Adriana Riva and 'Ruth': How an octogenarian changed the Argentine literary landscape

Ruth , Adriana Riva 's novel that burst onto the literary scene a year ago with unexpected word of mouth, is a deeply human exploration of time, aging, and identity . Featuring an octogenarian protagonist who defies the clichés of her age, the story flows with humor, introspection, and a keen observation of social dynamics . Ruth becomes a mirror in which readers of various ages recognize themselves, while the close and authentic narrative voice allows for a touching portrait of a generation that finds new spaces of freedom and expression in culture and technology.

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Adriana Riva reveals that the seed of the story was born from the voice of her mother , a figure who inspires Ruth and, in turn, resonates with any reader who has known the strength and wisdom of an older generation. The novel is built on a fine sensibility that combines the intimate and the everyday, while questioning concepts such as time and age, opening up questions rather than closing them. Between self-portraits, WhatsApp messages, and book clubs, the work captures an era and challenges the infantilization of old age , imbuing its protagonist with an empowerment and vitality that dismantle prejudices and celebrate the complexity of existence.

–I'll start at the end: the novel was published a year ago, and it's had great word of mouth and reissues, but who's reading Ruth ? What was the reception like?

–I confess that the reception was a surprise. I didn't know exactly who the target audience was, because I'm not exactly thinking about a reader while I write. Much less would I have imagined that Ruth would be a book "with commercial value": I liked it, of course, which is why I wrote it, but I thought: if I go to a bookstore and see an old lady on the cover, I read the back cover... and, I don't know if it's something that grabs you like a love story, a horror story, or a gothic one. So, it was really surprising because this word-of-mouth thing started very quickly; it was very nice, very unexpected. People would tell me, "I read it, I gave it to my mother," or "My mother read it and passed it on to me." What impresses me is how older people laugh and empathize, they can relate, they tell me.

–How did you manage to understand (and deal with) an eighty-year-old woman?

–Well, it was a voice very close to me, which is my mother—the woman on the cover. I have a mother who shares many of Ruth's characteristics, starting with her age, the world of her friends, whom I also know. But I soon realized that everyone had someone like that close to them, because there are more and more older people who are doing well. For example, many of the book clubs are for older women; there are a lot of older people who have time: if you go to the theater, there are older people, if you go to the movies, there are older people. They're truly an important part of culture.

–They have that asset that can be thought of as a two-sided coin: time, which is one of the major themes that runs through the novel...

–Time is a big topic, even more than old age, because old age is really part of that time, and what we do with that time and how time stretches and shrinks.

–We get to know Ruth through her daily life and her thoughts... How would you define the narrative treatment?

–When I had to present the novel, I remember asking my colleague [from literary workshops and the magazine El gran cuaderno ] Ana Navajas, what would you say it is? And she told me, "Well, it's like a stream of consciousness, an interior monologue," because it's not a diary; it's also a character-driven novel. Later, a colleague who's a screenwriter told me that what I was writing was a character-driven novel. "It's like the series The Nanny: you follow the character, you go with the nanny, and that's what people like."

–If you will, the point of intersection of time and old age is age, another question that runs through the novel: what is age?

–Yes, I don't know what age is, but it all comes together because people my age used to say to me: "I'm Ruth." I mean... "But you're 40!" "If it were up to me, I'd put on my nightgown, like Ruth." [Laughs] So again, it's hard to define old age: when does it start... at retirement? At the moment you turn around and go stiff? Suddenly, old age is a huge stage, so, in the end, it encompassed a lot of people who empathized. Ruth also says, "I don't recognize myself." Because you forget how old you are or how old you seem. It's just very hard to understand time. Time is something that drives me crazy, it's very difficult, and it's all we have, it's all we have, that's what we are, we are a time. So it's a topic I'm passionate about. On the other hand, Ruth never stops going out, she has a lot of time: because for many people, time is also elastic, it stretches.

– Ruth also offers a record of the era: details that span two or three generations, in which we recognize ourselves, like that photo under the glass of Ruth's nightstand: a type of furniture that is no longer made, but we have seen it in our parents' and grandparents' homes.

–That's right, I observe, and based on what I observe, I then fictionalize, arrange, and exaggerate. Unlike other writers who can write about anything, I'm just a child of my time and my era, and of my parents' time too, so I couldn't invent another table that didn't have a glass top, because that's the one I've seen all my life. In this case, the trigger was the theme that obsesses me: motherhood and mothers.

–And how did you get that idea from Ruth?

–Instead of writing about my mother, I thought, why don't I put myself in the shoes of an 80-year-old woman? The first thing that came to mind was her voice; it was all she had. How an older person speaks, how she expresses herself in the world. I started putting together loose fragments and taking them to (Federico Falco's) studio.

Ruth attends opera and takes art classes via Zoom. Her class notes are almost an intertext, a second layer of the novel. What interested you, what do you think art contributes to the story, in relation to what literature could contribute, for example?

–I think visual art, contemporary art, is spectacular. The course could have been about literature, but I see this all the time in the books I read, which I love, but I, well, wanted to do something else. All those artists mentioned in Ruth—and there are many more.

–In particular, Ruth focuses on self-portraits: do you see any connection with autofiction there?

–I think all artistic expression presupposes the need to express oneself and the need to see oneself. I love those artists who paint themselves over and over again, the self-portrait, because it's so easy to look at the other again and not at oneself. And it's the same with writing: deep down, I write and write, but it's so deceptive and so difficult. That's the thing about art, it's inexhaustible, in terms of representations and revisions, and with each thing: something new that's never the same, even though there are small changes all the time.

–Another issue the novel raises is Ruth's (good) relationship with technology, something I think was strengthened during the pandemic. A certain connection with the world when we had to stay home...

–In fact, the first fragments I began to write were during the pandemic. That's where this story begins for me, although it's a bit disguised, that isolation, through Zoom, a bit depressing at first, but then it improves. It's like this: there are things that have survived, because today we couldn't live without these technologies. They're the aftermath of the pandemic. And old people get along very well with technology. In the novel, Ruth and her friend Fanny use WhatsApp in a different way, like my mom. I say to her: "Hey, ma, are you coming over for lunch today?" and she answers me three days later.

–And it also becomes a literary resource in itself, almost epistolary...

–Yes. Because they don't use WhatsApp as something that drives them crazy: they don't suffer from it, that immediacy, that "you left me on read" thing, they don't have that feeling, like before you could call and get your call answered, let's say. There are other uses for the same tools.

–Would you say that Ruth's character has or experiences a certain empowerment in old age, in the sense of saying, "Now I do whatever I want"?

–Yes. I think that empowerment is beautiful: there's a kind of freedom that Ruth, at 82, seemed to have: she doesn't owe anyone anything anymore, she's done everything she had to do, I'm not going to take care of your grandchildren unless I want to see them, I'm not going to go out with these ladies unless they want to go out with them. This empowerment of old age goes against infantilization, against treating them as if they can't use WhatsApp, against "Come here, Grandpa." And at one point Ruth comments: "My son says something stupid and nothing happens. On the other hand, I say something stupid and I'm a gag-like or grumpy old woman." And it's a danger because it's how you override people who are completely competent and in full possession of their faculties.

–Humor runs through the novel in a particular way. Did it come with the character? Are you interested in this literature?

"I love literature with humor, and it's essential to laugh with a book, even the saddest book—I mean, like what happens at wakes, at funerals, when you laugh, there's no other choice, because everything is so absurd: the mystery of life compels us to laugh. Also, I wanted to deal with certain unavoidable themes—because it's still the last stage of life—and anyone who reaches that age has probably lost many people along the way, has gone through many situations and much pain, and death is lurking. These were unavoidable themes in the novel; I wanted to include them, and, well, it seemed to me that humor could be a safe passage there."

–Ruth has an obsession –funny in itself– with highlighting or questioning the Jewish character of artists, thinkers, writers, people in general.

–Look, when I first met with my editors, they asked me, "Why Jews?" I think I could have been a fan of Atlanta, or Argentina... again, I chose it because it was self-referential and I found it funny, but in the end, all those choices are arbitrary and then work together, like the fact that she's a widow, with two children, and healthy: all those characteristics that define Ruth and then make her whole.

–Also your opinion on the Palestinian question.

–That's right. I was already talking about Netanyahu before October 7th, and I thought, how is this going to fit in? Should I accommodate it? And I realized no, on the contrary, this dilemma will always exist and will continue to exist, and I think there will be as many opinions on the subject as there are Jews. It's impossible to simplify. In general, I try not to generalize. That's precisely why what interests me about old age is that it doesn't close anything; it continues to open, and there are still questions. In other words: old age isn't a time of conclusion, because there's nothing to conclude; it's a time to continue wondering, to continue doubting.

Ruth , by Adriana Riva (Seix Barral).