Tango 101 Reading List

When I first began to be swept up by tango and it became a metaphor for everything, I found few books available on the subject that expressed what I was feeling (so, naturally I wrote my own). Eventually I realized that no one book can capture tango’s essence—just as no one book captures what Zen is (or isn’t). Now, however, I’m pleased to see the bookstore’s shelves accumulating volumes that reflect the many different personal takes on tango. I’m slowly working my way through them as they appear. Here is a handful of recommendations (check back for more):

Kiss and Tango, looking for love in Buenos Aires, by Marina Palmer This book, an enjoyable read, is at turns funny, sad, witty, dark, and always sexy and intimate. Her one-woman quest for one perfect man—on and off the dance floor—recalls Erica Jong’s entertaining novel, Fear of Flying. Marina’s book is written in diary form and is a highly personal and mesmerizing insider’s view of tango, milongas, and the dancers.

The Temptation to Tango: Journeys of Intimacy and Desire by Irene D. Thomas and Larry M. Sawyer This handy guide delves into tango’s “lure” and is also a practical guide with loads of information on tango etiquette, festivals, and events. The chapters are interspersed with Larry’s short fiction which captures various aspects of the ever elusive tango experience. You don’t have to be (or have been) Catholic to love the story of the secret tango life of a Catholic priest.

Argentina, a Traveler’s Literary Companion, Edited by Jill Gibian (Whereabouts Press, Berkeley, Calif. 2010) –   If you travel as I do, not consulting guidebooks (in fact, avoiding them), but showing up and seeing what happens, this portable book is for you. Argentina is an anthology of the literature of that country. It tells you more, shows you more, and  penetrates a culture faster, more accurately, more deeply than a dozen guidebooks ever could or would dare to. The writers whose works you’ll encounter include some of the world’s greats: Jorge Luis Borges, Julio Cortazar, and Luisa Valenzuela. Marcelo Birmajer’s The Last Happy Family not only put me smack in the middle of the gritty Once barrio of Buenos Aires where I often went while living there. But it also shed some light on why it’s so gritty. This is no-holds-barred literature that deepens one’s understanding of a culture beyond the surface and superficial stories that make the rounds all too often. Other stories in the 234-page volume take you out to the provinces. As the book jacket notes, the collection of 18 stories takes you “on a literary journey that climbs the Andes Mountains, navigates the great River Plate, traverses the expansive plains of the Pampas, and explores the ever-changing landscape of the Patagonia as it extends south to Tierra del Fuego.”

Argentina‘s Editor Jill Gibian is Professor of Spanish and Latin American Studies at Eastern Oregon University. She is a Fullbright Scholar committed to the study and translation of the literature and culture of the River Plate region of Argentina and Uruguay. And, best of all (for some of us!), she is interested in tango and questions of memory and national identity. Watch for her forthcoming book, Tango-Lit: Parodies of Passion, with its focus on tango as cultural text.

Paper Tangos, Julie Taylor This book gives a chilling portrait of what it must have been like to try to dance tango in Buenos Aires under the military dictatorship (1976 to 1983), when public gatherings were forbidden. It’s not an easy read. It took me a while to get into this book because the various threads were not clearly woven together. The author hints at a violent father but never completely develops that thread. “Paper” tangos refers to little cryptic handwritten notes she found in her coat pockets some time after they were put there. They were cryptic to avoid arousing police suspicion.

Tango, The art history of love by Robert Farris Thompson This is the most academic of all the tango books. It’s a great reference guide and I recommend any tango devotee include it on her/his shelf. It’s full of well researched information on the various origins of tango, the music and its composers, and the dance. It’s not a book I would read leisurely. Thompson’s thesis—that the contribution of Africans to tango has been underexposed and undervalued—is both interesting and compelling. I especially appreciate this book for its indepth index, indispensable in a book of this nature, with so many terms and proper names.

TangoZen By Chan Park – I recently had the pleasure to meet and dance with Chan Park at a few of the popular milongas here in Buenos Aires where he’s been living and teaching “walking dance meditation” — aka tango.

We exchanged books and I was pleased to receive a copy of his compact work, about 173 pages of inspiration, famous Zen and dance quotes (Suzuki Roshi, Martha Graham, Buddha), and many black and white photos of tango dancers in contemplative tango poses.

“Tango is a walking dance—a special gift from Argentina to the world,” Chan writes in his introduction. “Can one meditate while moving around instead of sitting down?” he asks.

Of course, the answer is yes and Chan gives further explanations of Zen and tango and their parallels and overlaps. What’s nice about this edition is that it is bi-lingual—in English and Castellano, translated by Elisa Rosales. This edition is published by Kier.

For more info on Chan Park’s classes contact him directly (he’s about to head to Europe for a while):

tangozenAThotmailDOTcom – his web site: www.tangozen.com.