Violence in Argentine Literature: Cultural Responses to Tyranny (review)

298 Arizona Journal of Hispanic Cultural Studies Vioknce in Argentine Literature: Cultural Responses to Tyranny University of Missouri Press, 1995 By David William Foster In recent years there has been much scholarly interest in Argentine cultural production especially with relation to the years the nation suffered its most repressive military regime, known as the Proceso de Reorganización Nacional, from 1976 to 1983. Taking into consideration the cultural fragmentation which naturally resulted during this period of exile, state and self-censorship, and lack of critical attention, David William Foster makes a great contribution to this field of research. His insightful treatment of a number of eclectically selected Argentine texts published before, during and immediately after the dictatorship gives an extensive view of the writing that characterized the historical moment. The texts analyzed represent contestatorial literature published in Argentina as well as works of exiled writers published abroad. Foster points out in his introduction that the transition to democracy , which began in Argentina in 1983, necessarily included a reorganization and réévaluation of national culture. It became important to recover the literature produced during the years of tyranny in addition to exploring the great cultural outpouring of the years immediately following the dictatorship and reexamining the entire Argentine literary tradition . Foster's text, therefore, is one step towards a greater understanding and appreciation of the literature of Argentina of the last several decades. As the author indicates, several essays included in the volume were written as separate pieces over the course of fifteen years of research while others were conceived to form part of a unified work. Although this creates a sense of fragmentation within the text as a whole, and at times leads to the repetition of certain sociohistorical facts, it is actually a very effective format. Not only does the loose structure here allow Foster to include a larger variety of authors and genres in his analysis but it also reflects the cultural fragmentation he describes as a result of the dictatorship . In the opening chapter, Foster examines contemporary sociopolitical commentary in Argentina, focusing on journalists who, through their writing, have contributed to the social analysis of the nation. Discourse strategies and rhetoric are emphasized in the study of such works as Luis Duhalde's El estado terrorista argentina (1983), Carlos Gambetta's Todos somos subversivos (1983) and Santiago Kovadloff's Argentina, oscuro paÃ-s: Ensayos sobre un tiempo de quebranto (1983). Arizona Journal of Hispanic Cultural Studies 299 Chapter 2, entitled "Argentine Fiction during the Proceso de Reorganización Nacional", gives a wonderful overview of a variety of narrative works produced in Argentina during the dictatorship. Foster's point is to signal texts that responded to the sociocultural pressures of the time. Additionally, he pays special attention to the erratic nature of censorship and includes in this essay various books that were harmed by the censors as well as others that were not. Paradigmatic of the cultural atmosphere of the Proceso, according to Foster, is the novelist Enrique Medina. Other writers discussed in this chapter include Marta Lynch, Martha Mercader, Griselda Gambaro, Ricardo Piglia and Oscar Hennés Villordo. In subsequent chapters, Foster concentrates on just one or two specific authors. Chapter 3, for example, is an excellent interpretation of Las tumbas (1972) by Enrique Medina. Foster follows through on the concept of the prison as a microcosm of society in order to show the relationship between social control and violence, particularly as it relates to the dynamic of Argentine society during military dictatorship. Alejandra Piznarik's La condesa sangrienta (1971) is the subject of Chapter 4 as Foster examines the representation of absolute power and its horrific possibilities. Piznarik's depiction of the sadistic Etzóbet Bithory became an underground classic during the Proceso given the fact that it draws a distutbing parallel between the bloody history of the countess and the repression of the military dictatorship. The last novel of Marta Lynch, Informe bajo llave (1983) is expertly analyzed in the following chapter. Foster explains his concept of "farfetchedness " in literature and how it relates to this particular novel. In this light, the inexplicable obsession of the neurotic Adela for the powerful and violent Vargas becomes...