Bibliography
The following list comprises work by Latin American authors to complement the class. Faculty may remove or add other works before the class starts.
Novels are grouped by the subject areas we¿ll address in class. Choose one to read and write a short report (minimum of 1,500 words), discussing the following points:
a) Brief plot summary
b) The connection between the topics addressed in the novel and those in class
c) Personal opinion about the novel and its impact on you.
Your mark on this commentary will be a part of your final mark for the ESG: An Open Window on Latin America II (January) subject, averaged only if achieving a minimum of 5 our of 10.
Essays for a general and historical introduction
Carlos Fuentes, La Gran novela latinoamericana. Alfaguara. 2011 (a fairly broad though personal view of the best novels by Latin American authors and subjects).
Joaquín Marco and Jordi García, La llegada de los bárbaros. Edhasa. 2004 (a review of how the Latin American ¿Boom¿ was received in Spain).
Xavier Ayén, Aquellos años del boom. RBA 2014 (the journalist for La Vanguardia reviews the most noteworthy elements of the Boom, including personal anecdotes, and their relation with Barcelona).
Agriculture
Rómulo Gallegos, Doña Bárbara, Ed. Cátedra 2000 (1ª ed. Caracas 1929) (landowners, agrarian issues, the fight between civilisation and barbarism).
Ciro Alegría El mundo es ancho y ajeno, Ed. De la Torre, Madrid 2000 (indigenist novel, the fight for land), (1ª ed. Lima 1941).
García Márquez, Cien años de soledad. 1967 (RAE 2007 edition with good prologues; it¿s worthwhile as the story is based on a village in a banana plantation and summarises the history of a family and Latin America, in part, as well as being the representative novel of ¿magical realism¿ and the Boom).
Indigenism
César Vallejo, El tungsteno, 1931, Madrid-Peru (social novel: mining and indigenism).
Ciro Alegría, El mundo es ancho y ajeno, 1941, Peru, (indigenist novel and the fight for land), Ed. De la Torre, Madrid 2000.
Rigoberta Menchú, Me llamo Rigoberta Menchú y así nació mi conciencia. 1982,
Guatemala (military repression in Guatemala and indigenism), Seix y Barral, Barcelona 2000.
Jorge Icaza, Huasipungo, 1934 (Ecuadorian novel on indigenism and agrarian reform, in part) Ed. Cátedra 2005.
Conquest, colonisation and independence
Alejo Carpentier, El reino de este mundo, 1949, Cuba (Haitian revolution and independence, slavery and melding religions) Alianza Ed., Madrid ,2004.
Eduardo Galeano, Las venas abiertas de América Latina, 1971, Ed. Catálogos, Montevideo (essay on the plunder of Latin America), S.XXI ed. 2007
Octavio Paz, El laberinto de la soledad, 1982, FCE, Mexico (a people born from rape).
Gabriel García Márquez, El general en su laberinto, 1989 (a historical novel about Simón Bolívar).
Nélida Piñón, La república de los sueños (a beautiful story about the two continents, with Brazil at the centre).
Poetry
Ernesto Cardenal. El estrecho dudoso, Buenos Aires, Ed. Educa 1971 (a poetic and narrative text that combines extracts from the Crónicas de Indias texts on the colonisation of Central America and their relation with the present).
Pablo Neruda, Canto General. 1955, (an epic song dedicated to the history of the Americas and their social battles), Bibl. Virtual Miguel de Cervantes, Alicante 2000
Rubén Darío. Cantos de vida y esperanza.
Protests and dictatorships
Alejo Carpentier, El reino de este mundo, 1949, Cuba (Haitian revolution and independence, slavery and melding religions) Alianza Ed., Madrid, 2004,
Carlos Fuentes, La muerte de Artemio Cruz, 1962, (novelised review of Mexican history since the Mexican Revolution), Ed. A. Bello, Santiago de Chile 2003
Augusto Roa Bastos, Yo, el Supremo, 1974, (critique of the Paraguayan dictatorship) Bib. Ayacucho, Caracas
José Donoso, Casa de Campo, 1978, (social parable, Chilean dictatorship), Bib. Breve, Seix y Barral, BCN 1989
Rigoberta Menchú, "Me llamo Rigoberta Menchú y así nació mi conciencia". 1982, (military repression in Guatemala and indigenism), Seix y Barral, Barcelona 2000
Gioconda Belli, La mujer habitada, 1988, Editorial Vanguardia, Managua (the incorporation of women in the fight for freedom) Ed. Txalaparta, Tafalla 2008
Sergio Ramírez, Margarita, está linda la mar, 1998, Alfaguara (the Somoza dictatorship in Nicaragua)
Santiago Roncagliolo, Abril rojo, 2006, Alfaguara, (thriller based on the Sendero Luminoso guerrilla movement in Peru)
Tomás Eloy Martínez, Purgatorio, Buenos Aires (Argentine military repression) Alfaguara 2008
Vázquez Montalbán, Galíndez. Seix Barral 1990 (even Dominicans say that this novel is better than ¿La fiesta del chivo¿ to understand the Trujillo dictatorship, as well as exploring the relation with Spain and the Basque Country)
Sergio Ramírez, Adiós Muchachos, Alfaguara 2007 (a view of the Sandinista Revolution in Nicaragua after achieving power and becoming Vice President)
Ernesto Sábato, Antes del fin, Seix Barral 1998 (a book recalling social and political commitments).
Vargas Llosa, El sueño del celta, Alfaguara 2010 (based on the fight by Roger Casement, a pro-independence Irishman advocating workers¿ rights in Congo and Peru, a problem joining two continents under colonial control)
For debate
Apuleyo, Montaner, A. Vargas Llosa, Manual del perfecto idiota latinoamericano, Plaza Janés 1996, (against Galeano¿s thesis and written from a Liberal right-wing position. A good way to see what others think; very controversial).
Before the Boom
Jorge Luis Borges. El Aleph; Historia Universal de la infamia
Society, magical realism and the Boom
Juan Rulfo, Pedro Páramo (the start of magical realism in this short fictional work)
Rómulo Gallegos, Doña Bárbara, 1929, Caracas, (landowners, agrarian issues, the fight between civilisation and barbarism), Ed. Cátedra 2000
Ernesto Sábato, Sobre héroes y tumbas, 1961, Ed. Sudamericana, B. Aires (the decline of an oligarchic Argentine family) Ed. Ayacucho, Caracas 2004
Carlos Fuentes, La muerte de Artemio Cruz, 1962, (novelised review of Mexican history since the Mexican Revolution), Ed. A. Bello, Santiago de Chile 2003
García Márquez, Cien años de soledad. 1967 (already described)
Julio Cortázar, Las armas secretas y otros relatos. (any of Cortázar¿s collections of short stories is worthwhile).
Vargas Llosa, Conversación en la catedral (the brave who tackle this book will learn about the ins and outs of macro politics and its influence on people at the most personal level and in terms of their personal relations; only for the brave).
Latin American conflicts and its current problems
Vargas Llosa, Como pez en el agua (a dynamic reflection on the author¿s political adventure in Peru and his literary vocation)
Roa Bastos, Hijo de Hombre, Alfaguara 1997 (social drama based on the Chaco War between Paraguay and Bolivia provoked by fictitious oil interests).
Laura Restrepo, La multitud errante, Anagrama 2001 (a well-documented novel based on real stories of displaced Colombian farmers who were left without their lands with the war as the excuse)
Juan Gabriel Vásquez, Historia secreta de Costaguana, Alfaguara. 2007 (on the separation and creation of Panama).
Héctor Abad Faciolince, El olvido que seremos, Alfaguara 2010 (a sentimental biography of the author¿s father, killed by paramilitary forces in Medellin simply for being a doctor defending public health).
Roberto Bolaño, 2666, Anagrama, Barcelona 2002 (a very long and overwhelming novel focused on the crimes of Juarez, Mexico)
Don Winslow, El poder del perro. Roja y Negra. 2009 (a very realistic novel on the ins and outs of drug trafficking between Mexico and the US, from the 1970s when Nixon creates the DEA and begins the war on drugs)
Rafael Ramírez Heredia, La mara, Alfaguara, 2004 (immigration-related problems in Central America and the role that mara gangs play)
Juan Gabriel Vásquez, El ruido de las cosas al caer, Alfaguara 2011 (the most recent Alfaguara Award winner, providing a very good analysis of well-intentioned volunteers and every-day citizens and their unintended role in building drug-traffickers¿ power)
Rodrigo Rey Rosa, Piedras Encantadas (a brief and intense view of Guatemala today)
Edmundo Paz Soldán, El delirio de Turing. Alfaguara 2003. (the best writer in Bolivia today and very current, addressing the protests against Neo-liberalism and the dictatorship).