I came across the information looking for information about her new work: what is a novel by Delphine de Vigan published in 2021 doing among the best-selling books in Spain in 2026? And why has it been there for almost a year? They have given him an award, I thought, the Princess of Asturias. An adaptation has been released on Netflix. Has Delphine died?!
Then I remembered the one that was put together with ‘Tan poco vida’. That’s it, some celebrity has recommended it. Well neither. It turns out that the phenomenon of ‘Las gratitudes’ (Anagrama) was born exclusively on social networks. A book that had been published for four years began to circulate from recommendation to recommendation, until it became an unexpected long-seller (it has already been published for more than twenty editions).
But the most curious thing is the chosen work. ‘The Gratitudes’ is not exactly the type of book one would associate with the booktokera community. An Anagrama novel (with all that that implies of literary demand) about an old woman who lives in a nursing home and begins to lose her speech due to aphasia? A story about old age, dependency, care and memory?
Whatever the secret of her success – her brevity, her emotional intensity, her phrases to underline and share, her combination of literary quality and accessibility – the truth is that seeing Delphine de Vigan’s name on the sales lists above those of Freida Mcfadden, Dan Brown or Sonsoles Ónega would be the equivalent of seeing, I don’t know, Phoebe Bridgers’ ‘I Can’t Wait’ above Shakira’s ‘Dai Dai’. “Dale ale lets go!”
As expected, the consequences of this phenomenon have already been felt. On the one hand, Anagrama has republished ‘Nothing opposes the night’, the novel with which De Vigan became known around the world fifteen years ago. On the other hand, she has just published ‘Los figurantes’, the author’s debut as a playwright.
Would the publisher have published a play by De Vigan if this phenomenon had not occurred? Surely not. Theatrical texts occupy a very minority place in the publishing market and this work has not even been performed in Spain (in France it has, directed by Valérie Donzelli).
‘The Extrants’ is something like a mix between ‘Waiting for Godot’ (“What do we do while we wait?” says one of the characters; “Rereading Beckett,” answers another) and the series ‘Extras’, by Ricky Gervais. Its protagonists are five film extras who spend an endless day of filming waiting for someone to remember them. The curious thing is that De Vigan knows that world well: to write the work he snuck in incognito as an extra on three different filmings.
From that premise, the author builds a light, melancholic and very metatheatrical comedy (the text breaks the fourth wall and “incorporates” the audience in the room into the play) that talks about waiting, precariousness and the hierarchies of today’s world. The extra occupies a paradoxical position: he is essential for a scene to be believable, but his job is precisely that no one notices him. De Vigan takes advantage of this contradiction to build a social metaphor about all those who, despite being indispensable, remain condemned to the background.
‘The Extrants’ explores the small rivalries and complicities that arise while the five characters kill time, fantasize about getting a “little piece of paper” or simply try to get to the end of the day. It is an ingenious, fun and much more substantial piece than its initial lightness suggests. If the unexpected success of ‘Las Gratitudes’ has encouraged Anagrama to publish it, we will have to thank all those TikTok prescribers. 7.5.
