Spanish
Los siete locos
The Seven Madmen
Roberto Arlt
Buenos Aires written from underground and in a fever: the great novel of modern dread in Spanish.
Editions
Forthcoming
The app
Learn Spanish by reading Arlt. The original beside a clear translation, read aloud, with every word glossed.
The opening
Tap a line to unfold its translation. In the app, every word unfolds too.
The book
Arlt writes Buenos Aires the way Dostoevsky wrote Petersburg: from underground, and in a fever. Los siete locos drags the humiliated Erdosain through a city of swindlers, cranks, and self-appointed prophets scheming a revolution out of sheer anguish. It is coarse where Borges is burnished, and far more alive for it: the great novel of modern dread in the Spanish language.
In the app
The original and the translation, side by side.
The author’s words align line by line with a clear English translation: two columns on iPad, a paired reading flow on iPhone.
Every line, read aloud.
Hear how the language actually sounds: its weight, its rhythm, not just how it looks on the page.
Notes for the line you’re on.
Tap any line for the grammar, the words, and the context behind it, written by us, for this text. An editor at your elbow.
Read aloud, and hear how you did.
Read a line yourself and the edition scores it on your phone: the whole line first, then sound by sound. Your voice never leaves the device.
The particulars
- The text
- Los siete locos, Roberto Arlt
- Translation
- Public-domain Spanish (Arlt, d. 1942). English translation © 2026 1732 Studios, LLC.
- Method
- The translations are our own, drafted with machine assistance and verified line by line. How the editions are made.
- The app
- The first chapter is free: the complete app, every feature. One unlock covers the rest, yours forever, $4.99. No subscription, no ads.
- Privacy
- Speech analysis runs on device. Your reading and your voice never leave your phone.