Arturo Belano

Appearances

• Distant Star - as Arturo B.; narrator and character. in the introduction he is described as "a fellow Chilean...a veteran of Latin America's doomed revolutions, who tried to get himself killed in Africa." Bolaño explains that Arturo told him a shorter version of the story, which appears as the final chapter of Nazi Literature in the Americas, but Arturo was displeased with the outcome:
• The Savage Detectives - main character
• Amulet - secondary character mentioned by the narrator/protagonist Auxilio Lacouture as her "favorite young poet, although he wasn't Mexican," and revealed to be of the same age and nationality as Bolaño:
• 2666 - narrator, though this is not stated explicitly in the novel:

  Short Stories

• "The Grub" - narrator and protagonist; the story takes place in Mexico City in the 1970s, where the 17-year-old Belano spends his days browsing bookstores and watching movies. He strikes up an odd friendship with a man, whom he calls "the grub", who sits on the same bench every day, doing nothing.
• "Enrique Martín" - narrator
• "Photos" - protagonist; the story consists of his thoughts narrated in the third person.
• "Detectives" - mentioned parenthetically
• "The Old Man and the Mountain" - protagonist; the story consists of a short summary of his friendship with fellow writer Ulises Lima
• "Death of Ulises" - protagonist.
• "The Days of Chaos" - protagonist.

  Parallel characters

• "Sensini"
• "Mauricio 'The Eye' Silva"
• "Gomez Palacio"
• "Dentist"
• "Dance Card"
• "Cell Mates"
• "Clara"
• "Meeting with Enrique Lihn"
• "Jim"
• "Colonia Lindavista"
• "The Room Next Door"
• "I Can't Read"

• "A Literary Adventure"
• "Phone Calls"
• "Last Evenings on Earth"
• "Days of 1978"
• "Vagabond in France and Belgium"