• Skip to main content
  • Skip to header right navigation
  • Skip to site footer
  • Magazine
  • Our Story
  • Buzz Learning
  • Buzz TV
  • Contact Buzz
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • YouTube
Buzz Magazine

Buzz Magazine

What's On in Wales - Your Ultimate Guide

  • Culture
    • Art
    • Books
    • Comedy
    • Dance
    • Film
    • Music
    • Sport
    • Theatre
    • TV
  • Life
    • Reviews
    • Interviews
    • Travel
    • Food & Drink
    • Community
    • Environment
  • Regions
    • South Wales
    • Mid Wales
    • West Wales
    • North Wales
  • What’s On
  • Culture
    • Art
    • Books
    • Comedy
    • Dance
    • Film
    • Music
    • Sport
    • Theatre
    • TV
  • Life
    • Reviews
    • Interviews
    • Travel
    • Food & Drink
    • Community
    • Environment
  • Regions
    • South Wales
    • Mid Wales
    • West Wales
    • North Wales
  • What’s On

  • Magazine
  • Our Story
  • Buzz Learning
  • Buzz TV

  • Contact Buzz
  • Write for Buzz
  • Advertising
  • Jobs
  • FAQs
  • Privacy Policy

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • YouTube
You are here: Home / Culture / Books / Pleasingly jarring with a raw naivety – OLDLADYVOICE | BOOK REVIEW

Pleasingly jarring with a raw naivety – OLDLADYVOICE | BOOK REVIEW

November 3, 2021 Category: Books, Reviews
Elisa Victoria
Elisa Victoria
Oldladyvoice - Elisa Victoria
Oldladyvoice – Elisa Victoria

The title of Oldladyvoice derives from a passage in this, Elisa Victoria’s debut novel, in which the preteen protagonist is knocked back by a group of would-be playmates and mocked for her supposedly deep speaking tones, what they call her “old lady voice.”

RELATED: ‘Uršuľa Kovalyk’s The Equestrienne is a YA story about a young girl finding her passion on the backdrop of communist Czechoslovakia.’

By this point, we’ve clocked there’s a secondary meaning, as nine-year-old Spaniard Marina narrates her life with a pleasingly jarring combination of unlikely maturity (industrial language, knowledge of the peculiarities of adult society) and raw naivete (her mother – also named Marina, as is her grandma – has bouts of life-threatening illness, which the child fields with a puzzled shrug). All this in a register a little like Holden Caulfield, which may be attributable to Spanish-to-English translator Charlotte Whittle.

It requires a tightrope to be walked, having a kid pontificating like an adult without the results tipping from ‘good weird’ to ‘bad weird’. Marina thinks and talks of sex, indeed sexualises herself, but only a chronically bad-faith reading of Oldladyvoice would conclude anything dubious. The novel is set in Seville circa 1993, with occasional flashes of contemporaneousness (references to the Gulf War and Dragon Ball Z) but generally preoccupied with the enduring cogs of childhood. Your speech patterns aged nine probably weren’t much like Marina’s, yet her essential thought processes might get a twinge of recognition.

Oldladyvoice, Elisa Victoria [trans. Charlotte Whittle] (And Other Stories)

Price: £11.99. Info: here
words NOEL GARDNER

KEEP READING: ‘Sammy Wright’s book Fit casts a grim but absorbing view into young, contemporary Britain with mixed levels of detail.’

Advertise with us.

We have a range of options across print and digital.

Learn More
  • Tweet

About Noel Gardner

Noel is the listings, reviews, music and books editor at Buzz and has been doing some or all of these things here since the days of dial-up internet. He was raised in Cornwall, lives in Cardiff and that is more or less all he has ever known.
More

Tag: And Other Stories, buzz book review, Charlotte Whittle, Elisa Victoria, Noel Gardner

You may also like:

Captivating true story BELLE GREENE brings forgotten Black trailblazer to light

Sophie Buchaillard’s debut novel THIS IS NOT WHO WE ARE sheds fresh light on colonialism

STILL BORN presents a moving & nuanced exploration of motherhood

BAD EMINENCE: James Greer’s biting irony is unlike anything else you’ve read

APERTURE: Llanelli Fleet Street photographer memoir collects front line snapshots

Alium

Business is blooming at Barry’s ALIUM – and keeping THE HUMBLE ONION spirit alive


Sidebar

Looking for something to do?

The Ultimate Guide to What’s on in Wales!

See What’s On
BTP - Campaign

Buzz archives

Buzz Magazine

12 Gaspard Place
Barry
Vale Of Glamorgan
CF62 6SJ

[email protected]

Contact Us
  • Jobs
  • Advertising
  • Editorial
  • Submit an Event
  • Write for Buzz
About Us
  • Our Story
  • Magazine
  • Buzz Learning
  • Media Services
  • FAQs
  • Privacy Policy
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • YouTube


Copyright © 2022   |   All Rights Reserved   |   Buzz Magazine   


We are using cookie tracking to give you the best experience on our website.

You can find out more about which cookies we track and personalise your preferences in settings.

Powered by  GDPR Cookie Compliance
Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies so that we can provide you with the best user experience possible. Cookie information is stored in your browser and performs functions such as recognising you when you return to our website and helping our team to understand which sections of the website you find most interesting and useful.

Strictly Necessary Cookies

Strictly Necessary Cookie should be enabled at all times so that we can save your preferences for cookie settings.

If you disable this cookie, we will not be able to save your preferences. This means that every time you visit this website you will need to enable or disable cookies again.