Coffee & Complexity

Long After Midnight at the Niño Bien

I’ve rediscovered the joy of books. 2008 was one of the most reading-light years for me since 19933/4, when doing an English degree had burned the desire to read out of me. However, in the closing weeks of last year, I rediscovered my urge to read, and went for it. I’m determined to keep it up into 2009, and kicked off with a book I’d had sitting around for a few months:

It’s a travel book, which is not a genre I spend much time on. But it’s also a book about the tango, which is a dance I’ve enjoyed enough in my life to have started a (slightly moribund) blog about it. It traces the experiences the author, Brian Winter, has in Buenos Aires over the course of a couple of years. It’s only a slice of his life, as the main focus is on meetings and dances held in the small hours of the morning in various smoky tango clubs. You get little, tantalising hints of the rest of his life there, the journalism and the friends and the social life, but the focus in on both tango and the growing economic crisis in the country during his stay there.

By drawing these two threads out in parallel, Winter strives to find some hint of the Argentine character and the roots of the crisis by exploring the history of the county as it is hinted at through the lyrics of the tango. But that story, compelling as it is, is driven by his own exploration of the tango, and his growing obsession with the dance and with a beautiful tango instructor. 

This is a curious book, part-journalism, part-memoir, and part travel writing, but the combination works well and draws you into the city, the dance and the culture. I’m not sure it makes me want to visit Buenos Aires, but I certainly enjoyed visiting it through Winter’s writing.

Tags: Books, dance, tango, travel