Art

Four Pillars of New Latin American Narrative (part I):  Felisberto Hernández y Horacio Quiroga

Sources: https://sujetos.uy/2012/01/05/felisberto-hernandez-en-el-canon-narrativo-uruguayo/   and  http://librosquearden.com/biografia-horacio-quiroga/

Sources: https://sujetos.uy/2012/01/05/felisberto-hernandez-en-el-canon-narrativo-uruguayo/ and http://librosquearden.com/biografia-horacio-quiroga/

By: Luisa Ripoll Alberola

DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the KCL Latin American Society or El Cortao

 Where does Latin American literature come from? What gave birth to its voice? The modern Latin American literature is genuine and differs notably from the occidental tradition. This was first globally manifested with the Latin American Boom–the literary movement that united many young Latin American novelists in the 60s and spread their work around the globe. The Latin American Boom seems to be the beginning of the assertion of this new voice in the literary world. And thiscould be the reason why Gabriel García Márquez, Mario Vargas Llosa, Juan Rulfo, Carlos Fuentes, Jorge Luis Borges and Julio Cortázar – among others – are so popular. 

I wondered if these authors had been some kind of geniuses to create such a new and original form of written expression unexpectedly. What did they read? What was their inspiration? What features were picked up from other literary movements? One day, I found the answers to these questions hiding in a prologue in the words of Carlos Fuentes. His opinion shows these influences in four essential Latin American authors. According to Fuentes; Felisberto Hernández, Roberto Arlt, Horacio Quiroga and Macedonio Fernández are the four fundamental pillars to the renewal of the 20th century narrative. 

 

‘Renewal that connects with the coexistence of imagination and critique, ambiguity, humour and parody, and the generating capacity of myths–whose encounter converts these aesthetic operators in disruption of the language and literary history. Also because of the establishment of a diversifyingmovement, critical and ambiguous, radically different from the perspective and aesthetic approaches of the old naturalist novel.’  1

 

To satisfy my curiosity, I started reading one important book per each author –these were written around the 1920s. Hereafter, I will tackle my reading experience with these not-widely-known classics of the Latin American literature. 

Felisberto Hernández

Inspired by my local bookseller, who did his doctoral thesis about him, Felisberto Hernández was the first author I approached. Uruguayan musician and writer (1902-1964), he spent all of his life in Montevideo. I read one of his more popular storybooks: Nadie encendía las lámparas (No One Lit the Lamps). His short stories are homely, calm and without overdone, dramatic effects. The characters seem to be sleeply taken by a great dream.

The style of the renewed Latin American narrative is vivid, visual, colourful and sincere. These attributes are usually related with childhood because when we were young, we received the gift of life purely and happily. As we explored the world for the first time, everything had a new colour, a new taste. Life was marked by these feelings and by the illusion of discovery. The writer, in his adultness, can get close to these memories by a combined act of remembering and imagining. Latin American writers often use this literary resource and make their readers feel alike. The genres that get closer to this innocent and childlike view of life are poetry and specially the tale. Hernández mostly explored this genre, publishing nine storybooks.

From my point of view, his definitive contribution is the intimal link between his literature and his music. Hernández himself was a pianist and a composer. The lifestyle and music in the American continent dictate a rhythm that only him was able to transcribe. It is said that his book Por los tiempos de Clemente Colling (By the Time of Clemente Colling) achieves the ‘painting of piano lessons’. This relation between sound and written word is more profound than just alluding to famous singers, as it happens in other more modern books like Rayuela(Hopscotch) with jazz.

 

Horacio Quiroga

I followed by reading Historia de un amor turbio (A Murky Love Story), a short novel by Horacio Quiroga (1878-1937). Quiroga is Uruguayan, but he lived most of his life in Misiones, Argentina, close to nature. He died in Buenos Aires, but his legacy lived on in the works of BioyCasares, who he influenced. In Quiroga’s work I already recognised that sincere, shoddy way of expression, that had only been used by children until then. Just as Hernández, he devoted himself to tales such as Cuentos de la selva (Jungle Tales), Cuentos de amor de locura y de muerte (Stories of Love, Madness and Death), among others. 

Quiroga was a cinema passionate, just like Jorge Luis Borges. He was one of the first silent films critic of his generation, and he wrote articles in different magazines (Caras y caretas, El Hogar, La Nación…)2. Films had a great influence in the visual richness of his stories and inhis notorious experimentation with time –he makes use of ellipsis of time, just as cinema does. 

One characteristic that caught my attention is that he introduces nature so decisively that it seems just like another character of the story. On many occasions, the forest, the jungle, or the river, accompany the leadcharacter in his successes and his death. In others, the main characters are animals, making notorious his influence by Kipling. Definitely, his work is deeply rooted and embedded with Latin American landscape and the tropical forest. 

But the main theme of many of his stories is love. He portrays tradition, courtship, social classes, and all the conventions surrounding love. They are stories of tangible realities. Edgar Allan Poe was another of his influences; in his stories one can take notice of his sharply descriptive style. Quiroga already has some brilliant moments in the use of metaphor and anticipation and retrospection. 

By the time I read Quiroga’s books, I had already connected deeply with my experiment. Inside me, there was plenty of energy to continue reading and reviewing Carlos Fuentes’ chosen authors. Soon you will be able to read the second part of my journey with them and share my impressions about Macedonio Fernández and Roberto Arlt.

 

Bibliography

1 Enriqueta Morillas, “Prólogo” a Nadie encendía las lámparas, p. 18. Editorial Cátedra, Madrid, 2010. (Thetranslation is mine)

2 Many of these articles are collected in Horacio Quiroga, Cine y literatura, editorial Losada, Buenos Aires, 2007. 

 

Luisa is a Spanish 3rd Year Industrial Engineering student at the Technical University of Madrid. She is passionate about literature and philosophy.

Art Exhibition ‘​María Berrío: Flowered Songs and Broken Currents’​ at the Victoria Miró Gallery

Source: https://online.victoria-miro.com/mariaberrio-london2020/wp-content/uploads/sites/18/2020/09/MBE53_Clouded-Infinity_2020-a.jpg

Source: https://online.victoria-miro.com/mariaberrio-london2020/wp-content/uploads/sites/18/2020/09/MBE53_Clouded-Infinity_2020-a.jpg

By: Irene Pérez Beltrán

DISCLAIMER: The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the KCL Latin American Society or El Cortao

María Berrío is a Colombian artist based in New York, who predominantly uses a magical realist style to explore the themes of cultural heritage and life cycles. Being constantly inspired by the natural world and the Japanese paper–which she usually uses as her preferred medium–her work focuses strongly on colour and texture experimentation. When asked about the title of her most recent collection, Berrío describes Broken Currents as ‘the disruption of our flow of life’, and Flowered Songs, as a symbol of ‘creativity and new forms of reinventing the world’. This motif of the cyclical nature between resilience after a catastrophe and hope for a brighter future is palpable throughout the exhibition. 

Most of the subjects of her pieces are women and children, who are inspired by those she met when visiting fishing villages in Colombia last year. What she found most striking about her visit was the condition of deprivation these women and children faced due to ecological degradation and political instability. Colombia’s landscape is heavily marked by coastal areas that have become increasingly vulnerable to the effects of climate change. The communities that live in villages along the coast are often from a low socio-economic background, and therefore their stability is largely threatened by changes in the environment. Despite these hardships, the cyclical link between nature, motherhood and the growth of the new generation, creates a sense of optimism that illuminates all of Berrío’s paintings. This is particularly evident in her piece Clouded Infinity, where we see a pregnant woman with an expression of contained concern in front of a window showing a vast sky. Here, Berrío reminisces her emotions when she was pregnant with her own son, and how the worries about her child’s future and wellbeing would cloud her vision. Amidst all the uncertainty, however, there is this sense of celebration of womanhood as a symbol of new life. 

Most of the symbolism in Berrío’s art pieces stem from Latin American traditions, in particular storytelling as a means of transferring wisdom from the older to the younger generation. She would usually employ a large canvas to have more narrative freedom–constantly adding and removing images directly on the painting as part of a continuousevolving, and dynamic creation. However, forced to paint some of her works from home during lockdown, Berrío had to experiment with painting at a smaller scale. Interestingly, this restraint turned out to be an opportunity to explore the subject of childhood from a more intimate perspective. In both The Combed Thunderclap and Under a Cold Sun, there is a sense of proximity that transmits to the audience the endurance that these children have had to go through. Through their expressions, there appears to be a dichotomy between their innocence and a sense of maturity that has resulted from their experiences in Colombia’s coastal regions. 

Overall the exhibition Flowered Songs and Broken Currents is a beautiful and thought-provoking collection of artworks. Berrío’s exhibition not only provides an insight into her creative process and her intimate relationship to Colombian culture, but also gives a glimpse of hope that inevitably resonates with the audience during these uncertain times. 

Note: All the artworks in the exhibition have been photographed and are showcased online in the gallery Victoria Miro’s website. 

Irene Pérez Beltrán is a 2nd Year International Relations student at King’s College London with a passion for Latin American Literature and sustainable development.

Poem: Las Mujeres Somos Fuego (Us Women are Fire)

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By: Roberta Woodworth

Las Mujeres Somos Fuego

Era un solsticio de verano,

con la espalda hacia la luna.

Una belleza casi egoísta.

La risa desvergonzada,

dentro de un aula en silencio

con el perfume de las flores

trenzado en los cabellos.

Era mujer, era fuego

flama vibrante de alma ardiente

furia incandescente

esa que fantasea

con quemarlo todo.

Nació tranquila,

entre voces que apaciguan,

que encasillan.

Los hombres le temen,

su miedo compartido y desmontado:

querer jugar con fuego y no morir calcinado.

El fuego deja huellas,

en las pieles y en la arena.

Y las mujeres ardemos,

sin importar cuanto nos extingan.

Un buen día, sin avisar,

volvemos a arder, a quemar, a amar.

Un día volvemos a incendiarlo todo.

English Translation:

Us Women Are Fire

It was summer solstice,

with her back against the moon.

An almost selfish beauty.

An unapologetic laugh,

inside a silent room

with her flowery perfume

braided throughout her hair.

She was a woman, she was fire

a vibrant flame with an ardent soul.

incandescent fury,

one that dreams with burning it all.

She was born tranquil,

amongst appeasing voices.

Men are scared of her,

their shared and unmounted fear:

they want to play with fire and not burn to death.

Fire leaves its traces,

on skin and on sand.

And us women we burn,

no matter how much they try to extinguish us.

One day, without notice,

we will return to burn again, we will love again.

One day we will come back to burn it all.

Roberta Woodworth is a born and raised Mexican writer, fashion lover, poetry addict, sport enthusiast, foodie, and student. Apart from managing and editing her blog, My Vintage Armoire, she has collaborated with various publishers in her country, such ELLE México, Instyle, and Life&Style. She has also been the beauty editor for Finding Ferdinand New York and editorial advisor to the Fashion section for the Mexican newspaper Reforma.