The Savage Detectives

Note:  This is a work in progress.  All page references are to the 2008 Natasha Wimmer English translation, published by Picador/Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
This edition can be purchased here.

I began this project in an attempt to keep track of the many characters and relationships that are described in this section of the book.  It should be noted that as of this writing, I have not yet finished the novel and thus, some sections may be woefully incomplete.  Sorry about that.  This project was started on December 29, 2008.

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All characters appear in the order in which they are introduced.

Part 2

Amadeo Savatierra
January, 1976 ("Calle República de Venezuela, near the Palacio de la Inquisición, Mexico City")
Pages: 143, 165, 184, 206, 224, 250, 281, 309, 374, 396, 421, 485, 586

Old poet.  A contemporary of Octavio Paz and Cesarea Tinajero.  Member of the Stridentist ("estridentistas") movement in the 1920's.  Arturo and Ulises interview him about Cesarea.  Amadeo also has the only evidence of Cesarea's poetry.  The three share many drinks while Amadeo spins stories.


The Amadeo interviews bookend this section of the book.  

Perla Avilés

January, 1976 ("Calle Leonardo da Vinci, Colonia Mixcoac, Mexico City")
Page(s): 145


May, 1976
Page(s): 166 

Laura Jauregui

January, 1976 ("Tlalpan, Mexico City")
Page(s): 148


May, 1976
Page(s): 172 


March, 1977
Page(s): 217

Fabio Ernesto Logiacomo

April, 1976 ("editorial offices of the magazine La Chispa [The Spark], Calle Independencia and Luis Moya, Mexico City")
Page(s): 152

Luis Sebastián Rosado

March, 1976 ("La Rama Dorada coffee shop, Colonia Coyoacán, Mexico City")
Page(s): 155

July, 1976 ("lawn party with lights in the grass at the Moore's house, more than twenty people, Colina Las Lomas, Mexico City")
Page(s): 173

March, 1979 ("a dark office, Colonia Coyoacán, Mexico City")
Page(s): 287

March, 1983 ("a dark study, Colonia Coyoacán, Mexico City")
Page(s): 384

Alberto Moore

April, 1976 ("Calle Pitágoras, Colonia Narvarte, Mexico City")
Page(s): 162

Alberto Moore called Luis Rosado to tell him that Luscious Skin had been killed.  Alberto's sister, Julita, had been Luscious Skin's on-and-off-again lover since he had left Luis Rosado.

Carlos Monsiváis

May, 1976 ("walking along Calle Madero, near Sanborn's, Mexico City")
Page(s): 164

Luscious Skin

May, 1976 ("in a rooftop room on Calle Tepeji, Mexico City")
Page(s): 170

Bi-sexual.  
Luscious Skin was killed by police in a raid on a boarding house in February, 1984 (in Tlanepantla).  Half his face was blown off.

Angelica Font

July, 1976 ("Calle Colima, Colonia Condesa, Mexico City")
Page(s): 177

April, 1979 
Page(s): 291

Manuel Maples Arce

August, 1976 ("Walking along the Calzada del Cerro, Chapultepec Park, Mexico City")
Page(s): 180

The father of Stridentism

"...boys, this was what Manuel Maples Arce's prose was like, hurtling and incendiary, full of words that got us hot and bothered, prose that might not mean anything to you now, but that in its day captivated generals of the Revolution, stalwart men who had seen death and who had killed and who when they read or heard Manuel's words were stopped in their tracks, stopped cold, as if to say what the hell is this, prose that promised poetry like the sea, the sea in the skies of Mexico."

-Amadeo Savatierra (p.225)

Wikipedia article for Manuel Maples Arce 

Barbara Patterson

September, 1976 ("in a room at the Hotel Los Claveles, Avenida Niño Perdido and Juan de Dios Peza, Mexico City")
Page(s): 181

March, 1981 ("in her kitchenm Jackson Street, San Diego, California")
Page(s): 340

October, 1982 ("in the kitchen of her house, Jackson Street, San Diego, California")
Page(s): 365

Joaquín Font

October, 1976 ("Calle Colima, Colonia Condesa, Mexico City")
Page(s): 185

January, 1977 ("El Reposo Mental Health Clinic")
Page(s): 207

March, 1979 
Page(s): 285

April, 1980
Page(s): 316

March, 1983 ("psychiatric hospital La Fortaleza, Tlanepantla, Mexico City") 
Page(s): 379

September, 1985  
Page(s): 388

August, 1987 ("Calle Colima, Colonia Condesa, Mexico City") 
Page(s): 400

Jacinto Requena

November, 1976 ("Café Quito, Calle Bucareli, Mexico City")
Page(s): 186

March, 1979 
Page(s): 286

July, 1982 
Page(s): 361

September, 1985
Page(s): 387


María Font

December, 1976 ("Calle Colima, Colonia Condesa, Mexico City")
Page(s): 191

February, 1981 ("Calle Montes, near the Monumento a la Revolución")
Page(s): 333

Auxilio Lacouture

December, 1976 ("Faculty of Literature, UNAM, Mexico City")
Page(s): 195
    
    Self-described "mother of Mexican poetry."  From Uruguay, came to Mexico City in roughly 1965 (she's not 100% on this).  First met Arturo when he was sixteen years old.


Joaquín Vázquez Amaral

February, 1977 ("walking on a university campus in the American Midwest")
Page(s): 209


Lisandro Morales

March, 1977 ("Calle Comercio, in front of Jardín Morelos, Colonia Escandón, Mexico City")
Page(s): 211

January, 1980 ("pulquería La Saeta Mexicana, near La Villa, Mexico City")
Page(s): 314

Rafael Barrios

May, 1977 ("Café Quito, Calle Bucareli, Mexico City")
Page(s): 221   

March, 1981 ("sitting in his living room, Jackson Street, San Diego, California")
Page(s): 339  

September, 1982 ("in the bathroom of his house, Jackson Street, San Diego, California")
Page(s): 339  



Felipe Müller

May, 1977 ("Bar Céntrico, Calle Tallers, Barcelona")
Page(s): 228

January, 1978 
Page(s): 252

October, 1991 ("sitting on a bench in Plaza Martorell, Barcelona")
Page(s): 447

September, 1995 ("Bar Céntrico, Calle Tallers, Barcelona")
Page(s): 526


Simone Darrieux

July, 1977 ("Rue des Petites Écuries, Paris")
Page(s): 228 

September, 1977 
Page(s): 243, 245

Hipólito Garcés ("Polito")

August, 1977 ("Avenue Marcel Proust, Paris")
Page(s): 236 

Roberto Rosas

September, 1977 ("Rue de Passy, Paris")
Page(s): 240 

Sofía Pellegrini

September, 1977 ("sitting in the Jardins du Trocadero, Paris")
Page(s): 244 

Michel Bulteau

January, 1978 ("Rue de Téhéran, Paris")
Page(s): 246

Mary Watson

January, 1978 ("Sutherland Place, London")
Page(s): 253

Alain Lebert

December, 1978 ("Bar Chez Raoul, Port-Vendres, France")
Page(s): 269

Normal Bolzman

October, 1979 ("sitting on a bench in Edith Wolfson Park, Tel Aviv")
Page(s): 297

Heimito Künst

May, 1980 ("in bed in his attic apartment on the Stuckgasse, Vienna")
Page(s): 318

José "Zopilote" Colina

March, 1981 ("Café Quito, Avenida Bucareli, Mexico City")
Page(s): 343

Veronica Volkow

April, 1981 ("with a female friend and two male friends, International Departures, Mexico City DF airport")
Page(s): 345

    Great-granddaughter of Tolstoy.

Alfonso Pérez Camarga

June, 1981 ("Calle Toledo, Mexico City")
Page(s): 346

Hugo Montero

May, 1982 ("having a beer ar the bar La Mala Senda, Calle Pensador Mexicano, Mexico City")
Page(s): 349

Xóchitl Garciá

January, 1984 ("near the Monumento a la Revolución, Mexico City)
Page(s): 381

January, 1986 
Page(s): 391

Andrés Ramírez

December 1988 ("Bar El Cuerno de Oro, Calle Avenir, Barcelona)
Page(s): 406