Pedro Almodovar has finally gotten around to that memoir admirers have wanted him to write. Sort of. The Oscar-winning filmmaker has a book out on September 24, “The Last Dream,” that publisher HarperVia is calling a “debut collection of short stories.”
Almodovar, who has made a career out of defying boundaries, has a different definition — more like an anti-definition.
“I've been asked to write my autobiography more than once, and I've always refused; it's also been suggested that I let someone else write my biography, but I have always felt somewhat resistant to the idea of a book entirely about me as an individual,” he said in an excerpt from the book released Monday by HarperVia.
"I've never kept a diary, and whenever I've tried, I've never made it to page two; in a sense, then, this book represents something of a paradox. It might be best described as a fragmentary autobiography, incomplete and a little cryptic.”
According to HarperVia, “The Last Dream” includes 12 selections from his personal writings, however fragmented, that reflect his “most intimate obsessions.” Stories range from the title piece, about the death of his mother; to an account of a filmmaker in search of painkillers on a bank holiday weekend to the tale of a repentant vampire.
“This compilation of short stories offers a rare glimpse into the life of one of the most influential and eminent directors working today, presenting a narrative that comes closest to a self-portrait, revealing a wildly inventive and unconventional creative mind," HarperVia editorial director Juan Mila said in a statement.
Almodovar, 74, is known for such acclaimed films as Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, All About My Mother and Talk to Her. His book was translated from the Spanish by Frank Wynne.
HarperVia is a new imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, focused on “extraordinary international voices.”
