Ernesto Sabato: a conscious choice of words.

• Author: Bach, Caleb
• Position: Argentine existentalist

ERNESTO SABATO'S sober appraisal of the human condition echoes the pessimism so characteristic of his novels. His books are dark, brooding, baroque affairs populated with alienated urban souls who have lost their moral bearings. His protagonists are victims of their own inability to define themselves, to discover some purpose in life. Painfully aware that they have lost their way yet unable to communicate their condition with others, they live a bleak, self-destructive existence clinging to a stunted kind of hope based "on little daily things" (as Angela Dellepiane aptyly puts it).

Like many writers of an existentialist persuasion, Sabato has been chided by critics who feel his "black hope" is several shades too dark. "For Sabato there are no answers," some have said, "for every solution he has nothing but problems." Perhaps, but as this great Argentine writer celebrates his eightieth birthday this year, with his life embracing a vast chunk of the twentieth century, history is much on his side (one hesitates to say he has had the last laugh because for Sabato, smiling does not come easily). Modern man's proclivity, indeed talent, for self-punishment and self-destruction is a central motif in our time and it is central to Sabato's novels, as well.

Despite a somewhat reclusive nature, Sabato has been in the public eye a good deal in recent years. On the one hand, with the passing of Jorge Luis Borges, he has emerged from his compatriot's enormous shadow. On the other and more to the point, Sabato's very substantial role both as a skilled man of letters and his nation's conscience finally has earned him the widespread respect and recognition that he long deserved. Undeniably, President Raul Alfonsin's 1983 appointment of Sabato as leader of the Comision Nacional sobre la Desaparicion de Personas (CONADEP) was a pivotal event. The position required impeccable integrity and a tenacious desire to uncover the truth, all part of a process of national healing in the wake of Argentina's military dictatorship. Despite numerous threats on his life and pressures from all sides, courageously he proceeded in a thorough, balanced, and even-handed fashion, eventually over-seeing the release of the commission's findings in a document entitled Nunca Mas. The prologue, which he wrote himself, was notably eloquent: "The great calamities always are teachers and without a doubt, the most terrible drama suffered in its history by this country, during the period of the military dictatorship that began in March 1976, will serve to make us comprehend that only democracy is capable of protecting a people from a similar horror, that only it can maintain and preserve the sacred and essential rights of the human creature. Only thus will we ensure that in our country the deeds that have made us tragically famous in the civilized world will NEVER AGAIN be repeated."

One year later, in 1984, Sabato received not only the Gabriela Mistrial Prize created by the Organization of American States, but also the prestigious Cervantes Prize for excellence in the Spanish language. The Cervantes award was made in Alacala de Henares, Spain, the birthplace of the man who gave the world Don Quijote. King Juan Carlos presented the award, often called the Nobel Prize of Hispanic letters, on the 369th anniversary of Cervante's death. In his tribute, the Spanish monarch described Sabato as a "literary warrior, a magician with words, wise in the alchemy of Nature's secret fountain."

Sabato had told associates beforehand that he intended to use the occasion to pay homage to Cervantes, describe the role the Spanish language has played in unifying the people of Latin America, and wrestle with "the enigma of fiction" as he likes to call it. In his acceptance speech (from which...