Is it possible that the most modern, most startlingly avant-garde novel to appear this year was originally published in 1881?Parul Sehgal, New York TimesNow considered a progenitor of South American fiction, Machado de Assiss highly experimental novel is finally rendered as a stunningly contemporary work. Narrating from beyond the grave, Brs Cubasan enigmatic, amusing and frequently insufferable antiherodescribes his childhood spent tormenting household slaves, his bachelor years of torrid affairs, and his final days obsessing over nonsensical poultices. Rejuvenated (Pradeep Niroula, Chicago Review of Books) by Margaret Jull Costa and Robin Pattersons fresh new translation, Posthumous Memoirs of Brs Cubas is a work of acerbic mockery and deep pathos that offers a birds-eye view of how Machado de Assis launched the canon of modernist fiction.Sprinkled with epigrams, dreams, gags and asides, the story teases, dances and delights.Economist