Panic Signs

Cristina Peri Rossi was born in Montevideo, Uruguay, in 1941 and started her literary career in 1963 with the publication of her collection of short stories: Viviendo. She was a professor of comparative literature, a translator, and a journalist. In 1972, after the military coup in Uruguay, she emigrated to Spain where she lives and writes today. Her first narrative publications (El libro de mis primos, 1969; Indicios pánicos, 1970) combined symbolism with irony, questioning social reality and patriarchal structures. From 1972 through to the early 1980s, her work was banned in Uruguay. Cristina Peri Rossi's spirit of innovation, her rebelliousness, and her disregard for the conventions of society have made her an emblematic personality of the 1970s. This collection of short stories was originally published as Indicios pánicos in 1970 by Editorial Nuestra América.Mercedes Rowinsky-Geurts is an associate professor at Wilfrid Laurier University, specializing in Latin American social and political issues, the Latin American diaspora, and women writers of the twentieth century. Her book Imagen y discurso: El estudio de las imágenes en la obra de Cristina Peri Rossi (1995) has been awarded a Special Mention by the Ministry of Education and Culture in Uruguay in 1998. In 2000, Mercedes Rowinsky-Geurts was awarded the Outstanding Teacher Award at Wilfrid Laurier University.Angelo A. Borrás is a professor emeritus of Spanish in the Department of Languages and Literatures at Wilfrid Laurier University. Author of El teatro del exilio de Max Aub, and editor and co-author of The Theatre and Hispanic Life: Essays in Honour of Neale H. Tayler (WLU Press), he has published many articles on contemporary Spanish literature, several of which deal with exile literature.

With Panic Signs, English readers have access to an important Latin American author, Cristina Peri Rossi, whose work engages with issues of identity (gender, national, cultural, sexual) and authority (political, societal, familial), as it critiques all repressive structures that would limit individual freedom. Panic Signs gives readers a sense of the tense political climate in Uruguay just prior to the military takeover, with people living under the threat of house invasions, random detention and questioning by the police, and torture. Peri Rossi is a brilliant reader of the signs around her, signs that are beautifully and disturbingly evoked in Indicios Pãinicos, and that are now available in English through Mercedes Rowinsky-Geurts and Angelo A. Borrãis's translation.... Authoritarian regimes would impose one single reading, their reading, their ``truth.'' But literature, particularly literature like Peri Rossi's, resists such impositions, and having a number of her books available in English translation enriches those readers not able to read the original Spanish. Translation is a labour of love and translators put forth the results of their work never knowing if their reading ``has been correct, considering all the possible readings.'' Passages, sentences, and words can be translated in different ways, but Rowinsky-Geurts and Borrãis understand the possibilities are endless and offer, in Panic Signs, a strong reading of the original. -- Laura J. Beard, Texas Tech University

• Panic Signs by Cristina Peri Rossi, translated by Merceds Rowinsky-Geurts and Angelo A. BorrásPrefacePrologue1. I am very interested in botany 2. I live in a country of old people3. I have never been in Vermont4. We have not gone to the moon5. For more than twenty-five years6. Sometimes my mother consoles me7. I spent many years caressing statue8. I always imagine9. She brought me passionate presents10. She hands me the scarf11. I contribute to the general racket12. She had been brought from Peru13. I have a tiny apartment14. She has given me happiness15. Dialogue with the Writer16. For many years I lived17. When I was mature enough18. Hell is bloody birds19. ""You are very beautiful""20. I will till no more21. In the ghetto of my womb22. I dreamt that I was23. Desertion24. What is happening?25. As I was walking along26. The Acrobats27. Besieged28. The minister called me29. ""What are you doing?""30. Disobedience and the Bear Hunt31. The Statue32. I possessed her when I was eight33. Mamá's Farewell34. I started to feel your absence35. At the corner bar36. When the bishops rebelled37. A Great Family38. Such apparent senselessness39. I was enjoying an ice cream cone40. Selene I41. Selene II42. I have come by train43. Urgent Messages for Navigators44. The Social Contract45. The Stampede46. The HeroOther books by Cristina Peri Rossi