The writer Marta Jiménez Serrano signs ‘Oxygen’ (Alfaguara), a novel in which she recounts the accident she suffered in November 2020 – before publishing her first book – due to a leak in the boiler of her house that almost killed her and her then partner.
“The book can be understood politically“said the author in an interview with Europa Press in which she highlighted the importance of public health and the housing crisis to the story. The book arrives in Spanish bookstores this Thursday.
In ‘Oxígeno’, Jiménez Serrano begins by placing herself on the Saturday in November 2020 when, without knowing it, she and her partner were dying from a carbon monoxide leak –derived from “negligence” on the part of the landlord who rented them that house that had an illegal gas connection– which lulled them to sleep until she collapsed in the bathroom, hitting her head.
“I don’t like to call them that, but those things that we call luxuries because we don’t all have access to them, like therapy, being able to stop or being able to have time to process something that has happened to you, should be universal rights. We still react much more and we are much more aware of physical wounds than psychological ones. Social security covers a lot of things that no one doubts that they have to cover. If you sprain your ankle they are going to put it in a cast. “We should all be able to access good therapy with reasonable deadlines – because we know that there are some psychologists in social security but they do not make appointments,” the writer reflected.
Furthermore, he explains that this book has taught him that everyone should learn to stop, because even people who can do it, don’t do it. “We have to learn to stop, because what you do while you stop is also very noticeable. Scrolling or playing video games is not the same as stopping. You are not resting. We have to learn to be with ourselves“he stated.
After five years, the author recovers that episode – one that she “never” wanted to “write” – because in some way it has been “therapeutic” – although she specifies that the first thing that helped her was real therapy – and because as an author, it is “impossible to be one, to live a near-death experience and not write about it.”
“There was a double thing of needing to write it from a personal point of view and also because I know that this is very powerful material for a book. That’s how I gradually entered the book, progressively, and assumed that I had to write it,” he added.
“I HAVE VERY FELT THE LACK OF (FEMALE) REFERENCES”
The author of ‘The proper names’ (Sexto Piso) and ‘Not everyone’ (Sexto Piso) publishes this new novel with a feeling of privilege, something that keeps her away from the “pressure” because he doesn’t want to focus on the “negative” part of his “great fortune.”
After the success of those first books – in fact, ‘Oxígeno’ tells of the incident that occurred before the publication of her first copy – Jiménez Serrano assures that she feels “happy” to feel recognized and that the writers who come after her can take her as a reference.
“I have greatly felt the lack of (female) references. When I was little, I always tell it, but I wanted to be like Jo March, who is the protagonist of ‘Little Women’. And I’m talking about the movie, I hadn’t even read the book. Now I think about it and the only writer I had around me was a fictional character,” she explained.
Although the accident has changed the way he relates to his own body, Jiménez Serrano has pointed out that it has changed for the better and that he now values it more.
“The feeling of being lying down and my body not responding, the feeling of being absolutely stripped of my body, has made me take more ownership of it later. I am more in control of my body and my life because when you realize that it is gone… I remember that feeling very well and I am more in my body than before.“, he acknowledged.