Buiza, Carlos
Entry updated 12 February 2024. Tagged: Author.
Working name of Spanish editor, author and screenwriter Carlos Álvarez Buiza de Diego (1940-2024). He belongs to the so-called second generation of Spanish science fiction writers, along with Domingo Santos, Gabriel Bermúdez Castillo, Ángel Torres Quesada, Carlos Saiz Cidoncha, Juan G Atienza (1930-2011), Alfonso Álvarez Villar (1930-1981), Luis Vigil (1940-2019), Jaime Rosal del Castillo (1945-2019), Juan Tébar (1941- ), José Luis Garci (1944- ), Juan José Plans (1943-2104), Francisco Lezcano (1934- ), Carlo Frabetti (1945- ) and some others, who started writing in the 1960s.
Buiza was very popular for two stories: "Asfalto" ["Asphalt"] (1966), which was filmed that year by Narciso Ibáñez Serrador (1935-2019) for the Spanish Television series Historias para no dormir ["Histories to not sleep"] and won the Golden Nymph for best script at the Montecarlo Television Festival and the Silver Dove of the UNDA. The story describes how a gentleman gets stuck to an asphalt stain when he tries to cross the street, a stain that absorbs him little by little while he is ignored by pedestrians; a bleak metaphor for urban loneliness. His novella "Un mundo sin luz" ["A World Without Light"] (1967) was also filmed as a telefilm and won the Gold Plate and Jury Prize at the fourth Berlin International TV Festival. The plot describes a world approaching atomic war in which one morning the sunlight does not shine and unknown Aliens kidnap all the children on the planet to save them. Both stories, along with two others, were part of his first collection Un mundo sin luz ["A World Without Light"] (coll 1967). His only other collection was Apólogo del niño marciano ["Apology of the Martian Child"] (coll 1970) bringing together four of his best known stories.
Buiza wrote about fifty stories, which appeared in the most important magazines and anthologies of the 1960s and early 1970s, including the seminal Antología española de ciencia ficción ["Spanish Anthology of Science Fiction"] (1967) and Lo mejor de la ciencia ficción española ["The Best of Spanish Science Fiction"] (1982), both edited by Domingo Santos. He was the editor of Antología social de ciencia ficción ["Social Science Fiction Anthology"] (anth 1972), which included twelve representative Spanish authors. His more literary style is reminiscent of Ray Bradbury, though he has also written many humorous and Pulp-style stories.
Buiza was a prominent figure in the development of Spanish sf in the sixties, not only for his merits as a writer but also as editor first of Crónicas para la Vía Láctea, Andromeda y Brive ["Chronicles for the Milky Way, Andromeda and Brive"] (1965), a one-shot that contained 45 of his sf micro-stories (see Flash Fiction); and more importantly of the Fanzine Cuenta Atrás ["Count Down"] (1966-1970, 18 issues), in which he showcased important authors of the aforementioned second generation. It was the most popular fanzine of its time, with texts in English and French in order to facilitate international communication. Some of those stories were reprinted later in anthologies and magazines such as Nueva Dimensión, to which Buiza was one of the first contributors.
In 1970, he stopped publishing fanzines to create his own Small Press, Ediciones Cuentatrás, which published only four titles. After this failure, Buiza dropped out of sf and left unpublished his only novel, «El último» ["The Last One"]. [MV]
Carlos Álvarez Buiza de Diego
born Badajoz, Spain: 26 December 1940
died 27 January 2024
works
collections
- Un mundo sin luz ["A World Without Light"] (Barcelona, Spain: Edhasa, 1967) [coll: pb/Bas]
- Apólogo del niño marciano ["Apology of the Martian Child"] (Madrid, Spain: Cuentatrás, 1970) [coll: pb/Emilio Vedova]
works as editor
- Antología social de ciencia ficción ["Social Science Fiction Anthology"] (anth 1972) (Barcelona, Spain: Zero ZYX, 1972) [anth: pb/José Lorenzo Sánchez]
links
- Internet Speculative Fiction Database
- Carlos Buiza at La Tercera Fundación ["The Third Foundation"] (in Spanish)
- Tebeosfera (in Spanish)
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