My Clavicle (And Other Massive Misalignments)

“Marta Sanz’s language is like a body. She talks to you like nobody else can.” —ABC 

On an international flight to a conference, the author Marta Sanz notices a tiny bump beneath her skin, just below her clavicle, near her breast bone. So begins an inquiry that is at turns satirical detective story, philosophical inquiry, memoir, and pure poetry.

In Spanish, the title is Clavícula, which refers to the collarbone, but also makes a direct pun on the word clavé or key. In the aftermath of Marta’s discovery we realize that something fundamental has changed for her, and that whatever has happened, however elusive, it is something very real. At the same time, the mystery reflects in everything the author encounters, but especially the bodies of women, and especially women of a certain age. 

My Clavicle is a masterpiece of auto fiction from one of Spain’s most celebrated contemporary voices–the narration of the episodes fracturing like the author’s body into a deeply moving series of vignettes that never lose their tension: imperfect, obsessive, and often hilarious.

The difficulty of giving a name to Marta’s pain, of even locating a precise place for it, provokes a number of reflections: about the edge that separates the body from scientific definitions and imagination; about the function of poetry; about our intolerance for psychological gray areas; about anxiety as a pathology of late stage capitalism; and, in the face of constantly dispiriting headlines, the perversion of a public health system. Ultimately, Marta’s attempts to define something impossible are channeled through her strange and roving pain, manifesting in curiosity, humor, and love.