On the modernistic in Argentine literature.

Perhaps it's best to begin with Jorge Luis Borges--a kind of a crossroads in some ways between Kafka and Joyce. In Borges world there is the exploration of the world of dreams and limitlessness but curiously a kind of secular universe or one where the gatekeeper (or God) has gone missing. There is a compelling though very perceptive and articulate randomness to his subject matter. Of all his works it's his poetry I like the best but Ficciones and or Labyrinths to me would be the best place to start with his prose which is either in short story or essayistic form. I see echoes of his style in a number of very important writers from around the globe--particularly Italo Calvino, Juan Rulfo, Augusto Monterroso and his fellow Argentinian Adolfo Bioy Casares and more contemporaneously Alvaro Mutis. His work is integral and a huge influence to the Latin Boom coming out of the 50's, 60's and 70's which produced the works of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Mario Vargas Llosa, Julio Cortazar and Alejo Carpentier amongst others.

The polyglot nature of Argentine society rivals the United States. While immigrants flocked from Europe in their millions in the 19th century to North America (and that includes Canada) many also chose a South American destination and in particular Argentina which drew many from Germany, Switzerland, Italy and Eastern Europe. They brought their cultural identifications and languages which have assimilated into the broader culture of the Argentine people at large. One first generation immigrant of a Swiss mother and a German father was Roberto Arlt whose The seven madmen which was later followed up with Los lanzallamas describes in a noirist and very Dostoyevskian kind of fashion the alienation of a man within his own culture and can be seen as a precursor to the existentialist writings that will come into popularity worldwide some 10 to 20 years later. His main character--one Remo Erdosain--stumbles around Buenos Aires from one catastrophe to another--finally linking up with one of the more sinister characters I've ever run into in novel form who is known as 'The Astrologer' who by hook or by crook and meaning to use any ideology that fits his purpose plans with his cohorts on staging a coup d'etat to take over the government and establish a ruthless dictatorship run on fear. These two works published in 1929 and 1931 retrospectively seem to eerily point out the direction that the most meglomaniac dictatorial regimes (particulary Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia) will take in the 20th century.

As for the Latin Boom mentioned above--Julio Cortazar is without any doubt the most famous Argentine representative--his Hopscotch set in Paris and Buenos Aires owes something to both Borges and Joyce. One of the most ambitious pieces of fiction--it leaves much open to interpretation--and tempts the reader to read its chapters in any order he sees fit to find his own meaning. Among other works of his are the novel 62: A model kit and short story collections All fires the fire and End of the game.

Another significant Boom writer would be Luisa Valenzuela who has ties also to the French new novel and Tel Quel movements. Later on her Strange things happen here will give some insight into the death and disappearances of some of those opposed
to the Isabella Peron regime.

At this point I will bring up the poet Juan Gelman a political exile whose son Marcelo and pregnant daughter in law Maria Claudia disappeared during the time of the Argentine dirty war--1976-1983. Many years later a barrel containing the remains of Marcelo will wash up along the River Plate. The body of Maria Claudia has never been accounted for and until 2000 the whereabouts of the daughter that was born to her was unknown--at which time it was found that she adopted by people loyal to the military regime.

The dirty war informs a lot of the fiction by writers from the 1970's on particularly the excellent Ricardo Piglia whose Artificial Respiration is IMO maybe the best book to come out of Latin America in the 20th century. A novel on one hand it is also a philosophical and intellectual look at the meaning of existence and the right of an individual to forge his own way in a society that intimidates and stymies him every step of the way.

For now I'm going to take a break and later on come back with a Part II to this because I'm having some difficulty with the site on this.

A little bit of bounceback for some reason.

Anyway some commentary on other writers.

Ernesto Sabato--an existentialist who first came to fame for The tunnel. Not a big fan of that one--but much better would be On heroes and tombs and The Angel of darkness. Sabato began as a scientist and turned to literature in mid life. The latter two books are excellent with a kind of gothic though philosophical feel. For someone who likes Mark Z. Danielewski's House of leaves this is somewhat the same kind of territory.

Enrique Medina grew up in a reformatory. His Las Tumbas is a fictionalizing of that past. Gritty and very violent with many scenes of sexual assault amongst the inmates and their warders this lies somewhat in the territory between Hubert Selby and Jean Genet. The Duke deals once again with the dirty war. An out of work former boxing champion become an assassin for the dictatorship. Sex and gratuitous violence are part and parcel of this very compellingly written novella.

Mempo Giardinelli is someone in Arlt's vein. Sultry Moon is funny and noirish and concerns a man who visiting some friends rapes and murders their daughter and gets caught in a cycle of other crimes to cover up his deed. Also very good is his The tenth circle.

Tomas Eloy Martinez seems to write about the Perons particulary focusing on Evita in Santa Evita. A recent novel The tango singer takes a broad look at recent Argentine culture, history and literature and is very well done.

I'll go back to Ricardo Piglia for a moment. Artificial Respiration as I said is a great novel--almost as great is Money to burn a novel about a bank robbery that occured in the early 1960's pitting some real desperados against a corrupt police force. Very nasty, sleazy and violent--but as compelling as it gets in a noir genre.

A few other names to keep in mind--Osvaldo Soriano, Manuel Puig, Juan Jose Saer and Ricardo Feierstein and for now I'm done.

You've clearly been quite captivated by Argentine writers, lriley! I've never heard of most of these, and you've provided a great introduction. The two I am most familiar with, Jorge Luis Borges and Gabriel Garcia Marquez, both include elements of the surreal in their fiction, which prefigures the magical realism style that has become so prominent in South and Central American fiction (at least among the authors who are most read north of the border). Carlos Castaneda might also be mentioned in this context, though he was not Argentine. It's quite interesting that the dictator-like figure in The Seven Madmen would be called "The Astrologer." Why was he called this?

Margad--he goes by the name 'the Astrologer' throughout The Seven madmen and Los lanzallamas until the last couple pages where his name is finally revealed as Alberto Lezin. He is Svengaliesque and not really interested in astrology. He is interested in manipulating people into doing his bidding. Some of his monologues at least to me are fascinating--he's very upfront about his desires and talks with fascination about Napoleon, Lenin, the Ku Klux Klan--he sees in them all a kind of potential. The idea is to find an ideology that suits the moment. He is a criminal on one hand and a dreamer on the other. And somewhat bitter besides. An accident in his youth on one of his exploits has left him a castrato.

On the other hand he's well versed in the politics of the Americas of his time. He understands and rages against an American corporatist elite led by Theodore Roosevelt and a number of his cronies in the banking and corporate world who have stacked the deck against and made of South America nothing but a bunch of banana republics without the means to act on their own. So there is a dichotomy working constantly inside of his head between liberation through violent revolution and an ultimate meglomaniac dream of an iron-fisted dictatorship--none of which is ultimately resolved because the novel eventually blows everything up.

This sounds like a fascinating novel. I'm adding it to my to-be-read list. I've started tagging some of my new books BCRP for "Books Compared Reading Program."

Thanks for some really intriguing leads on Argentine writers! Back in my high-school days, when I was fluent enough in Spanish to read these guys in the original (alas! no more!), I loved Cortazar and Manuel Puig - especially El beso de la mujer araña/Kiss of the Spider Woman. I also remember an excellent short story involving a man trying to make his way across a barren desert landscape - does this ring any bells for any fans of Latin American lit on here? Anyway, good suggestions for the ever-expanding to-be-read shelf. :)

Puig and Cortozar are both huge names. I've read Julio several times but Manuel only once. I really should read him again and I do have a couple--three of his books around the house. The story you describe sounds somewhat similar to one by the Mexican writer Juan Rulfo and might be the title story of his collection The burning plain and other stories.

For some reason that's not showing in the touchstones but hit on Rulfo's name under the title el llano en llamas there is a cover of the burning plain.

Humberto Costantini was yet another recent Argentinian writer, who wrote a marvellous little book on the U.S.-supported Dirty War. The book's called The Long Night of Francisco Sanctis. It's both humorous and disturbing. Unfortunately his books are out of print at the moment and need to be found online or through second hand bookstores.

Other major Argentinian writers among Borges' circle that were left out include the influential Victoria Ocampo, and her younger sister Silvina Ocampo.

Lriley, I didn't like Sabato's The Tunnel either.

Che Guevara was also an Argentinian, and also, arguably, a writer.

On Costantini there is also The gods, the little guys and the police a kind of satire where the Ford falcons are closing in on an innocent gathering of a book club--or something like that. I'm a little vague on that now. I have read both that and the one you mentioned. More or less commenting on what I've read than one I haven't--and other contributions are very much welcome. I will have to look up the Ocampo sisters. Sabato's tunnel is a little over emotional for my taste. I think the other two are much better. I should have mentioned actually Witold Gombrowicz who although Polish spent quite a number of years in Argentina and his Trans-Atlantyk is definitely an Argentine novel.

Larry- great summary of the writers from the great and unique cultural context of Argentina.

Tomas Eloy Martinez also wrote a great book The Peron Novel which is a surrealistic tale of Peron's exile in Spain and subsequent, failed, return to Argentina with his second wife and the coffin containing the preserved Evita. He is a great writer and journalist, last year sited on the short list for the first International Booker Prize for literature. More recently he has headed up the Latin American Studies Program at Rutgers University but I have come to understand that his health condition may result in his retirement from this post.

I also have a particular interest in the Jewish Immigrant experience in Argentina and mention a few writers who come form this community: Edgar Cozarinsky and his The Bride From Odessa, Mestizo by Ricardo Feierstein, The Jewish Gauchos of the Pampas by Alberto Gerchunoff whom I understand was an influence upon Borges and lastly a rather definitive short story collection The Silver Candelabra edited by Rita Gardiol.

I have come to greatly respect the depth of knowledge you posess regarding the literature of both Latin America and the world at large!

I think the description of Borges as a mix between Joyce and Kafka would enrage the old man. While there is similarities between both (the passion for the language and classical literature, the way to build texts with several layers) they are far too different in style.
The correct way to describe Borges is linking him to other names such as Robert Louis Stevenson, Poe, Chesterton and Thomas Carlyle. After all Borges wasn't keen of language games, rather to use a minimal, simple and swift text, and Borges, unlike Joyce, never really went inside the mind of the "folk", always keeping the aristocratic distance.

Now that you mention it JCamilo I think I agree with you--it might have just been one of those 'inspired' moments that afterwards strike you as not so inspired at all. The one area of comparison is they all rank in the upper tier of 20th century novelists. Borges is a much more lucid writer than Joyce and especially Kafka. There seems to be an inevitable quality in his work--a narrator who knows the alpha and omega and all the letters in between--still maintaining at the same time the element of surprise. FWIW though I think if I were to take one work of each of Joyce, Kafka and Borges 'Ulysses' would be the one for me.

You may have heard this but BBC R4 transmitted this discussion of Borges a couple of years ago - Borges.

His attitude to translating was interesting, rather than trying to be faithful he would alter the stories if he thought it improved them.

One of Borges' predecessors who may be worth a look is Leopoldo Lugones. I recently started reading a collection of his short stories Strange Forces which seem to combine the influences of Poe and Wells. I know Lugones' poetry was also an influence on Borges, though I have not yet encountered it.

It is interesting that Jargoneer brings up Borges' involvement with translating. Having read an extensive bio on Borges, A life by Edwin Williamson he mentions that Borges was the first to translate Kafka into Spanish. Also Borges spent many years in Switzerland, I believe when he was of high school age (having his first romantic relationship there), and identified with the culture there even to the point that when he died this is where he wanted to be buried. He thus would have developed a strong connection to Kafka and other Eastern European writers.

Very interesting, Bert!

Re: 15

I'm a little puzzled by your post. I hope you won't mind a little attempt at clarification.

Switzerland is not Eastern Europe, whether by current or outdated norms/preconceptions.

Borges was a great admirer of Kafka and much of Kafka can be seen in his work, even if they are completely different writers in other regards. However, I don't see how one can infer that an affinity with Switzerland would lead to an affinity with East European writers, or even that an affinity with Kafka would lead to the same. Kafka is quite unique as a writer, whatever his origin.

Even if we take his origin into account, I think the geography is a bit deceptive. Firstly because Kafka, as a member of the educated elite in the Austro-Hungarian Empire (the Czech Republic did not exist then), wrote in German and was well assimilated into the mainstream West European mindset of his time; his work was also received (belatedly) from within the same perspective. Many "East European" writers came to prominence only as assimilated members of the mainstream/imperial culture, no matter where their roots lay or what they wrote about. This was not an uncommon predicament in turn of the century Europe because, secondly, "Eastern Europe" did not have the connotation then it does have now. Large parts of Eastern Europe were either part of the Austro-Hungarian or the Prussian or the Russian Empire, and the current "East European" countries 1) did not have the distinct national identity they have now, even if they always maintained (or were obliged to maintain) a strong ethnic and linguistic identity; 2) had not yet experienced Communism and not yet undergone the West-isolating effect of being part of the Soviet/Communist Bloc. Thus, major works were not always in less 'popular' languages, dissident work didn't have to be published in secret/abroad, and these countries were not seen as a 'group', the way they are perceived now.

I am only familiar with Borges' work translated into English, but I doubt that Borges (despite his prodigious reading) knew a great deal about modern East European writers outside of figures like Gustav Meyrink (Viennese, but lived in Prague), who were widely read in the Europe of Borges' youth, or Karel Capek who, although he wrote in Czech, was well-known before his death in 1938. The East European pantheon of writers we know now were only beginning to be known in Borges' old age, and I have no idea how many of them he had read - he could very well have read them all, but I doubt that indicates 'a strong connection'.

The second sentence should read "an attempt at a little clarification."

Of course, Switzerland is not Eastern Europe. However, there does seem to be an affinity between Kafka's themes and the themes of Communist-era Eastern European writers. Some of the symbolism seems quite dense in both cases (at least to me), and both Kafka and many of the Eastern European writers deal with characters living under harsh governmental systems and attempting to follow rules that defy logic.

#19:

I don't mean to debate, but there appears to be some confusion behind your post.

1) Kafka was not writing about "characters living under harsh governmental systems". Kafka can be interpreted on many levels, but his invention of an irrational, inexplicably cruel world in his fiction is a part of his vision as a writer, one of his many themes. The fact his descriptions came to serve as an explicit allegory, or to mean so much to people who actually lived through those conditions, is a testament to his vision, his talent, his craftsmanship. They are not a condemnation of any contemporaneous politics.

This is important, because 2) Kafka died in 1924. The socio-political climate of his particular time and place was practically nothing like the Communist- era world that followed over 20 years after his death. There was a war, there was the Holocaust, and there were other huge upheavals inbetween. Kafka was a citizen of Austro-Hungary as far as he was concerned, and also identified with his Jewish background, Prague culture, and so on. The culture of Communist Czechoslovakia would have been totally alien to him at first, as it was to many other people who were his contemporaries.

3) He died early enough in the century that he 'influenced' or at least made a great impression on a broad range of writers around the world - from Borges in Argentina to the Japanese Kobo Abe. If Kafka has many similarities with later Communist-Era East European writers, he also has many similarities with a lot of other writers who had little connection to the same Eastern European Bloc. The fact his writing was loved and adopted by people from his geographic region is not a confirmation that he belongs to some 'Eastern European' school.

In brief, it is a mistake to conclude that simply because one has an affinity with writer X from region Y, one will also have an affinity with all writers from region Y; there is no substance to the assumption that Borges would have had a strong connection with East European writers because he lived in Switzerland; and conflating Kafka's work with the work of writers who followed him is a bit like putting the cart before the horse (forgive the cliche.)

I didn't mean to go on for so long but I hope I have sorted out the various entanglements. :)

not to nit-pick...my thinking here is that we are talking about a "connection" between Borges and Kafka - one that is evidenced by Borges' writing about Kafka and translating his work into Spanish at an early date.

The fact that Borges spent several of his formative years in Switzerland/Europe is another connection...one need not get "hung-up" specifically about geography for we are talking more here about "sentiment"...ultimately, there are reasons,often inexpilcable, why we are all attracted to certain writers, perspectives or plilosophies.

Regarding Kafka, I view his work in 2 spheres - one of prophesy forseeing the horrors that were to come in his wake and secondly, how he depicted the dilemna of alienation in the "modern" world.

#21:

I don't disagree with anything you wrote above, and I apologize (to you and to Marg) if I went off on a tangent. I just think the initial posts (previous to any of my replies) didn't make sense on their own, without any clarification.

Of course, Borges loved Kafka; here is an excerpt from an interview:

"DB: You said, "When one reads Whitman, one is Whitman," and I was wondering, when you translated Kafka did you feel at any time that you were Kafka in any sense?

Borges: Well, I felt that I owed so much to Kafka that I really didn't need to exist. But, really, I am merely a word for Chesterton, for Kafka, and Sir Thomas Browne- I love him..."

No apologies necessary! It's great to have so much information and discussion in order to gain a deeper understanding of these writers.

I love the excerpt from the Borges interview. I'm so familiar with the feeling that one becomes a writer one is reading, if that writer is good enough to fully transmit his/her perspective to the reader.

I know the point has been made, but it's also worth mentioning that despite the predominance of political/other serious themes in 'famous' Eastern European literature, part of it an inevitable reaction to the sociopolitical climate, there was a much broader practice of writing in Eastern Europe under the Communist regimes. There were many writers of talent who never became vocal, active dissidents and were thus not media darlings of the Cold War propaganda machine. I don't mean that other dissident writers could be reduced to such a demeaning category - the well-known ones were of course hugely talented, intelligent and courageous, or they wouldn't have stood out in their environment to begin with. There was however a considerable amount of trashy or just light, forgettable stuff written in Eastern Europe too. If "Westerners" were more aware of this popular background they would appreciate that an artist is a rarity anywhere in the world, not a byproduct of difficult circumstances, and also that there is far more to recent Eastern European culture and literature than dissidence, politics, bad memories and so on. It might also shed some light on why the Western way of life now, for example, is not all that psychologically different from that of apparently brainwashed and repressed people living in stable times.

Existanai...your deep analysis is greatly appreciated...given your tag name i bet you are an "existentialist"?

No, for better or worse... "existanai" is a transliteration of the Greek word 'ecstasy' which, reduced to its components, means 'to be out of one's mind'. No better phrase to describe yours truly. :)

Existanai, it would be great if you created a new thread to compare some of the lesser known Eastern European writers of talent. I think many of us would be interested in learning about some of these authors.