the brand-new, Peruvian “sleek New Yorker-esque nonfiction magazine” Etiqueta Negra, which features, among others, our favorite flower girl:
“I don’t read Spanish so all I could respond to was the idea and feel of the magazine,” says New Yorker magazine staff writer Susan Orlean, who didn’t let a language barrier stop her from having her work translated and published in Etiqueta Negra. “Language aside, it’s one of the best-looking magazines I’ve ever seen.”
Many of the contributing English-speaking writers are scouted by Peruvian American writer Daniel Alarcon (“War by Candlelight”), who runs a sort of North American bureau for Etiqueta Negra out of his Fruitvale loft in Oakland.
As an associate editor, Alarcon skims his favorite magazines, such as Esquire, Harpers and Believer, looking for stories that would be of relevance or interest to Latin America, and passing the word about Etiqueta Negra on to other writers from San Francisco to New York.
Along with Orlean, several well-known North American writers — Gay Talese, Jon Lee Anderson and Tom Junod — have either had their work translated into Etiqueta Negra or have endorsed it with written shout-outs. And to emphasize their support for the magazine, most of the more well-known writers accept their assignments for free.
“I’m happy to give them my stories without getting paid,” Orlean says, “because just the thought that people from another culture are reading what I wrote and getting value out of it is more than enough. It’s sort of transcendental — like being transported to another universe.”
A lot of Anglo writers like Orlean are also intrigued by Etiqueta Negra’s graphic art design, which is louder and more expressive than that of most literary journals.
“The interpretation of a story I may have written in the New Yorker becomes more visually dynamic in Etiqueta Negra,” Orlean says. “Obviously the New Yorker doesn’t attempt that kind of aesthetic, so it almost isn’t fair to compare.”
But comparisons to the New Yorker are no accident.
Etiqueta Negra’s founding brothers, Huberth and Gerson Jara, originally wanted to start a political publication for diplomats and businessmen with the Economist and Foreign Policy as models. But while they were searching for an editorial director, a friend of a friend put them in touch with longtime Peruvian journalist Julio Villanueva Chang, who had something else in mind.
“I pulled out a copy of the New Yorker and said, ‘Let’s do something like this,’ ” remembers Chang, who had a background in Peruvian newspaper journalism that felt too limiting. After the two brothers stared blankly at the New Yorker magazine and its stories with few photographs or graphics, Chang explained that the Peruvian interpretation would, of course, be more colorful and picturesque. A small sigh of relief followed, along with a green light.
Unlike much U.S. culture that gets lost in translation by the time it reaches Latin America, Chang understood that the inspiration from the New Yorker was merely a starting point. Because while, say, a rock band from Lima might be influenced by Depeche Mode or the Doobie Brothers, the musicians sometimes forget to throw their own Latino roots into the mix. Not so with Etiqueta Negra.”
I’d also like to point out that the author of the San Francisco Chronicle story of which I’ve reprinted a sizeable chunk above is named Delfin Vigil. A name I love, suspect only slightly, and covet.
Also, a friend of mine who dated a man from Peru likes to say there are really four sizes to things: small, medium, large, and Peruvian. May Etiqueta Negra be the same!
