Mad Toy, an episodic narrative with a realist/naturalist flavor, takes the form of a memoir. The narrator, Silvio Astier Drodman, is a mature adult who looks back on his youth to his teenage years and recalls important events during that formative phase. Despite being a work of fiction, the novel conveys perhaps better than historical accounts a sense of the sordidness and social upheaval of the lower class districts of Buenos Aires in the early decades of the twentieth century. This is a novel of apprenticeship and formation—the formation of a future writer, Silvio; as such, it is clearly autobiographical in many respects and has much in common with the picaresque narrative. Arlt’s prose is hard-hitting and occasionally shocking, yet often poetic. In this skillful translation Aynesworth successfully communicates these stylistic nuances.

Arlt in his novelistic debut employs language in a striking way. Mad Toy is a linguistic menagerie that showcases everything from proper speech to foreign words, dialect, and underworld slang. The novel reflects the chaos and anarchy of the new social environment, a diverse urban jungle where the emergent cultural expression was shaped and defined by the immigrant experience. Aynesworth’s translation, based on the original 1926 edition of the novel, preserves these variations in admirable fashion. In her introductory material she provides a well-written overview of Arlt and his literary world. The endnotes serve as a useful supplement to the text by clarifying obscure references and placing characters and situations in historical context. English-language readers wishing to become acquainted with the writings of Roberto Arlt now have at their disposal this excellent edition, the logical starting point from which to begin their explorations.

       Melvin S. Arrington, Jr.