El tapaboca (review)

El tapaboca. Edited by JOSÉ AMOR Y VAZQUEZ. Providence: The John Carter Brown Library, 2000. Plate. Map. Appendixes. Bibliography. Index. xxxiv, 136 pp. Cloth.

Among the many items of bolivariana that Maury A. Bromsen donated to the John Carter Brown Library is a unique text that documents an aspect of the political controversy surrounding Venezuela's liberator and his nation's tumultuous struggle for independence. This volume, known as El tapaboca, belongs to a group of writings that is satirical in nature and has both historical and literary significance. The title, literally translated, means something that covers the mouth, which may refer to an actual article of clothing or, in this case, interpreting it figuratively, to a hand that silences, chastizes, or startles. Very few of these tapabocas are still in existence, and the one at the John Carter Brown Library is the only known copy of a work published in Puerto Rico in 1812 by an author who used the pen name of Leandro de Uldesage.

José Amor y Vázquez has carefully prepared a modern edition of the 1812 Puerto Rican tapaboca, making this rare volume easily accessible to both students and scholars. In addition to transcribing the text with appropriate changes in punctuation and orthography, he has provided an informative introductory study that places the work within the context of the independence period and has appended several related documents such as Diarrea de las imprentas, a similarly satirical exposition from Yale's Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, that was published in Lima and is referred to specifically in La tapaboca.

The most exciting aspect of Amor y Vázquez's research on La tapaboca and the circumstances under which it was written is his discovery of the real identity of Leandro de Uldesage. By treating the pseudonym as an anagram, he uncovered the name of Andrés Level de Goda, a prominent native of Cumaná who, as a royalist, fled to Puerto Rico at the outset of Venezuela's rebellion against Spain. Numerous supporters of the empire took refuge on the island and, in fact, Francisco de Miranda was being held prisoner there at the same time for the part he played in the insurrection. While many of Level de Goda's fellow Americans ardently supported complete separation from Spain, he was equally devoted to seeing his viceroyalty remain within the Spanish fold. Convinced that he was right, he endeavored to persuade independentistas to question their efforts by casting their actions in a ridiculous light rather than confronting them militarily. Devising a clever series of exchanges in both poetry and prose, therefore, he opened a dialogue between the two opposing factions in which he essentially is the lone voice. Level de Goda accomplishes this by taking the authorial pseudonym "Leandro de Uldesage" and dedicating his work to himself, the notable political figure, Andrés Level de Goda. As Uldesage, then, he purports to incorporate a letter sent to him by Level in which the latter states his ideological position in the debate. The brief volume also contains a previously published poem recounting a royalist naval victory, which Uldesage satirizes in his own poetic response.

In addition to uncovering the real identity of the author of La tapaboca, Amor y Vázquez provides valuable notes regarding the physical aspects of the book, since it was one of the first books published in Puerto Rico and only the second one produced there in poetic form. He meticulously references names, places, and events that occur in the series of documents Level de Goda has compiled. Of particular importance is the editor's explanation of certain expressions used by the author which shed light on his specific use of irony.

With the publication of La tapaboca, Amor y Vázquez succeeds in bringing a rare volume to the attention of specialists in Venezuela's independence period. The work is unusual not only for reasons surrounding its publication and preservation but because of the point of view held by...