They say that there are only three or four or five topics for literature, but maybe there's only one: belonging. Perhaps all books can be read in function of the desire to belong, or the negation of that desire. To be part of or stop being part of a family, of a community, a country, of Chilean literature, a football team, a political party, a rock band, the fan club of a rock band, or at least a group of scouts. That's what we write about when we're given a free topic, and also when we think we are writing about love, death, travel, telegrams or suitcases with swivel wheels. That's what we always talk about, seriously or in jest, in verse and in prose: belonging.
Alejandro Zambra, from ‘Free Topic’ (speech given at the Dept. of Communications and Literature in Diego Portales University, 2016), Not to Read (trans. Megan McDowell)
