Emir Rodríguez Monegal ³Tradition and Renewal² --->
3 violent breaks with the central traditional core:
Each crisis breaks with tradition, proposes new values, excavates in the past to legitimize the revolt, to justify its descent.
1920:
1940:
1960:
Tradition of the novel of the land or the country dweller --> ³deformed realism² (city vs. country) =|= universal = vanguard = change in form and essence.
Is this a surrealist work?
1924 ---> 1st. Manifesto (Breton) Antecedent: Dadaism (Tristan Tzara) Dadaism rejects art and literature,denied all precursors, declares his own genesis.
Surrealism tries to transcend art and literature, establishes its antecedents, systematizes all ³isms² and aspires to be the last one.
Three objectives: 1) social redemption of human beings 2) complete moral liberation 3) intellectual renewal
Antecedents ---> avant-garde (Creacionismo) of Vicente Huidobro and César Vallejo (Trilce, 1922).
Buenos Aires ---> Ultraísmo= exploration of pure poetry. Que (journal) 1928-30= point of departure of surrealism---> to erase all norms, to impose a new way of living and thinking and the absolute freedom of the individual self in order to reveal the essential truths hidden in the unconscious.
Chile---> center of surrealist activity: Grupo Mandrágora (Braulio Arenas): propose to study the great poetry cycles, the chivalry novels, the Elizabethan theatre, the Gothic novel, the German Romanticism and French symbolism, etc, and craft a new attitude to face the challenges of surrealism.
Mexico --> 1st. Avant-garde group estridentista (1923) 2nd group Contemporáneos (1928-1931) introduces surrealist ideas and techniques.
From the 30ıs avant-garde and surrealist techniques appear in prose.
* Surrealism is the natural evolution toward the universalization of the experience (more urban) and the abandonment of the regional, land-related narratives.
Two periods:
1935-1946: Introduction and experimentation
1946: Surrealism is an integral part of the general characteristics of Latin American narrative.
"The writer must be able to revel and roll in the abundance of words; he must know not only the direct but also the secret power of a word. There are overtones and undertones to a word, and lateral echoes, too." (Knut Hamsum, 1888)
* Exploration of the oneiric realm, poetic of dreams. (La última niebla).
* Mental action prevails over physical actions. Attempt to paint all facets of the unconscious.
* Sexual communication = only truthful communication.
* Women= instinctive and vital beings repressed by bourgeois society.
* Women= inner and ancestral attributes, essence link to the cosmic cycle =|= positivism and modern world.
* Use of symbols and archetypes.
Sources:
Rodríguez Monegal. "Tradition and Renewal." Latin American in its Literature. Ed. Julio Ortega. London/New York: Holmes and Meier, 1980.
Galvez Lira, Gloria. María Luisa Bombal: Realidad y fantasía.
Guerra Cunningham, Lucía. La narrativa de María Luisa Bombal.
Langowski, Gerald J. El surrealismo en la ficción hispanoamericana. Madrid: gredos, 1982.