The Last Dream by Pedro Almodvar (translated by Frank Wynne) is a collection of 12 short stories, including eight works of fiction, that were written over a span of 55 years.Considered a fragmentary autobiography by the author, this book demonstrates the Academy Award-winning film directors literary prowess and versatility. His writing, like his filmmaking, delves deep into the human psyche using beautifully crafted spare prose.The Spanish-speaking world will be quick to note the titles allusion to the 18th-century epic poem First Dream (Primer Sueo) by Mexican lesbian Renaissance nun, playwright, philosopher, inventor, painter, and composer Sor Juana de la Cruz. (I, the Worst of All, a film of her life based on research done by Nobel Prize Laureate Octavio Paz, is available for free online.)Fabulator, not writerIn the books introduction, Almodvar writes that he sees himself as a fabulator, his preferred term to describe what he does. Its a freeing term for him, freeing from a strict adherence to the truth, and even from himself as author-director. He rather prefers to consider himself a mere guide taking us on a wild ride into the recesses of his mind.He writes that there is an intimate relationship between what I write, what I film and what I live.Despite bold story lines that know no bounds and an exhibitionistic alter-ego named Patty Diphusa (patidifusa is Iberian slang for flabbergasted) that first appeared in the Spanish magazine La Luna in 1979, the fabulator remains a very private person hidden behind the camera.Nonetheless, several stories fill in biographical information about Almodvar the man, such as the title story The Last Dream, about the day his own mother died. It represents his finest writing in his own view.Author Pedro AlmodvarPhoto: Nico BustosIn the short story The Visit, he reveals the story of how one of his most enduring films Bad Education about clerical abuse came to be.Like fine sculpture, Almodvars writing has carved away all the superfluous description that many writers and readers luxuriate in. This book, however, is not perfect; no work ever is. At times the fabulator seems to be trying too hard to be overly creative when theres no need to be, something that feels like a more egregious sin in literature than in labor-intensive filmmaking: Genet was a sauce we sometimes used to douse our work together. Was there no budget for an editor? Whatever the books few mechanical shortcomings, it more than makes up for it in creativity.The secret to his geniusIn The Mirror Ceremony, a vampire enters a monastery and manages to transcend his unsatisfactory circumstances through an obvious yet startlingly novel solution: he simply accepts Christs redemption of his soul!Stories like this get readers wondering whether the premise of the plot is silly or serious. With Almodvar, its always both, always a paradox, always as fascinatingly complicated as real life.The same can be asked of the story Too Many Gender Swaps, which contains ideas that appear in several films including the gay thriller The Law of Desire and the wondrous film Dark Habits on which the terribly dumbed-down Sister Act films were based.In A Bad Novel Almodvar, 75, commands interest as he tries to candidly assess his own writing. But when he sets out to assess it again in Memory of an Empty Day we begin to see why he has thus far not been prolific. Nonetheless, the story fascinates as he tries to measure his worth as fabulator in light of the fact that he is aging and no longer shares a culture of youth with an ever-growing percentage of his audience (readers).The memorable short story Adis, Volcano was written as a tribute to the great Mexican queer singer Chavela Vargas upon her death. Vargas gained success despite (or because of) her masculine appearance and dress, and famously dated women like Frida Kahlo, even photographing themselves frolicking in the grass. The singer is featured in a number of his films.And finally, the collection would not be complete without a proper romp into surrealistic territory, not so far removed, really, from Catholic reality. The Life and Death of Miguel, written when Almodvar was very young man, depicts a world in which death and life happen in reverse as people grow younger, like Benjamin Button. (He was certain the idea was stolen when he first learned of the film.) Writing the story, he reflects, was his attempt to come to terms with our powerlessness in the face of unstoppable time.All in all, reading The Last Dream is well worth your time. But the book is best enjoyed after watching at least a few of his world-class films. In particular, I recommend Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown and All About My Mother as a basic introduction to the wild world of Pedro Almodvar.The Last Dream by Pedro Almodvar, HarperVia, $26.The post Review: Pedro Almodvars The Last Dream appeared first on News Is Out.