already been translated into 16 languages and was named one of Latin America's most promising writers at the British Literary Festival "Hay" and has won numerous awards in the Spanish-speaking world.
She knows the landscapes, people, and hardships she describes in "The Bitch" closely because she spent nine years in a cabin on the oceanfront, on the border between civilization and the wild forest, and lived without electricity or water - just as the book's protagonist, Demaris, lived.
But this assumption may be inaccurate, because Quintana, after all, is a white, urban, educated woman who voluntarily chose to live almost detached from anything she had known before.
Demaris, on the other hand, is a black woman, and even there, in the depths of poverty and neglect, her skin color places her in the most inferior position possible.
Demaris lives with her husband in a home abandoned by a wealthy family (or rather, a little less poor).
She is married to Ruhali, a man who often describes his violent outbursts - especially towards animals - but he also has a soft side, which is revealed in surprising places, especially when Demaris, who unfortunately fails to conceive, needs comfort.
The impending pregnancy is accompanied by a burning sense of failure, inside and out - because relatives, neighbors and acquaintances also see Demeris as someone who is not realizing her life, and feel sorry for her when she decides to adopt a bitch:
She was exactly the size of her palms, she smelled of milk and she made a very strong desire to hug her and cry. '
The same bitch, who gave the book its name, forces Demaris to deal with quite a few questions related to motherhood, jealousy, her capacity for containment and the limits of her cruelty she is capable of.
Although the reality she describes is difficult, Quintana's writing is beautiful.
"We are animals"
"The story takes place in a place two hours' drive away and another hour's sailing from the city where I was born," Quintana says in a zoom call.
'But he's actually farther from New York.
This is an area that the Colombian government has forgotten.
The nature there is amazing, but there is no infrastructure, no roads, the schools are poor.
It is one of the rainiest places on earth, but there is no running water.
Most of the residents are native or black who were brought to work in gold mines as slaves, and no one cares about them. '
And in an even lower and more neglected place than these are the women, for example Demaris, the heroine of "The Bitch."
Do they even have a chance to change their status in this area?
'When I lived there I saw a few women who managed to get out of there and study at university, and through education build a better life.
But it is very rare.
Most remain very poor and cannot leave the area. '
What made you move there?
'After graduating from Bogota, I traveled the world for three years, feeling like I wanted to live a simple life.
I love nature and I wanted to experience it up close, in a free way of life - one that would leave me plenty of free time to read and write.
To finance city life I had to work hard and pay bills.
In the jungle I collected rainwater, built my wooden hut with my own hands, the food was cheap - I bought fish from fishermen, I did not need too many clothes. '
According to your descriptions, he who lives this way is largely a hostage of nature.
"This is true.
I contracted malaria, and other types of unpleasant tropical diseases.
It was difficult, but as a writer I am very interested in examining our animal aspect, humans.
We are sure we are different from animals, superior, and I think we are completely animalistic, despite our intelligence.
Life there allowed me to find my place, as an animal no different from the animals around me.
Nature has taught me my place. '
What made you come back?
'I was married then to a very violent man.
I had to take my computer, very few objects, and run away from it.
I was scared for my life.
He is originally from Ireland, and we met on a trip to India and Nepal, from where we traveled to Australia and returned to Colombia. '
And along this winding road you worked packing mangoes, and also handling jaguars.
'When I was in Bolivia, I worked in a wildlife sanctuary, where they tried to rehabilitate previously captured jaguars in order to return them to the jungle.
It's not easy, but there are also cases where jaguars manage to return to wildlife on their own. '
In "The Bitch" you describe human relationships with dogs. There is concern and care, but also demands and disappointment. No one treats them like pets.
'When I was growing up, I did not see people in Colombia who had close ties to animals, only those who raised animals for guarding, for escort.
That has changed, of course, and today in cities in Colombia pets are part of the family.
When urban and western people think about nature, they are convinced that it is the same thing - nature is beautiful and we are supposed to love everything in it, and they do not know that when you live in nature not everything is harmonious, and in fact you must be aggressive to survive.
Between tenderness and cruelty.
A dog in a building in Bogota,
"You can not just admire the animals - you must learn the lifestyles of those who have lived there for generations, disperse poison so that termites do not eat your house, and go out into the jungle equipped with a machete to put a limit and tell the animals there: so far. You do not cross this line. '
Illuminate another violence
In fact, Demaris exceeds this limit, and for a moment treats the dog as if she were a real baby, disappointing her.
'She's discovering what I know, for example, as a mother of a seven-year-old: that right now he thinks I'm a superhero and the best mother in the world, but that will soon change and he's starting to think I'm completely stupid and old-fashioned, and he's ashamed of me.
It is a fracture that is difficult for the mother to digest, even if the 'baby', ostensibly, is a puppy.
Demaris is unable to go to therapy, unable to even express anger openly, and her reaction is an expression of all that she is forced to stifle within herself.
She's not a more violent woman than all of us, we just have other avenues to express hard feelings. '
You describe scenes of violence against women, which is accepted as fate. Were they born from your personal experiences?
'No, they were born from the fact that the violence is so natural to Colombia, and the wars that take place in it are accompanied by so much blood and horror - that such violence, inside the house, is almost invisible.
She looks so small and unimportant compared to what happens outside, in the streets.
I'm asked why I do not write about wars and politics and violence, and the answer is that I want to highlight the other violence, against women, that we do not even raise an eyebrow when it occurs. '
Did your book reach the same remote settlement where you lived and wrote about?
'There are not many literate people there, but when I came to talk about the book in a nearby town, the whole crowd was made up of black women, and they stood up in astonishment when I went in and read' What?
Are you not black?
can not be!'.
And yes, that's a compliment, of course. '
Were we wrong?
Fixed!
If you found an error in the article, we'll be happy for you to share it with us