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 | | Myth and Archive: A Theory of Latin American Narrative by Roberto González-Echevarría ISBN-10: 9780822321941 ISBN-10: 0-8223-2194-7 ISBN-13: 9780822321941 ISBN-13: 978-0-8223-2194-1 Paperback 1998-12 Duke University Press Find Lowest Price |
Editorials | ||
Product Description Myth and Archive presents a new theory of the origin and evolution of Latin American literature and the emergence of the modern novel. In this influential, award-winning exploration of Latin American writing from colonial times to the present, Roberto González Echevarría dispenses with traditional literary history to reveal the indebted relationship of the novel to legal, scientific, and anthropological discourses. Providing ways to link literary and nonliterary narratives, González Echevarría examines a variety of archival writings—from the chronicles of the discovery and conquest of the New World to scientific travel narratives and records of criminal confessions—and explores the relationship of these writings to novels by authors such as García Márquez, Borges, Barnet, Sarmiento, Carpentier, and Garcilaso de la Vega. Moving beyond demonstrating that early forms of creative narrative had their geneses in the sixteenth-century authoritative discourse of the Spanish Empire, González Echevarría shows how this same originating process has been repeated in other key moments in the history of the Latin American narrative. He shows how the discourse of scientific discovery was the model for much nineteenth-century literature, as well as how anthropological writings on the nature of language and myth have come to shape the ideology and form of literature in the twentieth century. This most recent form of Latin American narrative creates its own mythic form through an atavistic return to its legal origins—the archive. This acclaimed book—originally published in 1990—will be of continuing interest to historians, anthropologists, literary theorists, and students of Latin American culture. | ||
Reviews | ||
Fascinating, yet occasionally maddening! This is a fascinating reshaping of the academic discussion [or to use the current jargon, "discourse"]on Latin American literature. To read Gonzalez Echevarria is to be dazzled by erudition and his true passion for Latin American letters and culture. Aficionados of Latin American literature who study this work will undoubtedly be humbled by Gonzalez Echevarria's scholarly stamina and provoked by his insights. The insights themselves are worth careful consideration. Distancing himself from the traditional, chronological approach to Latin American narrative, and expressly by-passing a few "milestone works" that are perhaps less significant to the development of Latin American letters than is traditionally posited (e.g "Amalia", "Maria"), Gonzalez argues that the greatest shapers of Latin American narrative have been a few key works that in form and rhetoric embody the trends of the "hegemonic discourse" that dominated Latin America at different periods in the region's history. During the colonial era, Gonzalez argues, the predominant form of writing in the region was the legal document. Correspondingly, he argues, the salient literary texts of the period took on the forms, rhetoric and tones of legal discourse (e.g Bernal Diaz' "Historia Verdadera de La Conquista de Nueva Espana," El Inca Garcialaso's "Commentarios Reales,"). During the 19th Century--his so-called 2nd Conquest of Latin America--the "hegemonic discourse" was scientific observation; more specifically, the travel writings of Europeans and Americans who viewed Latin American flora, fauna, and customs through a scientific lense. Correspondingly, Gonzalez argues, the salient Latin American works of the period (e.g. Sarmiento's "Facundo," or Euclides da Cunha's "Os sertoes")seek to define phenomena in their respective societies while using the structures, form and rhetoric of the predominant scientific-travel writing. In the 20th Century, he argues, works are shaped by the concerns and observations made by anthropology and ethnography. Here he cites Gallego's "Dona Barbara" and Carpentier's "Los Pasos Perdidos", as well as Miguel Barnet's testimonial novels. Gonzalez suggests that thematically Latin American narrative has consistantly sought the region's cultural legitimacy and ownership of a mythic origin, a source of Latin America's true identity. This search for a mythic origin has generally been conducted through the hegemonic discourses that he describes. Gonzalez illustrates his point through key modern works by Borges, Carpentier, and Garcia Marquez--works which he shows are entirely conscious of the shifts in hegemonic discourse and the search for origins/identity. The work is generally a joy to read, and makes the lone, lay reader long for an animated discussion of Gonzalez' ideas around a seminar table. There are times, however, when the author lapses into the worst forms of academic obfuscation and post-modern excess, and when he does so he undermines the goodwill that his work engenders. A case in point-- in a discussion of Facundo, Gonzalez states: "What Sarmiento has found in his voyage of discovery and self-discovery is a present origin, one that speaks through him, hollowing out the voice of his scientific language. His authority will not be attained by it, but by the tragic sacrifice of his protagonist, which he re-enacts in the text. This tragic fusion is a reflection of the linear time introduced by the evolution of nature, which brings everything to an end, inexorably, so that it will be reborn in a different guise." This passage, while not representative of the whole book, is simply preposterous, wound as it is in obscurity and the solipsism of contemporary academic criticism. Passages such as this are particularly frustrating given that, in this instance, Sarmiento's "protagonist" is a historical figure, and the notion that Sarmiento is "reenacting" Facundo's fate is entirely a construction of the critic. Such analysis plays well in academia, but it is entirely removed from probable "authorial intent." [And yes, I acknowledge that the concept of "authorial intent" is now considered antiquated and naive in literary circles. But historians who have studied Facundo would be maddened by this passage.] In other works (i.e. "Celestina's Brood"), Gonzalez has argued that the Baroque is the most suitable mode for Latin American cultural expression. Perhaps in keeping with this conclusion, he himself occasionally engages in "gongorismo" that, while arguably culturally consistant, adds little to a sense of understanding. Ultimately, however, these lapses are only intermittent, and they do not spoil the insightful treasures and the intellectual thrills that Gonzalez provides. This book is a joy. | ||
Gonzalez Echevarria Every student of Latin American literature should read this book, which is the most compelling critical perspective in the field today. | ||