In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

Reviewed by:
  • Looking North: Writings from Spanish America on the US, 1800 to the Present by John J. Hassett and Braulio Muñoz, eds
  • Adolfo Campoy-Cubillo
John J. Hassett and Braulio Muñoz, eds. Looking North: Writings from Spanish America on the US, 1800 to the Present. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2012. 224 pp. ISBN: 978-0-8165-2998-8. $35.00.

Looking North delivers exactly what it promises: a highly teachable anthology of texts on the United States written by Spanish Americans. The anthology is structured in three parts: “The Two Americas,” “Travelers from the South,” and “The United States as Literary Theme.” Of the three parts, the selection of texts for the first one occupies the larger part of the book, and it is also the most interesting. The comparison between the two Americas seems to be the central topic of the anthology, and the selection [End Page 170] of traveler’s diaries and literary pieces on the United States provides simpler material to pace the reading assignments for students. Looking North not only provides a large selection of texts that can help the reader understand Spanish Americans’ perception of the United States but also allows the student to construct a clearer idea of what Spanish American culture is like. The detailed descriptions of what Spanish Americans find remarkable about their northern neighbors talks volumes about what they in turn find remarkable about themselves. The selection of texts is also wisely organized to prompt a review of the recent history of Latin America. Students will need to understand the historical context for Simón Bolívar’s “Angostura Discourse,” José Martí’s “Our America,” or Salvador Allende’s “Address to the United Nations General Assembly.” Similarly, certain topics keep coming up throughout the anthology, providing students with an opportunity to understand how history is also the history of ideas: the importance of the Protestant work ethic for the United States versus the accumulation and expenditure culture of Spanish America, racial segregation versus mestizaje, national pre-state identity versus nation-state identity. This recurrence of common topics allows readers to pay attention to the nuances of style that differentiate Octavio Paz’s analytic approach from Gabriela Mistral’s more subversive interpretation of similar cultural phenomena.

The three parts into which the book is divided are not defined thematically as much as by the genres anthologized in each one of them: essayistic for the first part, diary entry in the case of the second, and poetry and fiction in the case of the third. The organization of the material according to literary genre can prompt interesting discussions in the classroom. Is there a type of knowledge about the Americas that only fiction can express? Does the experiential knowledge that characterizes the diary entries in the second part of the book highlight differences between the two Americas that the more abstract approach that characterizes the essays in the first part fail to mention? Does our perception of America vary depending on the expectations raised by each genre? This type of contrast allows for interesting combinations of reading materials. Does Rubén Darío’s poem “To Roosevelt” work the same when read next to Mistral’s “The Infantilism of the North American” as opposed to reading it next to Manuel Baldomero Ugarte’s “An Open Letter to the President of the United States”?

Part 3 of the anthology is, perhaps, the most problematic one in that the selection of texts is presented as “The United States as Literary Theme.” It would seem as if the editors of Looking North were suggesting that only the texts included in this final part are to be considered literature. Or maybe they are instructing us to read Rubén Darío as literature but Simón Bolívar as history. This is a bit problematic because the historical significance of Darío’s letter to Roosevelt is undeniable, as is the literary value of Bolívar’s advocacy for a united Spanish America. In this sense, the structure of this anthology seems to be emphasizing the aesthetic value of fiction and poetry [End Page 171] as something that is separate from the political...

pdf