Literaturas centroamericanas hoy: desde la dolorosa cintura de América (review)

This collection of twenty-four essays originated in a symposium celebrated at the Instituto Iberoamericano in Berlin in April, 2002 as the Tenth Congreso Internacional de Literatura Centroamericana attended by regional specialists and creative writers. The Introduction by Karl Kohut, "Una(s) literatura(s) por descubrir," grounds the essays to follow by raising the pivotal question of Central American identity: is it Central American literature or literatures? Should the region be considered as a region, or as individual countries? Moreover, how does one talk about the literature of a region better known for its revolutions and civil wars, than its arts and letters?

The editors have valiantly organized the diversity of the papers of the symposium into four sections: "La realidad de lo imaginario," "Construcciones de lo nacional," "Memoria y olvido," and "Esplendor de la palabra." As the title suggests, the first section is much more theoretical. The first three essays compare how children create their fantasies to the construction of fictional works, discuss the Caribbean identity of Central America, and briefly analyze the (primarily negative) role of globalization on Latin American theater, where imported products from Europe may have delayed the development of (serious) local theater. The last two essays of this section concentrate on poetry as the form of choice for the five republics of Central America.

The eight essays of the second section are nation-based and include investigations of identity and nation in the novels of Guatemala, El Salvador, and Nicaragua; a "cartografía" for the Guatemalan novel of the last three decades, noting the inevitable presence of violence and politics; and a discussion of four great Guatemalan writers of the twentieth century, Arévalo Martínez, Asturias, Monteforte Toledo and Monterroso, against the political backdrop of their time. Nicaraguan literature of the 1980s and 1990s is examined from the perspective of women and revolution, while contemporary Salvadoran writers are classified as "the academics," writers of "literatura de chambre," and finally, "los inclasificables." Two essays on Costa Rican literature lament the national unwillingness to see the truth of national history, argue for a rejection of European models, and critique the invisible Costa Rican, the repression and exclusion of the black and mulato population of the Caribbean coast. This section ends with a reflection on Alteraciones del Dariel, a cycle of poems by a Spanish Jesuit from the seventeenth century.

Among the five essays of "Memoria y olvido" are examinations of the new historical novel in Central America and its deconstruction of official history, and a return to the question of identity in a different way, critiquing the "invisibilidad" of the region and its literature in comparison to the rest of Latin America. The third essay discusses the work of postwar poets. The final two essays investigate history and literature, including the "literatura femenina" that indeed exists, always in the shadow of patriarchy, and literary representations of the historical, archetypal figure of Sandino and Sandino's "miticidad." The final section of six essays contains five on Nicaragua writers: three on Sergio Ramírez, discussing his "mentiras verdaderas" and stories from Catalina y Catalina, an essay on the poet Ernesto Cardenal's Cántico cósmico, and an analysis of Gioconda Belli's Waslala as utopia. The section, and the collection, ends with what is essentially an introduction to a Salvadoran poet, and an invitation to "rescue" Robert Armijo's unpublished work from oblivion.

The subtitle of the volume, "Desde la dolorosa cintura de América," is clearly a reference to Pablo Neruda's Canto general, but also apprises the reader of the unifying theme of an otherwise quite varied collection of essays: the heritage of imperialism, the United Fruit Company, and the civil wars and revolutions suffered in these countries. Though the essays are in Spanish, quotations throughout are in the original English, French, and German, with no translation. Occasional typographical errors distract, but the volume is a solid contribution to the lesser-studied...