A foreign country is the past

Fernando Sdrigotti

Summary

The fifteen stories in A Foreign Country is the Past aren't glimpses into worlds, but worlds themselves. Entire lives are spun in each few pages as time reveals itself a strange fiction, everything ever present, leaking from the past into the future and back again. Sdrigotti's prose is immaculate, incisive and evocative with only the most minimal of gestures. The cumulative effect of reading these stories, which may all be in the same country, or same place, is disorienting, dazzling, and – crucially – re-orienting, as we rethink our own pasts, presents, and potential futures.
– C.D. Rose


At a secluded weekend home, a girl becomes entranced by the sound of the cicadas, as she grapples with the stifling summer heat, and her mother's recent death. Overwhelmed by a sense of foreboding, a young man seeks solace in a privatised cathedral, comically navigating religious bureaucracy, economic crisis, and existential angst. A journey to scatter his grandparents' ashes turns into a tragicomedy, as an unnamed man explores the changes in the city he left behind. A Foreign Country is the Past is the sensorial new collection from the acclaimed author of Jolts. Centering on identity and memory, viewed through a distinctive Argentine lens, these fifteen tales are a profound exploration of the spaces between places and the echoes of time.

Available since: 06/05/2025.

Print length: 192 pages.

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