Good ones
OrMuchos años después, frente al pelotón de fusilamiento, el coronel Aureliano Buendía había de recordar aquella tarde remota en que su padre lo llevó a conocer el hielo.
Cien Años De SoledadMany years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.
or
One Hundred Years Of Solitude
by Gabriel García Márquez
I read the English translation of the García Márquez book. My Spanish is only good enough to get what I want in a Mexican restaurant about 3 out of 4 times — Hey, what the heck is that stuff in my burrito?
The Border Trilogy uses a lot of untranslated Spanish in the dialogue. Both John Grady Cole and Billy Parham grew up speaking both languages. And while it helps to have a little Spanish, it’s not necessary. You can usually suss it out through context. Or if he uses an less common word you usually get it in English in the next paragraph.
McCarthy broke from that in the encounter between John Grady and a shoe-shine boy in Juarez. Their interaction is too lengthy and nuanced to be written in Spanish for most of us ‘Mercans. At any rate it’s a wonderful little exchange. The two sort of playfully joust with words. Also I’m sure there’s some sort of literary device or another going on there. The boy’s words turn out to be somewhat prophetic. Or perhaps, Danik, in keeping with your idea, it signals the change of an era. When asked, John Grady can’t imagine ever wanting to be anything but a cowboy, a vaquero. The shoe-shine boy decides he’d prefer to be rich or maybe an airplane pilot:
He brushed the boot and put away the brush and got his cloth out and popped it. John Grady watched him. What about you? What if you could be anything you wanted?
I’d be a cowboy
Really?
The boy looked at him with disgust. Sh*t no, he said. What’s wrong with you? I’d be a rico and lay around on my asss all day. What do you think?
What if you had to do something?
I don’t know. Maybe be an airplane pilot.
Yeah?
Sure. I’d fly everywhere.
What would you do when you got there?
Fly somewhere else.