The book I am currently reading
Per Olov Enquist’s The Chamber Doctor’s Visit (I don’t know the title in English; the Spanish one means that). It is set in 18th-century Denmark, and, as I had to travel there I thought it would be appropriate reading. Also a way to get acquainted with that Swedish author.
The book that changed my life
The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne, as I translated it into Spanish when I was about 25. It took me two years.
The book I wish I’d written
Too many: Joseph Conrad, Marcel Proust, George Eliot. But perhaps still more Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s The Leopard. It was the author’s only novel, so it seems more “feasible”.
The book that influenced my writing
Again, Tristram Shandy. I learned almost everything about novel writing, and that a novel may contain anything and still be a novel.
The book that is most overrated/underrated
Ulysses by James Joyce is overrated, as it was not a very new thing, but the peak of old-school realism. Richard Hughes’s A High Wind in Jamaica is underrated. It should be considered an absolute masterpiece everywhere.
The book that changed my mind
Proust always changes your mind. Vladimir Nabokov too.
The last book that made me cry
I very seldom cry while reading. Perhaps Rainer Maria Rilke’s The Duino Elegies, a long time ago, when I was younger and more sensitive.
The last book that made me laugh
Some of Thomas Bernhard’s novels. He is often seen as gloomy, but I find him extremely funny, and deliberately so.
The book I couldn’t finish
Not many, I am very disciplined. But I recently gave up after reading Karl Ove Knausgaard’s first 300 pages.
The book I’m ashamed not to have read
Titus Livy’s History of Rome and Edward Gibbon’s The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. But I still plan to read them, some day.
My earliest reading memory
Richmal Crompton’s Just William books. They were a great success in Spain. I loved them.
My guilty pleasure
PG Wodehouse. I devote too much time to reading him, now and then. Ian Fleming as well.
The book I give as a gift
Joseph Conrad’s The Mirror of the Sea. In Spanish (as I translated it, too, a huge task). A most wonderful book, not so well known in English.
The book I’d like to be remembered for
Posterity has become something of the past, not of the future.
• Berta Isla by Javier Marias (Hamish Hamilton, £18.99). To order a copy for £16.33, go to guardianbookshop.com or call 0330 333 6846. Free UK p&p over £10, online orders only. Phone orders min. p&p of £1.99.
