Elizabeth Coonrod Martínez - Böcker

In the early twentieth century, a technological revolution as well as new ideas in science and philosophy, precipitated a radical change in narrative fiction in Latin America. The avant garde novels that appeared by the 1920s forever changed discourse and structure, or the way of creating narrative fiction, and heavily influenced the creation of the internationally recognized Latin American novel of the modern era. However, this early movement has received little attention or recognition as a literary period, although it is as significant to the development of twentieth century literature as the Modernist movement was in the U.S. and Europe. Before the Boom: Latin American Revolutionary Novels of the 1920s proposes a postmodern analysis of the early twentieth century or avant-garde novel by authors from four different Latin American countries: Arqueles Vela in Mexico, Martín Adán in Peru, Pablo Palacio in Ecuador, and Roberto Arlt in Argentina. Each chapter details the socio-political context of each novel, chronicling the events that led to an artistic desire to create an entirely new voice in Latin American fiction.

Elena Poniatowska is recognised today as one of Mexico's greatest writers. 'Lilus Kikus,' published in 1954, was her first book. However, it was labelled a children's book because it had a young girl as protagonist, it included illustrations, and the author was an unknown woman. 'Lilus Kikus' has not received the critical attention or a translation into English it deserved, until now. Accompanying 'Lilus Kikus' in this first American edition are four of Poniatowska's short stories with female protagonists, only one of which has been previously published in English. Poniatowska is admired today as a feminist, but in 1954, when 'Lilus Kikus' appeared, feminism didn't have broad appeal. Twenty-first-century readers will be fascinated by the way Poniatowska uses her child protagonist to point out the flaws in adult society. Each of the drawings by the great surrealist Leonora Carrington that accompany the chapters in 'Lilus Kikus' expresses a subjective, interiorised vision of the child character's contemplations on life.

This is the story of a remarkable woman whose artistic mission was to relate Mexican cultural history to English-language readers. A world-renowned playwright in the 1930s and best-selling novelist in the 1940s, Josefina Niggli published at a time when Chicana/o literature was not yet recognized as such. Her works revealed Mexico from an insider's point of view, although she found herself struggling with publishers who wanted an American hero pitted against a Mexican villain. Niggli's life experience transpired in Mexico, Texas, the East Coast in the pre-World War II years, and North Carolina, with jaunts to Hollywood and to England, all in an era when few U.S. women writers were able to publish. Only recently has Niggli received critical attention as scholars of Chicana/o literature recognize her as one of the earliest Mexican American writers to focus on life lived between two cultures and nations. This scholarly biography, which includes selections from some of Niggli's unrecognized writings, is designed to solidify her place in the literary canon.

Mexicana and Chicana authors from the late 1970s to the turn of the century helped overturn the patriarchal literary culture and mores of their time. This landmark volume acquaints readers with the provocative, at times defiant, yet subtle discourses of this important generation of writers and explains the influences and historical contexts that shaped their work.Until now, little criticism has been published about these important works. Addressing this oversight, Teaching Late-Twentieth-Century Mexicana and Chicana Writers starts with essays on Mexicana and Chicana authors. It then features essays on specific teaching strategies suitable for literature surveys and courses in cultural studies, Latino studies, interdisciplinary and comparative studies, humanities, and general education that aim to explore the intersectionalities represented in these works. Experienced teachers offer guidance on using these works to introduce students to border studies, transnational studies, sexuality studies, disability studies, contemporary Mexican history and Latino history in the United States, the history of social movements, and race and gender.

This includes Frida Kahlo, Maria Izquierdo, and Nahui Olin, three outstanding artists of the cultural renaissance of the early twentieth century, and Nellie Campobello, Elena Garro, Rosario Castellanos, and Pita Amor, forerunner writers and poets whose works laid a path for Mexican women writers in the later twentieth century.