Latin American Literature and Culture – serie

This enthralling story of survival is the first major narrative of the exploration of North America by Europeans (1528-36). The author of "Castaways (Naufragios)", Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca, was a fortune-seeking nobleman and the treasurer of an expedition to claim for Spain a vast area that includes today's Florida, Louisiana, and Texas. A shipwreck forced him and a handful of men to make the long westward journey on foot to meet up with Hernan Cortes. In order to survive, Cabeza de Vaca joined native people along the way, learning their languages and practices and serving them as a slave and later as a physician. When after eight years he finally reached the West, he was not recognized by his compatriots. In his writing Cabeza de Vaca displays great interest in the cultures of the native people he encountered on his odyssey. As he forged intimate bonds with some of them, sharing their brutal living conditions and curing their sick, he found himself on a voyage of self-discovery that was to make his reunion with his fellow Spaniards less joyful than expected.Cabeza de Vaca's gripping narrative is a trove of ethnographic information, with descriptions and interpretations of native cultures that make it a powerful precursor to modern anthropology. Frances M. Lopez-Morillas' translation beautifully captures the sixteenth-century original. Based as it is on Enrique Pupo-Walker's definitive critical edition, it promises to become the authoritative English translation.

An early cameo of Latin American surrealism, Rosamel del Valle's erotic narrative of ecstasy and perdition creates the rhythm of the dream and the tempo of madness. Intermittently a waiflike young woman, Eva, intrudes into the daily routine of the writer. Her appearances are marked by a circle of red and the vision of a deep well with a star hanging over it. A tone poem of surrealist encounter, pursuit, and loss, "Eva y la Fuga" was written in 1930 and finally published posthumously in 1970, by Monte Avila Press in Venezuela. Anna Balakian offers here the first translation of the work into any other language. She brilliantly conveys in English the author's highly metaphoric language and the immediacy of surrealist experience, signaled in the narrative by frequent lapses into a haunting present tense. On their walks through the streets of Santiago, Eva and the narrator mingle in the fiesta atmosphere of the Chilean Amusement Park, with its gigantic Ferris Wheel. Bits of real-life dialogue float through the air. But the couple move on different wavelengths from the crowd and often from each other.Passing in and out of his life, Eva exercises a hypnotic fascination over the writer and makes an equally profound impression on the reader. This narrative is in the same genre as Gerard de Nerval's "Aurelia", Andre Breton's "Nadja", and Michel Leiris' "Aurora", and should be counted among the most compelling works of twentieth-century surrealist literature.

When the famous anthropologist Claude Levi-Strauss arrived in Rio de Janeiro, he had one book in his pocket: "Jean de Lery's History of a Voyage to the Land of Brazil". Lery had undertaken his fascinating and arduous voyage in 1556, as a youthful member of the first Protestant mission to the New World. Janet Whatley presents the first complete English translation of one of the most vivid early European accounts of life in the New World.

National consolidation and romantic novels go hand in hand in Latin America. "Foundational Fictions" shows how 19th century patriotism and heterosexual passion historically depend on one another to engender productive citizens.

Christopher Columbus authored over a hundred documents, many of them letters giving testimony on the Discovery to Isabela and Ferdinand. In this first book in English to focus specifically on these writings, Margarita Zamora offers an original analysis of their textual problems and ideological implications. Her comprehensive study takes into account the newly discovered "Libro Copiador," which includes previously unknown letters from Columbus to the Crown. Zamora examines those aspects of the texts that have caused the most anxiety and disagreement among scholars--questions concerning Columbus's destination, the authenticity and authority of the texts attributed to him, Las Casas's editorial role, and Columbus's views on the Indians. In doing so she opens up the vast cultural context of the Discovery. Exploring the ways in which the first images of America as seen through European eyes both represented and helped shape the Discovery, she maps the inception and growth of a discourse that was to dominate the colonizing of the New World.

In this first comprehensive study of Latin America's literary vanguards of the 1920s and 1930s, Vicky Unruh explores the movement's provocative and polemic nature. Latin American vanguardism--a precursor to the widely acclaimed work of contemporary Latin American writers--was stimulated by the European avant-garde movements of the World War I era. But as Unruh's wide-ranging study attests, the vanguards of Latin America--emerging from the continent's own historical circumstances--developed a very distinct character and voice. Through manifestos, experimental texts, and ribald public performance, the vanguardists' work intertwined art, culture, and the politics of the day to produce a powerful brand of aesthetic activism, one that sparked an entire rethinking of the meaning of art and culture throughout Latin America.

A classic work of Latin American literature, Domingo Sarmiento's "Facundo" has become an integral part of the history, politics, and culture of Latin America since its first publication in 1845. Partially translated into English when it was first published, this foundational text appears here for the first time in its entirety. An educator and writer, Sarmiento was President of Argentina from 1868 to 1874. His "Facundo" is a study of the Argentine character, a prescription for the modernization of Latin America, and a protest against the tyranny of the government of Juan Manuel de Rosas (1835-1852). The book brings nineteenth-century Latin American history to life even as it raises questions still being debated today - questions regarding the 'civilized' city versus the 'barbaric' countryside, the treatment of indigenous and African populations, and the classically liberal plan of modernization. "Facundo"'s celebrated and frequently anthologized portraits of the caudillo Juan Facundo Quiroga and other colorful characters give readers an exhilarating sense of Argentine culture in the making.Kathleen Ross' translation renders Sarmiento's passionate prose into English with all its richness intact, allowing the English-language reader the full experience of "Facundo"'s intensity and historical reach.

"The Canto General", thought by many of Neruda's most prominent critics to be the poet's masterpiece, is the stunning epic of an entire continent and its people.

The atom, a tuna, laziness, love - the everyday elements and essences of human experience glow in the translucent language of Neruda's odes. Chilean poet Pablo Neruda (1904-1973) wrote three books of odes during his lifetime. Odas elementales was published in 1954, followed in subsequent years by Nuevas odas elementales and Tercer libro de las odas. Margaret Sayers Peden's selection of odes from all three volumes, printed with the Spanish originals on facing pages, is by far the most extensive yet to appear in English. She vividly conveys the poet's vision of the realities of day-to-day life in her translations, while her brief introduction describes the genesis of the poems. To write simply of simple things was a task the poet undertook consciously, following his experiences in the Spanish Civil War, the 'social conversion' that resulted from a visit to Macchu Picchu, and the writing of his epic Canto general (California, forthcoming). The odes are arranged in brief, sinuous lines that flow down the page and connect the poet to the animal, mineral, and vegetable world, to people and objects, and to the landscape of history.'Chile', eruda once said in reference to the work of sixteenth-century poet Alonso de Ercilla, 'was invented by a poet'. In accepting the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971, he declared that 'We [writers from the vast expanse of America] are called upon to fill with words the confines of a mute continent, and we become drunk with the task of telling and naming'. The odes reflect what Neruda saw as both an obligation and a privilege - the naming and defining of his world.

This is a generous, long-overdue presentation of the major Brazilian poet Manuel Bandeira (1886–1968) to the English-speaking reader. Well over a hundred poems appear here in both Portuguese and English, together with a critical overview that introduces the poet and Brazilian poetry to the nonspecialist and contributes significantly to the existing body of Bandeira scholarship.  Bandeira’s poetry not only stands among the most important in twentieth-century Brazil but also embodies the experience of transition from one literary movement to another. The poems span a half century of writing, from the publication of Bandeira’s first book in 1917 to the definitive edition of his collected work in 1966. Because critics agree that the poet’s most influential creative efforts began in 1930 with the publication of Libertinagem (Libertinism), the collection concentrates on the later period. A smaller number of poems drawn from the three books published before this date provide a useful basis for comparison.  Candace Slater’s fine versions of the poems are augmented by a translator’s note that considers Bandeira’s poetic language in terms of the particular challenges it offers the translator into English. Her introduction offers a fresh and comprehensive look at the poet whose artistic transformation from nineteenth-century modes of expression to experimental twentieth-century Modernism paralleled the transformation of his country. It focuses on the poet’s continuing alternation between an acceptance of, if not allegiance to, the material world and a desire for something more. This fundamental though often subtle opposition is reflected in the title, This Earth, That Sky.This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1989.

The Dissonant Legacy of Modernismo: Lugones, Herrera y Reissig, and the Voices of Modern Spanish American Poetry examines the intricate evolution of modernista poetry in Spanish America, focusing on the works of key figures such as Leopoldo Lugones, Julio Herrera y Reissig, and their successors. The book explores the contradictions and shifts within modernismo, a literary movement defined by its ornamental style and the tension between tradition and innovation. Lugones, known for his diverse body of work, epitomizes the fragmented nature of the movement, offering a precursor to the dissonant trend that would influence later poets. His early works, starting from 1893, signal a break from inherited poetic traditions and social structures, employing innovative thematic elements and technical procedures that defy conventional poetic forms. This drive for reform, despite Lugones' later authoritarian leanings, positions him as a central figure in understanding the dissonant legacy of modernismo.The study then shifts to other poets like Herrera y Reissig, who, like Lugones, questioned and subverted modernismo's conventions. These poets expanded the movement's boundaries, challenging European models and incorporating elements of the colloquial, the ridiculous, and the avant-garde. By exaggerating and naturalizing European influences, they not only resisted but also transformed traditional poetic structures. Through metaphors like the map, the landscape, and the city, the book reveals how modernista poetry’s sensory overload created gaps that allowed for the emergence of new poetic possibilities. As social and economic changes reshaped Spanish American societies, poets began to fragment poetic structures, deconstructing rhyme, rhythm, and meter. This deconstruction laid the groundwork for the radical experiments of vanguardista poets and the broader transformation of Spanish American poetry in the twentieth century. Ultimately, the book demonstrates how the dislocations in modernismo, often seen as imperfect imitations, were in fact innovative subversions that dissolved traditional hierarchies, allowing for the development of a distinct Spanish American poetic voice.This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1989.

The Dissonant Legacy of Modernismo: Lugones, Herrera y Reissig, and the Voices of Modern Spanish American Poetry examines the intricate evolution of modernista poetry in Spanish America, focusing on the works of key figures such as Leopoldo Lugones, Julio Herrera y Reissig, and their successors. The book explores the contradictions and shifts within modernismo, a literary movement defined by its ornamental style and the tension between tradition and innovation. Lugones, known for his diverse body of work, epitomizes the fragmented nature of the movement, offering a precursor to the dissonant trend that would influence later poets. His early works, starting from 1893, signal a break from inherited poetic traditions and social structures, employing innovative thematic elements and technical procedures that defy conventional poetic forms. This drive for reform, despite Lugones' later authoritarian leanings, positions him as a central figure in understanding the dissonant legacy of modernismo.The study then shifts to other poets like Herrera y Reissig, who, like Lugones, questioned and subverted modernismo's conventions. These poets expanded the movement's boundaries, challenging European models and incorporating elements of the colloquial, the ridiculous, and the avant-garde. By exaggerating and naturalizing European influences, they not only resisted but also transformed traditional poetic structures. Through metaphors like the map, the landscape, and the city, the book reveals how modernista poetry’s sensory overload created gaps that allowed for the emergence of new poetic possibilities. As social and economic changes reshaped Spanish American societies, poets began to fragment poetic structures, deconstructing rhyme, rhythm, and meter. This deconstruction laid the groundwork for the radical experiments of vanguardista poets and the broader transformation of Spanish American poetry in the twentieth century. Ultimately, the book demonstrates how the dislocations in modernismo, often seen as imperfect imitations, were in fact innovative subversions that dissolved traditional hierarchies, allowing for the development of a distinct Spanish American poetic voice.This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1989.

This is a generous, long-overdue presentation of the major Brazilian poet Manuel Bandeira (1886–1968) to the English-speaking reader. Well over a hundred poems appear here in both Portuguese and English, together with a critical overview that introduces the poet and Brazilian poetry to the nonspecialist and contributes significantly to the existing body of Bandeira scholarship.  Bandeira’s poetry not only stands among the most important in twentieth-century Brazil but also embodies the experience of transition from one literary movement to another. The poems span a half century of writing, from the publication of Bandeira’s first book in 1917 to the definitive edition of his collected work in 1966. Because critics agree that the poet’s most influential creative efforts began in 1930 with the publication of Libertinagem (Libertinism), the collection concentrates on the later period. A smaller number of poems drawn from the three books published before this date provide a useful basis for comparison.  Candace Slater’s fine versions of the poems are augmented by a translator’s note that considers Bandeira’s poetic language in terms of the particular challenges it offers the translator into English. Her introduction offers a fresh and comprehensive look at the poet whose artistic transformation from nineteenth-century modes of expression to experimental twentieth-century Modernism paralleled the transformation of his country. It focuses on the poet’s continuing alternation between an acceptance of, if not allegiance to, the material world and a desire for something more. This fundamental though often subtle opposition is reflected in the title, This Earth, That Sky.This title is part of UC Press's Voices Revived program, which commemorates University of California Press’s mission to seek out and cultivate the brightest minds and give them voice, reach, and impact. Drawing on a backlist dating to 1893, Voices Revived makes high-quality, peer-reviewed scholarship accessible once again using print-on-demand technology. This title was originally published in 1989.

This text examines the multiple narrative perspectives Donoso presents and traces a transformation in Donoso's works from complex stage performance to political forum. It illuminates a weaving of feminine and masculine aspects of artistic voice in his work.