Book Reviews

Reviews

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Few publishers in the world have done more to provide Hispanic scholars with bibliographies than has Grant & Cutler in its Research Bibliographies and Checklists series of which this is volume 47. Prominent scholars in various fields have compiled outstanding critically annotated bibliographies which are extremely comprehensive and useful. This is the eighteenth volume that has dealt with a Hispanic topic. The editors have established high standards for their compilers, who have met them in every way.

Faulhaber's bibliography concerning books and libraries in medieval Spain continues with meeting the high standard of excellence already established. In 1975 Faulhaber announced his intention to compile such a bibliography. He writes «en aquel entonces creí que conocía ya la mayoría de los inventarios impresos; pero a medida que profundizaba en mis investigaciones, me di cuenta de que quedaban muchas fuentes por revisar» (17). Like most bibliographers he discovered that few bibliographies, especially those that demand much travel to countries outside of one's own, are compiled within an expected definite time.

His introduction, pp. 11-18, should be read with care. He notes that his bibliography «es esencialmente un suplemento, en lo que se refiere a bibliotecas medievales, al Handschriftenschátze Spaniens de Beer. Por tanto, omite materias ya señaladas allí, a menos que requieran adiciones o correcciones» (14). The introduction discusses the organization of the volume, the indices as well as the history of the work's development and acknowledgments.

The work is divided into España, Corona de Aragón, Corona de Castilla, Francis and Italia. The two Coronas are subdivided. There are a subject index, a chronological index, a toponymic index, index of individuals who owned the library and an index to modern scholars who have compiled inventories of medieval libraries or written studies on medieval books and libraries.

This bibliography has 666 well-annotated items. The annotations are extremely useful commenting as they do on the types of works found in medieval library catalogs and inventories. The annotations identify the individuals to whom these libraries and books belonged. They vary from one to twenty lines. His abbreviation list of journals and homenaje volumes occupies pages 19-22 and it is very doubtful, despite his modest disclaimer in his introduction, that he has missed material of any importance. Pp. 22-24 are identification symbols for libraries, for Faulhaber quite helpfully indicates one library either in the United States or in Europe that possesses the item.

Data concerning medieval books and libraries in Spain are scattered throughout many sources and this bibliographical guide will be an indispensable starting point for those interested in these subjects. Through placing his vast knowledge of the field, his patience and perseverance in searching out studies on his subject, Faulhaber has put all of us in his debt.

Hensley C. Woodbridge

Southern Illinois University-Carbondale

The Libro del arcipreste, as the Libro de buen amor was best known to medieval audiences and readers, is a text which is not only aware of the possibilities of its own kaleidoscopic verbal ambiguity («Non ha mala palabra si non es a mal tenida», 64b; «De todos instrumentos yo libro só pariente; / bien o mal, qual puntares, tal te dirá ciertamente», 70ab, and passim), but one which has come down to us in three principal differing incarnations: manuscripts S, G, and T. Together the latter raise issues not only of textual fidelity, filiation, chronology, and authorship, but also of the validity of critics' multiple interpretations of the work. In short, along with Celestina, the Libro is one of the two most important yet textually unstable and problematical literary works of the Spanish Middle Ages.

While Manuel Criado de Val's and Eric W. Naylor's edition of the Libro (Madrid: CSIC, 1965; second corrected, expanded edition, 1972) remains the first and best comprehensive effort to negotiate the textual labyrinth of the work through synoptic editing, Anthony Zahareas's and Thomas McCallum's provides a reliable, more readable alternative. Essentially an abridgement and sensible reorganization of the labors of Criado de Val and Naylor; this new synoptic edition permits an easier reading of the Libro as literature without losing sight of the major instabilities of the text. Lacking Criado's and Naylor's possibly distracting paleographical intricacies

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(albeit this reviewer finds the latter important), as well as suppressing transcription of the various fragments of the Libro cited in other medieval witnesses, this edition deliberately eschews interpretive notes, commentary, and recording minor variants in order to offer an unobstructed vision of the Protean text. As a result, it provides a salutary reminder of the risks inherent in the Libro's interpretation.

Zahareas's and McCallum's edition is important, then, because it reminds critics, particularly those dazzled by theory at the expense of philology, that there remain significant unresolved codicological problems which an undermine and vitiate even the most elegant and persuasive interpretations. Though aware that the act of reading, indeed even of synoptically editing the Libro, are in themselves gestures fraught with nuances of interpretation, the editors continue to believe that a degree of empirical objectivity is both possible and necessary in reading and understanding the work. They are sensitive to the fact that medieval texts persist in posing arresting diachronic questions which will continue to command our attention. Zahareas and McCallum, thus, provide a wider, welcome lesson in the inherent interdisciplinary and tentative nature of Medieval Studies.

The mechanics adopted for the presentation of this synoptic text are logical and easy to use. Using S as a base, differences between the three principal manuscript witnesses are coded in the left margin using the abbreviations S, G, and T. Hence, a cuaderna marked SGT 1251 indicates that it appears in all three. SG 70, on the other hand, points to a quatrain recorded in S and G but lacking in T, and so on. Similar devices help distinguish missing and transposed verses, clearly and simultaneously identifying at each step the reading in each of the manuscripts. In keeping with the desire to produce a synchronically readable text, however, only variants affecting the rhyme and the sense of key words and expressions are registered in the Notas de comentario textual at the back. The Guía del lector preceding the text is a useful reference tool de signed to help readers sort out the relationship of the Libro's narrative voice to the myriad literary forms it adopts. The accompanying selected bibliography is well-chosen, well-organized, and up-to date, while the glossary is adequate, though not complete, since it fails to record many puns and well-known ribald second acceptations recognized by medieval audiences (for example recabdado, 868d, and cobros, 591b, not in the sense of logrado and logros, as per the gloss, but as euphemisms for sexual conquests).

In conclusion, while the Libro may be satisfactorily read in this edition, the latter does not commend itself to scholars interested in detailed philological and paleographical aspects of the work. The result is an eminently useful edition that nevertheless falls short of providing a fully comprehensive, synoptic vision of the text.

E. Michael Gerli

Georgetown University

El Conde Lucanor ha recibido últimamente docenas de estudios críticos, como se verá en la extensa bibliografía de más de 300 citas en éste de Biglieri, el cual es sin duda no de los más valiosos por su nítida brillantez en aclarar la función de los ejemplos dentro del marco del texto. Sus ocho capítulos van dedicados a análisis semióticos («es decir, de lo que hace posible el sentido de la fábula» [183]) de los ejemplos 36, 46, 37, 41, 23, 24, 2 y 33 respectivamente. Todos, incluso la aplicación especial de los modelos formales de Susan Suleiman (Authoritarian Fictions) al 24 y de Lucien Dällenbach (Le récit spéculaire) al 2, forman un argumento integral que desdice un ambiente realista-mimético-autobiográfico para El Conde Lucanor en favor de uno arbitrario-composicional-didascálico. Según este punto de vista, la obra es el producto de una mentalidad elitista feudal -caballeresca- en que la sentencia rimada que se encuentra al final de cada ejemplo, aparentemente allí como efecto de una aplicación del relato de Patronio a la vida real, es en verdad el motivo y causa de lo anterior: «La moraleja, ciertamente, está al final del discurso, pero en realidad, y por pertenecer al nivel de sentido y, por lo tanto, al del texto en su totalidad, lo precede y lo condiciona en todos sus aspectos» (43). Por eso, uno tiene que despojarse de las ideas decimonónicas del verosimilismo realista para aceptar una verosimilitud genérica en que la lógica de la narración se basa en una motivación composicional por la cual las acciones no tienen lugar porque algo ocurrió, sino para que el lector entienda el sentido que da Juan Manuel al relato. Además, esta arbitrariedad del relato depende de dos propiedades siempre presentes en la obra manuelina: la falta total de ambigüedad, para asegurar la univocidad del mensaje, y moralización única, para facilitar, una vez establecido su sentido, la universalización de la enseñanza.

Dado esta lógica del discurso didáctico, El Conde Lucanor es una colección de relatos bastante «cerrados», planeados y construidos para persuadir al lector que acepte una visión arbitraria de la sociedad feudal del siglo XIV español. El lector, por su parte, sea contemporáneo o moderno, sabe y acepta la agenda de don Juan Manuel al empezar el libro mismo con su introducción al lector y al leer cada ejemplo con sus redundantes principios y finales. Las consejas hincadas en cada ejemplo vendrán de un sinnúmero de fuentes literarias e histórico-legendarias, pero los consejos son de la

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ética nobiliaria de la Edad Media. En las palabras de Biglieri: «Su misión consistirá en imponer una sola descodificación privilegiando determinadas relaciones de significación y, simultáneamente, excluyendo o "bloqueando", interpretaciones contrarias. En otras palabras, en el marco se estipula el "contrato de lectura" a que el lector deberá someterse» (195).

La prueba más genial de estas aseveraciones es su análisis del ejemplo 33, «De lo que contesçió a los muy buenos falcones garçeros... del infante don Manuel». El alegato tradicional por un texto autobiográfico, o por lo menos representacional de asuntos históricos en que Alfonso XI es el águila y Juan Manuel el halcón, es rechazado sistemáticamente por Biglieri en un impresionante ejercicio de análisis semiótico digno del mayor aprecio, que pena a la consideración correcta del halcón como un símbolo de las virtudes estamentales de los «defensores»: los atributos de constancia, tesón, fortaleza y esfuerzo predicados ya en el libro entero.

En fin, el libro de Biglieri hace más que indicar nuevas sendas que seguir; porque cierra la puerta a toda una serie de estudios histórico-realistas. Es un libro esencial para una apreciación completa de El Conde Lucanor como magnífico artefacto literario y como la obra maestra representante de su clase social nobiliaria y su época medieval.

David H. Darst

Florida State University

Lewis J. Hutton's study is an ambitious attempt to slow the evolving nature of Christianity as seen in works of Spanish literature from the Middle Ages through the twentieth century. The author has evaluated representative works from all periods to show the differing portrayals of the Spanish literary spirit. In particular, he contributes significantly to the readers' understanding and appreciation of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The Christian Essence contains an introduction, five extensive chapters and an epilogue. Chapter 1 treats «Knights, Warrior Priests and Troubadours»; Chapter 2 examines «Renascense Exuberance and Erasmus»; Chapter 3 continues the themes examined in the previous chapter and traces them through the Baroque period. In Chapter 4, we find the impact of the Age of Reason on the religious experience, which Chapter 5 develops to its logical conclusion, «Alienation, Destruction and Christian Symbols». The Epilogue provides the reader with suggestions for further reading for «the Christian person» (493).

The scope of this book is wide and potentially interesting, but one which is too ambitious for a single-volume work. While the author's intentions are worthy, he does not always five up to the expectations suggested by the title. Much of the text plot summary, completely unnecessary in the case of such well known works as the Poema del Cid, La vida es sueño and El burlador de Sevilla. Space which could have been devoted to critical analysis is wasted on a repetition of the obvious. In particular, Hutton fails to examine critically the works of Gonzalo de Berceo and El libro de buen amor which he summarizes at great length. In his evaluation of the Poema del Cid, he tantalizes the reader with the theme of anti-semitism, but fails to follow up with an explanation. A more serious defect lies in two major omissions from the study. No mention is made of El auto de los reyes magos, the oldest surviving religious play in Spanish, nor of Lope de Vega's La corona trágica, a controversial contrarreforma work. Despite Hutton's acknowledgment of the significance of the battle of Lepanto to the Christian Essence, he fails to cite any of the recent studies devoted to the naval encounter.

The book contains a thorough and insightful treatment of the mystics Luis de León and Santa Teresa and the section on Cervantes succeeds in piecing together the lofty ideals in the Quijote and the Novelas ejemplares. The author makes a convincing case of parallels between the latter and the Bible. For many of his ideas, however, Hutton relies too heavily on summaries of previous criticism. Where he does excel is in his digression on the visual arts, which are technically speaking, beyond the scope of his study.

Perhaps the most serious defect of The Christian Essence is its documentation style and too numerous typographical errors. The extensive end notes contain too many superfluous Ibid. citations, which could have been incorporated into the body of the text. A large number of the references are to standard textbooks rather than to critical editions or studies, which present more reliable information There is no bibliography, a technique used by publishers to hold down the costs of publication, but one which is frustrating to scholars attempting to use the work.

The Epilogue does not adequately replace a summary or conclusion. All of the author's extensive investigations do not seem to have a point. It is only after several readings of the lengthy text that the reader an appreciate the author's intents. Hutton's inconsistent use of Spanish names or their English equivalents (e. g., Juan of Austria vs. John II of Castile) adds to the confusion of the work. Moreover, his use of Elizabeth to designate Isabel I does not conform to modern standard usage. The author's best sections are in the modern period. Perhaps had he limited himself to a narrower chronological scope (e. g., 1800 to the present), his efforts would have been more fruitful and his study more coherent.

Michael G. Paulson

Kutztown University

Tomando como punto de partida la falta de prestigio real que tienen los clásicos en España, Francisco Ruiz Ramón explica que estas obras responden a la doble función del teatro: la función celebrativa y la función catártico-conjuradora. Ya que se ha tendido a silenciar esta segunda al insistirse en el carácter exclusivamente conservador del teatro clásico español y en su intención radicalmente didáctico-moral, los directores y su público no han llegado a «leer» el contratexto o antitexto «donde aparece algo mucho más profundo y de radical alcance ideológico» (21). El libro de Ruiz Ramón sirve pues un doble propósito, el de reflexión de cómo debe ser adaptado un texto clásico hoy en día, y el de interpretación de textos a través de personajes, mitos y la doble función del teatro.

Estos tópicos se estudian en una serie de breves ensayos donde, por ejemplo, se examina una adaptación moderna de La hija del aire; se afirma que el protagonista de la comedia de capa y espada no es ni el galán ni su dama sino la pareja «en busca de su mítica unidad original» (44); se habla de mitos históricos, personajes-mito y mitos clásicos, llegando a la conclusión que el grupo titulado mitos bíblicos-cristianos es «el más rico, complejo, original y prometedor» (52). También se agrupan personajes en dos categorías, Autoridad y Libertad; y se analiza la relación entre el rey y el bufón, recalcándose un segundo contraste entre el vestido cómico de este personaje y «la trascendencia del significado de su palabra» (62), lo que se relaciona claramente con las dos funciones de los textos teatrales propuestas anteriormente.

Todas estas formulaciones y estudios breves sirven de prólogo al último capítulo de la primera parte que es en realidad el núcleo de este texto y está dedicado al estudio del Nuevo Mundo en el teatro clásico. Apunta Ruiz Ramón, como ya otros lo han hecho, la pobreza del tema americano en el drama del Siglo de Oro y nos presenta una lista de sólo unas dieciséis obras que abordan directamente este tema. A éstas podríamos añadir El nuevo rey Gallinato de Andrés de Claramonte aunque se sitúa Chile junto a Camboya y los eventos históricos en que se basa la obra pertenecen al mundo oriental -una expedición española que partió de las Filipinas a Camboya. Utilizando los conceptos y categorías anteriores, Ruiz Ramón estudia en detalle varias comedias de tema americano. En el Auto de las Cortes de la Muerte de Michael de Carvajal, la queja de los indios ante el tribunal de la muerte es claro ejemplo de los textos y antitextos de que habla Ruiz Ramón. La escena incluye no sólo una celebración de la conquista del Nuevo Mundo sino que también manifiesta claramente la función catártico-conjuradora, pues San Agustín, San Francisco y Santo Domingo actúan como defensores de los indios quienes se lamentan de las atrocidades de los españoles y se sorprenden de su codicia. La ironía del antitexto se presenta aún más claramente en las palabras de Satanás, Carne y Mundo quienes defienden a los cristianos del Viejo Mundo.

El juego de oposiciones lo estudia Ruiz Ramón con destreza y precisión en las comedias americanas de Lope de Vega. Por ejemplo, en la compleja caracterización de Cristóbal Colón, encontramos la imagen del loco/cuerdo que ya había descrito este crítico al tratar del gracioso como bufón del rey. La visión mística e idealista del descubridor de América se opone en El nuevo mundo descubierto por Cristóbal Colón a la «práctica» o codiciosa actitud de otros conquistadores. Ruiz Ramón demuestra claramente cómo el oro y el sexo obtenido por la violencia se enlazan irónicamente con la catequización de los indios en esta comedia. Añade este crítico que Lope le da más importancia a cómo los indios perciben a los conquistadores que a la visión que los españoles tienen de ellos y nos muestra cómo esta escena clave de El nuevo mundo descubierto por Cristóbal Colón se repite en obras de Tirso y de Calderón. El uso del punto de vista ajeno reaparece también en Arauco domado. Aquí Fresia, esposa de Caopolicán, es realmente un personaje indomado cuya pasión por la libertad subraya el tema central de la obra: «Aunque la victoria de las armas corresponda a don García Hurtado de Mendoza y sus españoles, la tragicomedia está pensada en tanto que teatro como un canto a la libertad del vencido» (112). Ruiz Ramón podría muy bien haber apuntado aquí que esta idealización del vencido tiene una larga historia teatral, desde Los persas de Esquilo a La Numancia de Cervantes. De gran interés son también las páginas dedicadas a la mitología en la trilogía de Tirso y finalmente a la transcodificación de dos universos míticos (el incaico y el cristiano) conciliados en María/la Aurora en la obra de Calderón.

Si aquí concluyera el libro, sería una importante aportación al estudio del teatro del Siglo de Oro. Pero Ruiz Ramón añade una segunda parte donde se establecen paralelos muy certeros entre el conflicto padre-hijo de La vida es sueño y ciertos aspectos claves de dramas románticos tales como Don Álvaro o la fuerza del sino y Don Juan Tenorio. Coincidimos con Ruiz Ramón en deplorar la falta de un estudio sobre la recepción romántica de la obra de Calderón en España. Esperamos que continúe sus investigaciones sobre este importante aspecto del teatro romántico. También se encuentran en esta segunda parte de Celebración y catarsis estudios sobre Valle Inclán, Buero Vallejo, Martín Recuerda, Domingo Miras y Luis Riaza, concluyendo el libro con una visión panorámica del teatro español de 1975 a 1985. Estos ensayos finales se apartan de algunos de los temas ya discutidos y crean algo así como un segundo núcleo dentro de este libro. Celebración y catarsis presenta lecturas cuidadosas y reflexiones teóricas que interesarán

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tanto a los estudiosos del teatro clásico como a los del teatro contemporáneo.

Frederick A. de Armas

Pennsylvania State University

Fernández publishes a facsimile edition of the princeps of both plays along with a brief introduction. Vásquez, on the other hand, provides a critical edition of El burlador with introduction and notes.

Fernández is interested in the possible relationship between the two plays; he subscribes to the theory that an early, inextant version of Tan largo gave rise to the published version of the play and also to the composition of El burlador. Because no autograph manuscript remains of either Tan largo or El burlador, Fernández reproduces the single copy of the first extant printed edition of each play, numbering verses and pages for easy reference. In so doing, he has performed a great service to Tirso scholars whether or not they agree with his hypothesis about the plays' origins. Although he had planned to publish this edition as long ago as 1964, the recent publication has benefitted from later studies of the two works.

In the «Presentación» of Fernández's edition, Luis Vásquez notes that the editor, who published the text of Tan largo in Estudios (1967), and El burlador in Alhambra (1982), was the first editor to produce a critical, an notated edition of Tan largo and also the first to attempt to establish the text of El Burlador without depending on Américo Castro's earlier edition (5).

El burlador de Sevilla y convidado de piedra first appeared in Doze comedias nuevas de Lope de Vega y otros autores, Segunda parte (Barcelona: Gerónimo Margarit, 1630). The play, the seventh in the volume, is ascribed to Tirso. The title page also states that Roque de Figueroa staged it. Cruickshank, basing himself on typographic evidence, was able to prove that El burlador has been published in Seville by Manuel de Sande (1627-1629). He also proved that the volume of Doze comedias was actually published in Seville by Simón Faxardo with the falsified title page of «Barcelona, Margarit, año de 1630» (10). In his 1967 edition of Tan largo, Fernández had conjectured that the editor of Doze comedias had reprinted nine sueltas and three comedias taken from an earlier volume. El burlador is one of the three (9). Thus arose the enigmas surrounding the provenience and publication of El burlador (9).

Mystery also surrounds the first appearance of Tan largo which was attributed to Calderón and published in a suelta with no indication of place, publisher or date. Fernández notes that Cruickshank determined that the play was published in Seville around 1635 (11). Fernández goes on to state that Jorge Ferreira de Vasconcellos's Comedia Eufrosina, which appeared in Spanish translation in 1631, inspired the characterization of Don Juan and is responsible for the definition of Don Juan as «el gran garañón de España» in contrast to El Burlador's description of him as «el gran burlador de España» (11).

While Ferrández elucidates the bibliographical mysteries surrounding the two plays and their possible interrelationships, Vásquez, who believes El burlador's composition to be totally independent of Tan largo, prefers to deal exclusively with the former work (17). The detailed «Cronología de Tirso de Molina» which opens the volume is presented in advance of the documented biography Vásquez has planned (9).

Vásquez states that the goals of his edition are to recover the text of the princeps, discuss the questioned passages, and prove that Tan largo does not aid in editing El burlador because its solutions postdate the princeps and modify the latter's meaning, aesthetics and structure (17). Vásquez also disputes Alfredo Rodriguez's attribution of the play to Andrés de Claramonte and attempts to disprove the claim by means of textual analysis. He points out that the doubts about Tirso's authorship stem from the imperfect text and from the fact that Claramonte's posthumous Deste agua no beberé contains one almost identical redondilla as well as overlapping names-Diego Tenorio, Tisbea and Juana Tenorio (19). After enumerating the many suppositions about the two plays, he concludes that he sees no reason to doubt Tirso's authorship of El burlador. The play was published in his name twenty years before his death and in several other abbreviated versions during the seventeenth century with nobody questioning his authorship. El burlador also coincides... «con el modo de poetizar y hacer comedias, con la formación teológica, con la libertad lingüística, con el habla, etc., de Tirso de Molina» (21).

Vásquez is further convinced that although the princeps contains some errors, omits some verses and was probably carelessly edited, it is much less defective than previous editors -Castro, Fernández and Rodriguez- believe (21). He then discusses the play's linguistic forms, poetic language, dramatic structure, characteristics of style and Tirso's use of gods, heroes and Greco-Roman characters.

«La prioridad textual de El burlador» is a key section to Vásquez's theory of El burlador's independent composition. Here he refutes Fernández's theory that Tan largo and El burlador proceed from a common text. He points out that El burlador, written long before it was published, still appeared six to eight years before Tan largo:

Vásquez refutes at great length Alfredo Rodríguez's theory that Tan largo preceded El burlador and that Claramonte wrote both plays.

Having stated previously that El burlador was written long before it was published, Vásquez attempts to establish a date of composition despite the lack of documents concerning either the composition or the representation Believing that the play belongs to Tirso's early stage, he sets the termino a quo at 1613, before Tirso's voyage to Santo Domingo. The termino ad quem he sets at 1617 (79). He concludes his introduction with a list of proverbs appearing in El burlador and other plays by Tirso, an analysis of the play's versification and a bibliography of editions and critical studies. The edition itself is clean, meticulously documented and has much room for marginal notes. Only one speech out of place, Don Juan's answer, «No». to Isabela's question «¿Qué no eres el Duque?» (106) and a few printing errors mar the work.

Scholars must decide for themselves which theory of composition they prefer. In the absence of historical documents that would prove one or the other definitively, Vásquez's meticulous study is very persuasive. Yet despite the need to disprove others' theories, his work would have benefitted from more emphasis on his own very considerable contributions. Fernández, by making available a facsimile edition of the princeps of both plays, has done an outstanding service for Tirso scholars. Both volumes are valuable contributions and welcome additions to Tirso scholarship.

Ann E. Wiltrout

Mississippi State University

It is common practice, under the aegis of deconstruction, to show how marginalia -in the broadest sense- may both subvert and supplement an uncertain center.

A telling example here is Don Quijote's supposed dictum on Ut pictura poesis, brought forward as lead epigraph for chapter 2, «Confronting the Text» (11). Rather than substantiation, his querulous comment on Avellaneda serves to preclude any prospect of promising parallels («el pintor o escritor, que todo es uno, que sacó a luz la historia deste nuevo don Quijote que ha salido; que pintó o escribió lo que saliere...» (II, 71]). The supposed parallelism between the arts («que todo es uno») is vitiated by the fact that it is marginal to the main point, which is that Avellaneda combines the worst features of bad poets and bad painters, for, being a writer, he emulates the inept painter Orbaneja in his casual approach to strategy and structure: «lo que saliere». The parallel concerns the incompetence of a certain sketcher and a certain scribbler, not inter-media comparisons.

The author maintains that «we are crossing the threshold of modern painting» (8) already in 1605 15, since Cervantes's text «anticipates by three centuries the revolution in the arts» (64). The thesis is that Cervantes captures in his portraits of characters and scenes key elements of realism, impressionism, expressionism, and surrealism. Some may be perplexed by this premise and may question the evidence adduced in support of it; they may wish to indulge a choleric quest for analytical rigor and conceptual clarity elsewhere.

On the other hand, readers receptive to allegory should relish the following critique of the episode of the lions (Don Quijote II, 17): «His lance, now 'a phallic symbol'... is cast aside. Rocinante, the flesh, is dismissed... Only the knight, the spirit, remains vigilant, clutching his symbolic sword (the cross) and his bare shield (his identity)... Don Diego futilely flees on his mare, lust; Sancho... spurs his donkey, simplemindedness; the carter... prods his mules, stupidity and ignorance» (47). Others may relish it for other reasons.

The author does attempt to validate her reading of this «emblematic» level (51) by recourse to Cirlot's Diccionario de símbolos. She situates Cide Hamete on the narrative level, Cervantes on the emblematic, and maintains that they send the reader disparate messages. In one instance, «Cide Hamete has told us a medieval tale; Cervantes a modern one» (35), using identical material.

Nevertheless, we learn that Cervantes laughs caustically through his main character, which is to say through Cide Hamete's narration of the incident (42). Elsewhere, «Cervantes's voice addressing the reader may be perceived in Don Quijote's words to Sancho...» (76). These appear to be instances of metalepsis, the intrusion of the emblematic level (Cervantes's sphere) into the diegetic (Cide Hamete's) and the mimetic (Don Quijote's).

This dialectic of emblematic (Cervantes) and diegetic (Cide Hamete) is transposed to the mimetic level in binary pairings of characters. Thus, in chapter 3 Don Quijote is set in privileged opposition to Sansón Carrasco, while in chapter 4 he is similarly opposed to Diego de Miranda. In both instances, a Romantic reading is proffered.

No mention is made of Cide Hamete's illuminated manuscript (1, 9), although it is the Moor who is portrayed textually as a practitioner of both imitative arts, rather than Cervantes. His illustrations

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were apparently suppressed by the translator (or the editor persona), who must have felt in adequate to the task of reproducing them.

The principal problem with this study is that it is distressingly impressionistic. The voluminous theoretical and practical commentary on the inter relations among the arts and the efficacy of intermedia comparisons of this sort has not been utilized. Had it been, the monograph could not have been published in its present form.

I am grateful for the supplementary insights on pp. 3, 6-7, 23, 33, 38-45, 51, 57-58, and 69-70, most of which are marginal to a center that will not hold, in my estimation. The copious notes, several illustrations, and extensive bibliography are likewise welcome and worthwhile.

James A. Parr

University of Southern California

Hispanic Issues is the generic title of a series of books being published by The Prisma Institute of Minneapolis, Minnesota, with assistance from the Program for Cultural Cooperation between Spain's Ministry of Culture and United States universities as well as from other cultural organizations that the editors duly acknowledge in preliminary notes. The editor-in-chief is Nicholas Spadaccini, Professor of Hispanic Studies and Comparative Literature at the University of Minnesota. Several of the contributors are from the same institution, but readers of the three volumes will observe that the authors, the editors, and the members of the Advisory/ Editorial Board come from a wide range of European and North American universities. Among them are mature and distinguished Hispanists as well as young scholars who are commencing their academic careers.

Hispanic Issues defines itself as follows:

A semi-annual publication in English touching on theoretical and methodological issues toward are configuration of Spanish literary history and criticism. The series stresses collaborative research, drawing on a network of scholars from the U. S. and abroad. Sample areas of inquiry include: Literary Criticism and Historiography; Historical Function of Cultural Forms; Popular and Mass Culture; Literature and Institutions; Literature among Discourses (5).

A key word is «reconfiguration». The editors and the authors invite us to examine Hispanic literature with different perspectives. They employ critical approaches that have been developed over the last several decades and make frequent references to exponents of a particular approach. On the part of some authors there is a commitment to Marxist criticism while others choose from among the many systems that have achieved prominence in recent years. What seems to be in «descendancy» is the aestheticism of the New Critics of yesteryear.

The heading of this review shows the three books in the order of publication. Another order would be chronological by the periods of Spanish literature covered: Autobiography... with the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries: Santa Teresa, Antonio Pérez, picaresque novels, Cervantes. The Institutionalization... refers to the eighteenth century, while The Crisis... publishes chapters on the Romantic period, the nineteenth century, and the early twentieth century. This last volume also has chapters on Catalan and Chilean literature. They seem out of context except that methodologically they fit in well enough. A fourth issue is being announced as a special Quincentennial (of the discovery of America) volume entitled: 1492-1992: Re/Discovering Colonial Writing, to be edited by René Jara and Nicholas Spadaccini. The announced contents deal with the Colonial period in Latin (mostly Spanish) America. In an appendix entitled «Documenting the Conquest», the editors propose to reproduce in Spanish or Latin several documents with their English translations. (In Autobiography... they printed a Cervantine document in the same manner).

It is clearly the intent of the editors of these volumes to produce books rather than collections of disparate «articles» that might well appear as appropriately in a journal. The key word here is the designation of chapters. The editors -Spadaccini for all volumes plus a second person for each- have striven to set the contributions in an order that gives a logical flow from one to the other. They have written introductions that succeed in bringing coherence to the whole, and my recommendation to readers is that they begin each volume by reading these introductions. The editors have further provided a single index to each volume, so that the total contents are at the command of the reader. However, each article has its separate notes and bibliography. (A few, by the way, do not follow MLA style.) It might seem that, if the chapters use numbers one to seven or nine or ten, it would make sense to take them in that order. However, I expect that most readers will choose the topics that interest them most and read that chapter first (remember that I urge that the introductions be read beforehand). Readers who do so will not be wrong, for try as they may, multiple authors do not achieve the unity of style of a single author or of co-authors, even when they are as

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resolutely methodological as are these.

There are disparities in the «texture» of language evident in the introduction and chapters of these volumes that militate against the unity of a book. The editors are, as they state in their purpose, determined that Hispanic Issues be written in English. For example, quotations and titles are given in both languages. While many of the contributors are native «speakers» of Spanish, only four of the chapters are acknowledged to be translations. That is, I think, cause for celebration, for it is desirable that American Hispanists write equally well in both English and Spanish. Nevertheless, the reader will observe that these authors speak with many «voices», and some write with a texture that gives real style to their statement.

The question of style is important, because the authors are presenting arguments that not all readers will be prepared to accept. The very word «institutionalization» is the title of the first volume is a barrier. It piles up four suffixes (more if the Latin base is considered) in order to express its concept. Some readers, I suspect, will abandon the book at the cover page in the face of this abstraction. That will be a pity, for this volume and its companion Crisis... set forth in detail some provocative ideas. In brief, «Institutionalization», as used in the first volume, refers to that eighteenth-century process by which enlightened government officials co-opted literature for the purpose of installing their own ideology. Once «institutionalized», literature experienced in the nineteenth century the crisis that is the theme of the second volume.

Yet readers may justly complain that the texture of language in these volumes, in some instances, creates a barrier to clarity. Such is the case with the chapter by Antonio Gómez-Moriana (translated by James V. Romano) in Autobiography... [41-58]. It is entitled straightforwardly «Narration and Argumentation in Autobiographical Discourse», and the author tells us clearly enough: «My thesis, then, proposes nothing other than a synthesis of diachrony and synchrony» (43). But what are we expected to make of the protracted sentence that begins the next paragraph?

If the inclusion of the semantic dimension obliges us to revise our concept of 'literature' (and of art in general) as an autonomous and autotelic entity (common denominator of the schools of diachronic structuralism that coincide in proclaiming their self-referentiality as specific to artistic and literary language), the inclusion of the pragmatic dimension will force us to take into consideration the socio historical implications of literary praxes (including autobiography), at least as an «interdiscursive task» (44).

There are many sentences in these volumes that produce a similar clouded vision before the reader attains the final period. Nevertheless, I want to continent positively on the achievement of these writers who provide the material that the editors have so ably put together. Clearly, colleagues will wish to look into the contributions of established scholars such as the late José Antonio Maravall, Iris Zavala, Margarita Levisi, Anthony Zahareas, and Ruth El Saffar. Their chapters speak for them. Deserving of comment are several of those listed at the end of each volume, in the sections entitled «Contributors», as assistant or associate professors at their institutions.

It is with real pleasure that I observe the sound scholarship of younger colleagues who are bravely endeavoring to bring Hispanic themes into the critical mainstream. At the risk of omitting equally deserving contributors, I want to call attention to chapters that struck me, with my particular interests, as exceptionally good. In Institutionalization... Edward Baker's «In Moratín's Café» presents a novel perspective as he considers the themes of «urban politesse, idleness, and their relation to the social organization of productive labor and public entertainment» (101) in La comedia nueva. Steven Suppan, although he uses «occult» (131) as a verb, indulges in phrases such as «the Enlightenment instrumentalization of reason» (133), and commits barbarisms such as «everyone always already knows their place» (128), nevertheless gives us a refreshing view of Ramón de la Cruz's familiar sainete in «Managing Culture: Manolo and the Majos's Good Taste» (125-68).

In Autobiography... George Mariscal may be given a temporary pardon for using «foreground» (60) as a verb in return for his study, «A Clown at Court: Francesillo de Zúñiga's Crónica burlesca» (59-75), which places an unfamiliar work in the spirit of its times and interprets it in the context of ours. Many readers will enjoy, I think, the lively boldness of Patrick Dust in his presentation of «A Methodological Prolegomenon to a Post Modernist Reading of Santa Teresa's Autobiography» (77-96).

In The Crisis... Gwendolyn Barnes is to be congratulated for a masterful treatment of a difficult subject that we hear little about: «The Power of the Word: Religious Oratory in Nineteenth-Century Spain» (121-47), although one misses at least a passing retrospective reference to Padre Islas Fray Gerundio. In the same volume, Nancy Membrez, who wrote a doctoral dissertation on the teatro por horas, offers a splendid essay on «The Mass Production of Theater in Nineteenth-Century Madrid» (309-56).

In summary, some readers may be put off by the approaches used by the authors of these three volumes, but I think they will ignore at their peril the subject of these essays. There is much sound scholarship here. Although the jargon may offend some (including this reviewer), the presentation, especially by the mature scholars, is on the whole straightforward. Best of all is the treatment of both

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novel topics and familiar subjects from perspectives that provoke a thoughtful response.

John Dowling

The University of Georgia

Cienfuegos, one of the most intriguing figures of the late eighteenth century, has received less attention than other authors. Jose Luis Cano rekindled modern interest in him in a series of valuable articles written in the late 1950s through 1970s (including his excellent 1969 edition of the Poesías), but stiff, no one has published a complete study of the life and works of this fascinating individual. Coughlin's book, a coherent overview of what is known about Cienfuegos, his poetry and drama, takes a step in that direction.

Coughlin breaks no new ground in his presentation of the life (1764-1809) or in the analyses of his verses, plays, and minor writings, but he convincingly argues for this «poet and patriot's» central place in the Spanish Enlightenment. In the biographical section Coughlin discusses Cienfuegos's artistic and political career against the tumultuous background of the Carlos IV-Maria Luisa-Godoy period. Cienfuegos was deeply influenced by Cadalso, Jovellanos, and (especially) Meléndez Valdés in Salamanca, and combined his career (he was named to a bureaucratic position in the Reales Consejos in Madrid in 1789) with his growing interest in literature. The 1798 edition of his Poesías stared debate and revealed a thinker fully in tune with the progressive ideals of the European Enlightenment, whose major themes included mankind, social justice, friendship, sentiment, virtue and the importance of reason as a motivator of man's actions. Coughlin discusses the poetry predominantly from this thematic perspective, reserving some comment for structure, versification and, in an interesting section, language. Several provocative observations might have been developed, such as reference to «a movement away from the universal quality of the descriptive passages to a greater realism through reference to specific locales in Madrid» (32; Sebold has detected similar movement toward realism in Iriarte, Moratín and García de la Huerta), the importance of female friendship in Cienfuegos (38), and the employment of first-person narrators «to express feelings concerning personal experience as well as events in society» (62). There is material here for further study.

Cienfuegos wrote four tragedies -Idomeneo (1792), Zoraida (1798), La condesa de Castilla (1798), Pítaco (published 1816)- and one comedia lacrimosa, Las hermanas generosas. Coughlin presents the theme, plot, characterization, ideology, and artistic achievement/defects of each play in turn, and gives us this good reminder: «To appreciate... Cienfuegos it is important to bear in mind that he wrote... in a society preoccupied with questions of law, justice, duty, government, and virtue...» (83).

The book bears the marks of having been hastily written. Clichés, inconsistencies (Leandro de Moratín [105] vs. Leandro Fernández de Moratín [107]; Nivelle de la Chauseé [103] does not appear in the index), and repetitions mar the otherwise straightforward discussion of Cienfuegos's life and works, and distract from its effectiveness. At times very similar wording is repeated: «The manner in which Cienfuegos describes his friendships is not surprising because the poets of Salamanca considered it to be the principal way to achieve virtue» (38); «It is not surprising to see this friendship, for among the poets of Salamanca it was a most notable passion and the principal means of achieving virtue» (45). Or: «Abuse of his priestly role to strike fear in the hearts of others in his most striking characteristic» (70). Or this sequence (all within four paragraphs): «great emotional intensity», «intense emotions», «outbursts of emotion», «intense states of passion», «intense emotion», «passionate outbursts», and «strong passions» (93-94). Coughlin criticizes Cienfuegos for «overstatement, an unnecessary repetition of words, and a tendency to create an inappropriately rhetorical or overly dramatic tone» (119). Apparently, to paraphrase Mesonero Romanos, «se pega».

David Thatcher Gies

University of Virginia

Students of Galdós will recognize immediately in this last book by Shoemaker the same encyclopedic motivation and style as in his earlier titles La critica literaria de Galdós (1979) and The Novelistic Art of Galdós (1980, 1982). Given the subject of the work and the octogenarian status of the late author, readers may have expected a different kind of book: a personal meditation on the stated theme with the work of Don Benito serving as stimulus. Robert Kirsner's Veinte años de matrimonio en la novela de Galdós (1983) comes to mind here. Such is not the case though.

Shoemaker considers only the twelve Galdosian contemporary novels from Doña Perfecta (1876) to Miau (1888). He does not explain why the Episodios nacionales might not have been also taken into account, but does offer two versions of one reason for selecting the group of novels upon which he settled. These novels «were and still are the least likely among Galdós's entire corpus of contemporary social novels to contain a significant role for God and His religion» (9). And later novels such as Realidad, Ángel Guerra, Nazarín, Halma, Misericordia and the Torquemada tetralogy do not require attention because they «are well known to the casual reader and have been studied in depth

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for their affirmative Godly, Christian content and motifs, and for this reason have not needed to be included in my present search for affirmations where least expected» (9). Shoemaker does not address the probable objection that Doña Perfecta, Gloria and La familia de León Roch might be thought by many to fall into the category of novels well studied for their «affirmative Godly, Christian content and motifs». Nonetheless his chapters on these works average only slightly more than two pages in length and refer to some of the relevant extant bibliography.

Shoemaker purposely limits himself to evoking the verbal references to God and religion and to setting forth the extent to which the Divinity and the Church are active in Eves of given characters. He concludes that while that system of references is one of the «important fundamentals» in the twelve novels studied, «literarily in Galdós's novelistic art, these fundamentals have rarely been the dominant force, except in certain parts and temporarily, in the human situations, but they have often been the contrasting, dramatic counterpoint» (105), i. e., «contrasting literary foils to the usually dominant nature of these novels» (109). La de Bringas is the novel where their contrapuntual contribution is least, Miau where it is greatest.

In the epilogue to his monograph, Shoemaker seems to indicate that it is an incomplete study, or, perhaps better said, the first stage of a complete one (108). Perhaps he felt he did not have time to work out fully exact analyses that would reveal how «God's role and His religion» are integrated into the overall literary syntheses which are the novels. Doubtlessly Shoemaker would want to see someone else take up where he left off.

Stephen Miller

Texas A&M University

What Dobson calls one of his aims, namely to suggest reasons for José Ortega y Gasset's relative decline and the factors that could lead to his «resuscitation» (3), is [as I read the book] the aim of this excellently written and well researched study. Making frequent use of Ortega's private correspondence, the book is an introductory exposition and an extended critique of Ortega's political philosophy that developed from doctoral research at Oxford by Dobson, who at present is in the Department of Politics of the University of Keele.

The work is written with the British public primarily in mind in order to convince it that reading Ortega is worth the time and effort. This is no easy task, given that «even at the height of his [worldwide] fame he was never particularly well known or well-received in Britain» (3) except by a circle of Hispanophiles. The causes of Ortega's low profile are various. Besides the age old «generally held British prejudice toward Spain» (10), which reluctantly admits Spain to be part of the European continent, one can point to two main causes. One is the almost exclusive philosophical emphasis in Britain on the analysis/elucidation of language, an emphasis that excludes most of continental thought from philosophy. The other is the fact that the 1932 English language translation of La rebelión de las masas never met with nearly as large a readership in Britain as in the United States, presumably be cause the British form of liberalism did not favor a «meritocracy». As Dobson perceives the cultural situation, it is changing as to what counts both in philosophy and the contents of liberalism. Through his book he aims, admirably, to encourage an interest in Ortega's political philosophy and in the metaphysics and epistemology of the human condition in which it is grounded.

The case for Ortega is presented in three parts. Part one, consisting of Chapter 1, is devoted to Ortega's political life and the principal influences on him. Included is a contrast between Ortega's public silence and private correspondence during the Civil War, an issue to which Dobson rightly devotes more space given the relatively recent accessibility to Ortega's private papers. It is Dobsons «opinion» that this new material confirms the previous general assumption that Ortega's sympathies were with the Nationalists, even if he grew increasingly disillusioned with the Franco regime.

Part two, consisting of Chapters 2-6, analyzes/elucidates the key concepts of Ortega's political philosophy: (2) «socialism» and «capitalism», (3) «liberalism» and «democracy», (4) «conservatism» and «elitism», (5) «nationalization» [in the sense of national integration but not centralization] and «decentralization», and (6) «fascism». Included in this part is a brief, but important, section on «Ortega and John Stuart Mill», in which it is argued that «... Ortega's concerns in La rebelión de las masas are identical with those of Mill, and provide us [British readers] with another relatively familiar landmark for orientation» (69). Dobson's effort to reconcile Ortega' s early rejection of «isolated individualism» and his espousal of some form of liberalism would have been dearer, as I see it, if he had placed it within the context of Ortega's later distinction, in El hombre y la gente, between «the interindividual» and «the social».

The consideration of these concepts in part two leads directly to their metaphysical basis in part three, whose four chapters (7-10) outline Ortega's discovery of individual human life as radical reality through the utilization of «reason from life's point of view» (as Dobson translated razón vital). This discovery amounts to a radical reform of philosophy, a reform that Dobson is convinced, rightly so, is still worth studying today.

Antón Donoso

University of Detroit

This collection of thirteen essays -five in Spanish, eight in English- by well-known United States-based scholars of the contemporary fiction of Spain has as its stated purpose the offering of critical insights, employing a variety of methodological models, on the Peninsular novel of the Seventies and Eighties. The essays are of several distinct types: panoramic studies focusing upon a group of writers (Concha Alborg's «Cuatro narradoras de la transición» and Germán Gullón's «El novelista como fabulador de la realidad: Mayoral, Merino, Guelbenzu»); overviews of a particular writer's entire novelistic production, or a substantial portion thereof (Catherine G. Bellver's «Division, Duplication and Doubling in the Novels of Ana María Moix», «Una visión esquemática de la novelística de Ramón Hernández» by Luis T. González-del-Valle, Janet Pérez's «Rhetorical Structures and Narrative Techniques in Recent Fiction of José María Guelbenzu», Kessel Schwartz's «Themes, Style and Structure in the Novels of Pedro Antonio Urbina» and «Juan José Millás, fabulador de la extrañeza» by Gonzalo Sobejano); and approaches to a writer through a particular work or, in one case, two. This last category includes: Germán Gullón's «El reencantamiento de la realidad: La orilla oscura, de José María Merino»; «The 'New' Characterization in José María Guelbenzu's El río de la luna», by David K. Herzberger; «Behind the 'Enemy Lines'»: Strategies for Interpreting Las virtudes peligrosas of Ana María Moix, by Linda Gould Levine; Gonzalo Navajas's «Repetition and the Rhetoric of Love in Esther Tusquets's El mismo mar de todos los veranos»; Gemma Roberts's «Amor sexual y frustración existencial en dos novelas de Guelbenzu»; and «Ana María Moix and the 'Generation of 1968'», by C. Christopher Soufas, Jr. The articles range in length from eleven to twenty-five pages.

Luis T. González-del-Valle rightly notes, near the beginning of his chapter on Ramón Hernández, the concentration of critical study of the post-Civil War and post-Franco novel of Spain upon a few major names, to the neglect of numerous other writers of substantial merit. His article -in which he successfully takes on the task of crafting a coherent, unified analysis of thirteen Hernández novels- represents one effort toward redressing this injustice. Since González-del-Valle is also co-editor of this volume, whose chapters taken together represent a clear emphasis upon less-studied writers, it seems reasonable to surmise that one of the book's guiding principles has been the desire to draw the attention of Hispanists and other scholars to the large body of under-studied narrative of Spain's post-war years. In this sense, the Nuevos y novísimos portion of the volume's title suggests a subtle play upon the concept present in José María Castellet's now-classic Nueve novísimos poetas españoles (1970), since several of the writers included in the present volume were publishing well before the two decades focused upon but suffered critical inattention, while the long, cumber some subtitle of the Landeira and González-del Valle book anticipates the disclaimer offered in the preface. «No se ha pretendido... dar una visión equilibrada de la novelística española más reciente» (7). Indeed, the volume's contents represent a clear imbalance. For example, one writer -the excellent novelist José María Guelbenzu- is the sole focus of two studies and the partial focus of another, while many others are omitted entirely. While most critics would agree that Spain's women writers belong to the group of neglected authors, five of the thirteen essays and a portion of a sixth are devoted to their works; three of the five are on one writer, Ana María Moix. The advantage of this sort of concentration is, of course, the opportunity for breadth and depth in the consideration of the two writers in question.

Two focal points for a vision of Spain's recent narrative emerge from the volume's contents: a grappling with the «New Spain», the Spain of political transition, and the marked tendency toward fantasy in the newest Peninsular fiction, while twentieth-century existential anguish remains as a constant theme. In the first of his two companion pieces, Germán Gullón examines the fantastic mode in the work of José María Merino, a member of the interesting and original «Leonese group» of contemporary novelists; the Galician, Marina Mayoral; and the Asturian, Guelbenzu. Writing gracefully and engagingly, Gullón views the work of these writers in the context of the fantastic tradition of Spain's Northwest and elucidates the defamiliarizing function of the fantastic. In the second essay, Gullón studies the mirror-imaging, pluralizing functions of «narrador mago», narratee, and character in the portrayal of multiple reality in the 1986 novel by poet and storyteller Merino.

Pedro Antonio Urbina and Juan José Millás are also studied as writers in the fantastic mode. In his carefully documented essay, Kessel Schwartz links recent, bizarre Urbina works to the confusion of identities and of reality/fantasy evoked by Urbina in his previous writings for very young reading audiences and for the theater. Insisting perhaps too greatly upon the autobiographical nature of a substantial portion of Urbina's work, Schwartz suggests the role of fantasy as an artistic response to the New Spain. Less successful is the attempt to elucidate the complex, shifting author-narrator character relationship in Urbina's fiction. Terminology relevant to these three entities tends toward interchange and, hence, confusion, despite the helpful use at one point of a distinction between «the super author» and «the temporary author».

In his well-written and convincing essay on Juan José Millás, Gonzalo Sobejano focuses upon the nightmare as structuring device of Millás's novels and organizing experience of his characters. Sobejano studies the nightmare motifs in each of three expressions: loneliness, family membership, and group identity. In each case, the individual is overwhelmed by a devastating force, as in nightmares.

Though the narrative of Guelbenzu is also rich in fantasy, Janet Pérez and David Herzberger take on other aspects of the Asturian's work. The Pérez article examines unifying rhetorical devices in Guelbenzu's prose: abundant imagery of travel; variations upon the pathetic fallacy; the use of fight and color, sounds and silences; the parody of literary and cinematic conventions. The completeness and meticulous documentation of this study will make it an invaluable research tool for students of Guelbenzu.

In his persuasive, well-crafted essay on «new» characterization in Guelbenzu's El río de la luna, David Herzberger continues a line of research he has undertaken with reference to the novels of Juan Benet. Observing that «in many respects... Spanish narrative during the past two decades moves in opposition to de-characterization» (84), Herzberger sees the development of strong individual characters, not only as a counterpoint to the collective protagonists of neo-realism, but also «as a new point of departure, in which authors equate the revalidation of character with the essential purposes of their art» (84). Guelbenzu is seen to take a post-modernist approach to characterization, eschewing the restrictions of nineteenth-century literary conventions.

In an insightful essay whose points could be further sharpened by careful pruning, Gemma Roberts applies to Guelbenzu texts the theories of Erich Fromm and Victor Frankl on sexuality in relation to selfhood and society. Studying El río de la luna and El esperado, Roberts sees the protagonists' compulsive sexual activity as an indicator of existential alienation and a reflection of society's consumerization, which tends to separate sex from love.

Also treating love is Gonzalo Navajas in his rigorous, tightly structured, and articulate post-modernist analysis of the first novel by Esther Tusquets, to whom surprising reference is made in the volume's preface as «esta importante pero poco conocida narradora» (10). Love in the novel is seen as an anti-mimetic force of individuation which, however, is subverted by the protagonist's ironically absolutist «theology of negativity» (24) and her return to a trivialized world.

In her look at the fiction of Lourdes Ortiz, Cristina Fernández Cubas, Soledad Puértolas, and Rosa Montero, Concha Alborg discusses the narrative strengths of each and the question of the existence of a «new novel» to match the New Spain. The three quality pieces on another woman writer, Moix, are particularly welcome given the paucity of critical work on this unprolific writer of challenging and remarkably varied texts. C. Christopher Soufas examines her 1968 novel Julia in the context of a possible Generation of 1968, considering the insights of major theoreticians of the literary generation in Spain and concluding that Julia is antithetical to such a generational notion.

Hispanists have come to appreciate the skill with which Catherine G. Bellver brings to the study of Hispanic texts the insights of other disciplines. Her essays on character division and doubling in Moix's fiction adeptly incorporates the fruits of psychological research. Threading her way carefully through existing Moix scholarship, Bellver studies several kinds of doubling, seeing its use as a metaphor for the instability and complexity of human relationships generally. A tendency toward the use of calques from Spanish is mildly distracting.

Finally, Linda Gould Levine applies discourse analysis to the study of the strange and disconcerting stories in Moix's Las virtudes peligrosas. She sees the collection's discourse as characterized by «a complex artifice of absence» (97), a dialectic of dominant and muted voices, and a «hostility and antagonism toward words present in [Moix's] writings since the inception of her career» (100). Textual silences, both forced and otherwise, connote for Levine those of marginated groups within Spanish society today, as well as the «devaluation of discourse» (100) of the Franco years.

Despite a rather high incidence of typographical errors and some unevenness in the essays, this volume is a valuable addition to criticism of very contemporary Peninsular fiction which its critics will undoubtedly find themselves consulting again and again.

Mary S. Vásquez

Michigan State University

Despite the critical and popular success enjoyed by Gonzalo Torrente Ballester, as yet there have been surprisingly few monographic studies of his work and thus Genaro J. Pérez's La novela como burla/juego is especially welcome. Pérez analyzes seven of the Galician author's most innovative novels, published between 1963 and 1987, giving a brief summary of the plot of each before examining the principal themes, motifs, structural and stylistic features. In addition he notes the influence of writers admired by Torrente (Cervantes, Sterne, Chesterton, Arthur Conan Doyle) and points of coincidence with some of his contemporaries (Nabokov, John Fowles).

Don Juan is the first work in which the concept of the novel as juego is evident. Pérez explores

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the theme of burla, as executed by Don Juan and experienced not only by the women enamored of him but also by the narrator and by those naive readers who expect a conventional, closed novel rather than an experimental, open one. This initial chapter is an excellent introduction to two elements, metafictionality and intertextuality, that are of great importance in Torrente's oeuvre. Chapter 2 is devoted to Off-side, the least studied of the novels apart from the early El golpe de estado de Guadalupe Limón. Pérez describes the 1969 book as a novela negra, albeit an atypical one because of its philosophical dimension and because its tough guys are not flat characters. Structurally the novel is reminiscent of La colmena and it depicts life in Madrid some twenty years later, during the 1960s. The portrayal of swindlers, prostitutes, homosexuals, and former prisoners lends itself to implicit criticism of the sociopolitical realities of the Franco dictatorship.

Chapters 3 and 4 deal with the best-known novels, La Saga/fuga de J. B. (1972) and Fragmentos de apocalipsis (1977). Pérez focuses on the intertexts, showing how Torrente has drawn from a variety of sources (including fiction, classical and Arthurian mythology, poetry, popular songs, and literary criticism in La Saga/fuga and has adapted or naturalized the borrowed elements. These intertexts serve a variety of functions, of which the parodic is paramount. The metaliterary aspect is particularly significant in Fragmentos, an intensely self-conscious narrative that is filled with reflections on the process of literary creation and its attendant problems, the genesis of characters, and the development of story lines.

La isla de los jacintos cortados (1980) is more conventional than its immediate predecessors as far as structure is concerned. Torrente, long interested in historical figures and the myths that spring up around them over the course of time, investigates the birth and development of the «myth» that Napoleon existed, when in actuality he was but an invention. This rewriting of events permits an exploration of the relationship between fiction and history, and the reality of both. The parodic, demythifying tendency of so much of Torrente's fiction continues in Quizá nos lleve el viento al infinito (1984), which is a combination science fiction and spy novel. Its characters include androids and a narrator-protagonist who is a cross between Sherlock Homes and James Bond, possessing the analytical skill of the former and the sophistication of the latter, plus the ability to metamorphose into other beings at will. He is a master at the game of cold war politics, all the players of which are the target of the author's satire. Yo no soy yo, evidentemente is a tribute to Fernando Pessoa, famous for his use of pseudonyms to represent different facets of his personality. In Torrente's novel two university professors attempt to solve the mystery of the identity of the hypothetical writer Uxío Preto and his relationship to three other supposed authors, but they fail miserably and their questions regarding textual authorship/authority go unanswered. (This chapter is ironically titled «Quién es quién en Yo no soy yo, evidentemente»). Torrente here pokes fun at some of the absurdities of the academic world and the critical establishment which for so long underestimated or ignored him.

La novela como burla/juego closes with are capitulation of Torrente's key intellectual concerns and an extremely useful, up-to-date bibliography. In the introduction Pérez compares his book to a tray of hors d'oeuvres, and it succeeds admirably in whetting the reader's appetite for more novelistic experiments by Torrente and further illuminating studies of them.

Kathleen M. Glenn

Wake Forest University

Autor ya de varios libros de ficción, Juan Pedro Aparicio es galardonado en 1988 con el Premio Nadal por su novela Retratos de ambigú. Esta obra está dividida en doce apartados que constituyen una serie de viñetas sobre los personajes más importantes del texto. Estos seres son presentados junto a otros que comparten con ellos el haber coexistido en una misma ciudad de provincias.

Son muchas las historias que se narran en Retratos de ambigú. En general, ninguna de ellas resulta demasiado interesante. Tampoco se detecta en estas tramas mayor profundidad: ofrecen más bien relatos truncados y poco efectivos sobre las vidas de varios personajes. Entre los argumentos más importantes se destacan los amores de Blanca y Vidal y de Vidal y Laura, la leyenda de Chacho en contraste con su posible realidad como personaje histórico (se le dedica gran espacio en el texto a la existencia de un ser que al parecer ha adquirido curiosos atributos en recientes años; esta atención no queda verdaderamente justificada), las intrigas políticas en un municipio donde los Mosácula ejercen gran influencia y donde se pretende darle un golpe de estado al alcalde Polvorinos, el supuesto accidente automovilístico de Vidal y las complicaciones que ello le trae, ciertos hechos ocurridos durante la Guerra Civil, y las relaciones incestuosas entre Blanca Mosácula y su hermano, el tonto del castillo.

Todas estas historias resultan truncadas y, por tanto, poco eficaces en la presentación de aspectos transcendentales de la naturaleza humana. La ya mencionada fragmentación es todavía más perceptible cuando en ocasiones se narran historias que constituyen claros callejones sin salida al no vincularse verdaderamente con los argumentos centrales de la novela (por ejemplo, la historia del cirujano y del jeque, 230-31). Entre los argumentos mencionados, el de Vidal aparenta ser el más importante

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aunque, retrospectivamente, no es fácil documentar esta creencia.

Otra posible deficiencia de la novela se percibe cuando en el relato se llegan a explicar los tres posibles sentidos del título. En esta forma, cuanto se lee no son más que los retratos de varios personajes en aquel lugar donde trabajaba Chacho, una explicación de aquellas figuras pintadas en «La Charca», o imágenes ambiguas de varios seres humanos. Las tres posibilidades que se acaban de dar son todas factibles a la luz de lo que ocurre Retratos de ambigú y constituyen, hasta cierto punto, explicaciones innecesarias dentro del texto de su sentido, algo que implica cierta desconfianza hacia sus lectores implícitos.

El texto concluye con un capítulo algo delirante donde, en una forma u otra, se atan cabos al aclararse ciertos aspectos de la novela que o no habían sido totalmente explicados o que todavía no habían o quedado resueltos.

Con Retratos de ambigú nos ha dado Juan Pedro o Aparicio una obra de poco alcance, de horizontes limitados, que a pesar de ello se caracteriza por una prosa fluida. En términos narratológicos este relato no nos ofrece nada verdaderamente nuevo. Esperemos que la selección del próximo Premio Nadal sea más acertada.

Luis T. González-del-Valle

University of Colorado at Boulder

In his preface to Black Literature and Humanism in Latin America, Richard Jackson states concisely the thrust of his study and clearly enumerates the means whereby his objectives can be accomplished. The principal focus of this study is the impact of the humanist vision in 20th-century Afro-Hispanic literature which includes Brazilian literature written in Portuguese. Jackson has divided his study into seven chapters briefly summarized in the introduction. Also included in the introduction are significant terms which appear frequently throughout the study. Arguably, the most significant term which appears with high frequency is humanism defined in the context of this scholarly work as «an attitude of concern for the welfare and dignity of human beings, especially the marginal ones and for the problems that beset them in this life» (xiii).

Chapter 1, «The Authenticity Question», traces the quest for a constant, a common denominator, that may explain and give a sense of unity to Latin American Literature. The important requisite for this constant is its relevance to humanity. In this chapter Richard Jackson describes the trajectory of Literary Americanism, the search for an authentic American voice. Prose writers in the first half of this century saw their mission as exposing the suffering and plight of their people.

Chapter 2, «From Black Folk Up», describes and analyzes the black legacy of Literary Americanism in Latin America. This historical review covers the Afrocriollo Movement which has been called the Harlem Renaissance of Latin America. The Afro-criollo Movement, not limited to the purely literary or aesthetic, also embraced social and ethnic issues. Nicolás Guillén is characterized as the authentic voice of Afro-Cuban poetry.

Chapter 3, «Modern Black Heroism», centers primarily on the novel Juyungo and its protagonist Ascensión Lastre who exemplifies the model black hero in literature. Ascensión Lastre, like so many outsiders, both fictional and real, is tested by his many encounters with hunger, pain, arbitrary fortune, racial hatred and fear. One of the secondary characters admires and envies Ascensión whom he describes as a remarkable black man with a noble soul and not born to be a slave. The author, Adalberto Ortiz, not unlike his later black brothers, writes from the stance of eye-witness and lived experience. Jackson calls Ortiz's creation, Ascensión Lastre, «a true American voice whose indomitable spirit becomes contagious» (49).

In Chapter 4, «The Great New Mandinga», Jackson discusses the earlier black literary models whose humanist values set the standard and focus for the more recent writers. Black Protest goes beyond racial and cultural lines while addressing universal suffering and inhumanity. The title of this chapter is indebted to a line from the poem El desempate by Nelson Estupiñán Bass. According to the poem a new Mandingo voice, spokesperson for the masses, will give great strength and power to blackness.

Chapter 5, «The Continuing Quest», evaluates the new black writers in Latin America who continue in the humanistic tradition. Jackson highlights the literary contributions of Nelson Estupiñán Bass (Ecuador) and Carlos Guillermo Wilson (Panama). Bass, by virtue of his last five novels, has been credited with a radical and innovative approach to fiction. His novel, Toque de Queda, attests to the author's artistic and social commitment.

Chapter 6, «The Shango Saga», focuses on the humanistic pattern of the most recent novels by black writers in Latin America today. The outstanding novelist in this most recent group is Manuel Zapata Olivella whose novel, Changó el gran putas,

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depicts in epic fashion, «soul force» and the black experience from Africa to the New World. This black odyssey reveals the humanistic saga of blacks victimized by slavery, racism, and economic exploitation. Olvelli's narrative, «from below and from within», represents the authentic black voices that contrast sharply with the voices of the enemies, the oppressors «from above», Olivella, like Cubena (Guillermo Wilson) and others, reverses symbols, and attributes negative attitudes and actions to persons of mixed blood with the «white» not the «black» drop of blood.

In the final chapter, Jackson restates the humanist pattern of Afro-Hispanic literature and addresses such issues as the role of black literature in the classroom, humanistic criticism, the black legacy, and the role of Black Studies. This final chapter reinforces the conviction that by affirming black humanity, the Afro-Hispanic writers in Latin America are the authentic American models and voices. Through Black Studies, students are encouraged and directed into human experience.

In spite of some overlapping, which is understandable when discussing humanism and its manifestations in literature, Richard Jackson presents a cohesive and informative study. More specifically, Jackson in his preface and introduction previews the objectives and focus of this work. His historical survey of the early and later stages of modernism, including contributions of Vallejo, Neruda, Guillén, and Rubén Darío, is an enlightening discussion Jackson refers to the two stages of modernism as the periods of antihumanism and humanism. His trajectory of the novel begins with the mundonovista writers and ends with the most recent novels by the black writers, Manuel Zapata Olivella and Guillermo Wilson. Jackson contrasts the old for mulistic writings, cliches of social reform, with the new innovative, stylistic, and artistic works. In their response to the new novelists, including such distinguished writers as Cortázar, Vargas Llosa, and Carlos Fuentes, the latest group of writers re-evaluates the mundonovistas who were concerned with the human condition in Latin American literature. In laying the foundation for Literary Americanism, Jackson gives a keenly perceptual distinction between negritud and negrismo. Negritud is the literary movement that inspired a positive image of blacks by destroying the myths and stereotypes. Negrismo, in contrast, produced a negative and racist image as portrayed by Menegildo in Carpentier's Ecué Yambá O. Menegildo is a stereotype of a black who is strong, sexually competent, simple, and blessed (or cursed) with hereditary rhythm.

Richard Jackson is most adept and perceptive at describing and analyzing the writings of Afro-Hispanic authors, especially the novelists. From Juyungo to Changó el gran putas, Jackson succeeds in interpreting the black vision which is firmly rooted in the lives and experiences of black people. Those authentic narratives written by blacks about blacks develop the themes and recount the humanistic episodes of pain, suffering, and struggle for survival and freedom in Latin America.

This reviewer has found few defects or significant omissions in this inspiring and indispensable study. However, in spite of the cohesiveness of the work, Jackson is guilty of excessive repetition, particularly with respect to the use and application of the term humanism and to a lesser extent the expression Literary Americanism. In his zeal to emphasize and demonstrate the humanism of Afro Hispanic literature, Jackson frequently repeats, restates, and over-explains. Also somewhat distracting is the relatively vast amount of quoted material within the text. Much of this material could have been reduced by more paraphrasing. Surprisingly, unlike his usual clarity and conciseness in defining and illustrating literature terminology, Jackson's discussion of ethnopoetics in the introduction is less precise although its meaning does become clearer and more precise in its later application throughout the study. Notwithstanding the importance and space given to the poetry of Nicolás Guillén, Jackson could have reinforced and illustrated his presentation with lines (in Spanish and English) from the original poetry. It is understandable why Jackson includes very little about Brazilian literature in his study, primarily because in reality there is a paucity of black writers in Brazil. On the other hand, one does question the absence of any discussion of drama and black dramatists which seems to limit the scope of the study. Finally, with the exception of three misprints, including Máquez for Márquez (33), this work seems free of grammatical and typographical errors.

Richard Jackson withholds his «Pandora's box» until the last chapter where he supports and advocates humanistic criticism in analyzing black literature. Jackson agrees with Addison Gayle, Jr., who rejects critical methodology or more scientific approaches and condemns them as being irrelevant to blacks and the black experience. According to Jackson, humanistic criticism «looks to literature for what we as readers find significant or relevant to life» (124). Also in his discussion of humanism in the classroom, Jackson takes Dexter Fisher and Robert Stepto to task for their edition of Afro-American Literature: The Reconstruction of Instruction which overlooks the need for humanistic criticism while stressing instead course designs and critical approaches to Afro-American literature. Obviously, Jackson's viewpoint is debatable and will undoubtedly be a controversial issue for some time to come. Perhaps one answer, if not a resolution, would be that black literature with all of its richness and humanist vision deserves not only the scrutiny of the scientific approach, but also that of humanistic criticism which may complement and enhance any literary evaluation and appreciation

In addition to a brief though helpful index, Jackson's bibliography covering General Literature,

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Latin American Literature, and Black Literature in the Americas, is a useful tool for researchers teachers or students. Above all, hispanists specializing in Latin American literature are greatly indebted to Richard Jackson for providing a scholarly study that establishes and defines the black legacy and the humanistic core of Afro-Hispanic literature. Moreover, this enlightening study presents a concise history of 20th-Century Latin American Literature. After reading Black Literature and Humanism in Latin America, this reviewer concurs with the author who maintains that the above work will add to and update his earlier studies. More importantly, Jackson's study has revealed and affirmed the balance that blacks and their humanist values have contributed to both Afro-Hispanic and Latin American Literature.

Heanon M. Wilkins

Miami University

Según la autora, la originalidad de este estudio se fundamenta en su acercamiento fenomenológico y existencial a los textos, acercamiento que opone la tendencia actual hacia estudios sociológicos, históricos, semióticos, feministas y hasta deconstruccionistas (vii). The Radical Self se inicia con una introducción en la que se demarca la metodología crítica y se subraya la intención de establecer un método que facilite el análisis del significado existencial del fenómeno literario de la metamorfosis. El libro estudia cinco textos, examinanda tres aspectos novelísticos fundamentales para comprender el fenómeno metamórfico: «The method developed here will analyze the mutability of the world in which the metamorphosis takes place, the mode of being of the transforming character, and the knot of values represented by the metamorphic crisis» (1-2).

Los textos escogidos -El reino de este mundo (Cuba 1949) de A. Carpentier, Hombres de maíz (Guatemala 1949) de M. A. Asturias, Macunaíma (Brasil 1977) de M. de Andrade, «Axolotle» (Argentina 1956) de J. Cortázar y Zona sagrada (México 1967) de C. Fuentes- representan algunos de los logros más sólidos de la literatura latinoamericana moderna. Díaz los escoge porque cada uno de ellos es representativo de los varios tipos del «radical self» que señala el título y que, según Díaz explica, cada obra termina por identificar con el personaje, al escritor y al lector.

Las dos primeras novelas examinan la función de la metamorfosis dentro de la colectividad. El capítulo sobre El reino señala que Carpentier asimila intelectualmente los mitos populares y las configura en el texto por medio de lo real maravilloso. La creencia popular en la metamorfosis le permite estructurar la dialéctica de la revolución como un proceso histórico que revela la existencia colectiva como lucha y sufrimiento, pero también como enriquecimiento y desafío, y el egoísmo individualista como aislamiento y petrificación.

Los problemas socio-culturales forman también el meollo de las novelas de Asturias. Sin embargo, su uso del mito es distinto. Al estudiar Hombres de maíz, Díaz contrasta el acercamiento intelectualizado a los mitos no-occidentales de Carpentier con la presentación intuitiva y visionaria del mundo quiché reproducido por la novela mágico-realista de Asturias. Según Díaz, en Asturias el mito sirve de metáfora para subrayar la doble esencia de un mundo novelístico dentro del cual la metamorfosis apunta a la trascendencia de una colectividad en busca de su origen.

El uso novelístico de la metamorfosis en la novela de Andrade sirve de transición entre su uso en el mundo del mito y la magia presentados por Carpentier y Asturias y el mundo lúdico del juego que caracteriza las obras de Cortázar y Fuentes. Según Díaz, Andrade está más interesado en el folklore que en las condiciones socio-históricas de los indios. Su novela, o mejor dicho, su sátira, usa el folklore para crear un héroe/anti-héroe que le permita señalar, lamentar y escarnecer la falta de carácter y la falsa vida nacional de sus compatriotas.

«Axolotie» y Zona sagrada relacionan la metamorfosis no a la colectividad sino al individuo. En el capítulo sobre Cortázar, Díaz asocia la metamorfosis con la preocupación de este autor por momentos de transición (adolescencia/madurez; arte/vida; sueño/despierto; vida/muerte), y muestra la dimensión ontológica que en su obra asumen los juegos. Para ella, en «Axolotle», la metamorfosis es metáfora de la escritura. En Zona sagrada, la metamorfosis aparece como un medio de representar una visión nihilista de la corrupción y de la derrota del ser humano.

Díaz señala en sus conclusiones que el fenómeno metamórfico, con sus posibilidades de transformación y asimilación, puede leerse como una alternativa viable a la confrontación civilización/barbarie, con la que por lo normal se ha presentado en la novela latinoamericana la evolución histórica del continente. El libro de Díaz es una aportación fundamental. Su metodología ofrece una posibilidad de estudiar el uso de la mutabilidad y la metamorfosis en la configuración de algunos de los «temas» más característicos de la literatura latinoamericana.

María A. Salgado

University of North Carolina Chaptel Hill

Autobiography, present in all Hispanic cultures, suffers from neglect because it has never achieved the status of the more recognized genres of the

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novel, the short story, the essay, poetry; or drama. Editor Julián Olivares in this thematic issue of the Americas Review attempts to redress the lack of concern for life writing at least among U. S. Hispanics.

The effort is commendable as an initial step for the contents simultaneously call attention to the presence of autobiography among our largest minority and more importantly highlight lacunae where more studies are wanting. The issue, comprised of seven articles and three reviews, concentrates mainly on Mexican-American males and the twentieth century. Indeed the absence of both Puerto Ricans and Cubans suggests that the word «Hispanic» in the title may be misleading. The lack of female life writings, except for Genaro Padilla's autobiographies of nineteenth-century Californianas, is understandable and coincides with their underrepresentation in other genres.

Three of the articles, although focused on specific works of autobiography, broach the topic of this genre and its meaning for the interpretation of U. S. Hispanic (Chicano) cultures. Alfredo Villanueva-Collado perceives Hunger of Memory and Family Installments as searches for identity but through distinct first-person narrative modes. William Anthony Nericcio, as implied by the title of his essay, «Autobiographies at 'La Frontera''», claims that the autobiographical voice, whether in life writing or in fiction demonstrates a collective effort to find identity. A codicil to this, that voice is also a quest for «access to the realm of power», is one of the most stimulating arguments propounded in the anthology. Kimberly A. Kowalczyk, contrasting the two volumes of the Autobiography of a Brown Buffalo and the Revolt of the Cockroach People, understands Oscar Zeta Acosta as an effort to evaluate not only himself but his entire race. These three articles, interpreting autobiography as simultaneously individual and collective identity, will be the most seminal in future research on ethnic life writings. Perhaps a submerged minority in the U. S. will have more of an obsession with self finding than will mainstream autobiography. A task for a comparatist might well be to sound out this theme in the various ethnic autobiographies that have enriched the entire field in the last twenty years.

In spite of the accomplishments of this forerunner for autobiographical studies in U. S. Hispanics, more must be done. Consideration must be given as to how life writing is handled in parent Hispanic cultures. Although we have documented mainstream U. S. autobiography, we know little of this genre in Mexico, Puerto Rico and Cuba. Are the canonical texts on theory of autobiography applicable to minority life writing or does descent from dual maternal cultures diffuse normal standards? in other words, in evaluating Chicano autobiography, is the influence of Mexico and its attitudes towards the privacy of both self and family an inhibiting factor in Mexican American self delineation? What does a chronological approach or the relation of an earlier text to succeeding text indicate in the way of development of a genre? Perhaps the early autobiographies (1935-1940) of Miguel Otero link to the recent Hunger of Memory. Finally, and this is a question that confounds all theorists, what is the relationship between fiction and autobiography? Have U. S. Hispanics, actually writing disguised autobiography in their novels, inadvertently anticipated the recent theory that autobiography and fiction stem from the same source?

The field of U. S. Hispanic autobiography, one of the newest and potentially most productive areas of study, now, thanks to Olives and the Americas Review, enjoys a beginning. Further research surely must follow and resolve the above questions.

Richard D. Woods

Trinity University

Antología retrospective del cuento chicano is a compilation of short stories which comprise a representative sample of Chicano prose generated during the last two decades. The book has a total of eighteen short stories, a limited bibliography, and a prologue by Bruce-Novoa which contains a brief history of Chicano literature. Although the index demonstrates a sexual bias in favor of male authors, the selection of short stories is excellent in that the list of works provides an eminent sample of the best that Chicano literature has to offer in this particular genre. In addition to the individual cuentos, each story contains, in the form of a footnote, an all too brief introduction of the author, the individual work, and where appropriate, the name of the translator.

All the cuentos in the anthology are reproduced in Spanish although the majority of the original works were written either in English or a mixture of Spanish and English. In all, twelve of the eighteen cuentos have been translated. The authors do not offer an explanation for the extensive use of translation, but one cannot help but take notice that the book was published in Mexico, and that most of the translations are written in a variety of Spanish which does not reflect the Southwest dialect. These facts indicate that the book is not intended for Hispanics in the Southwest; consequently, its marketability is limited in the United States. One can perceive its usefulness for professors of Spanish literature, but not for students of Chicano literature. Its usefulness to students is marred by the fact that most of the translations are linguistically inappropriate, but more important, the tone of the translations does not adequately reflect the timbre of the original works. In fact, this is the greatest weakness of the Antología. It does not portray the individual, real, or

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ultimate nature of the Chicano, i. e., it does not linguistically depict the marginality in which the Chicano exists. The Chicano is characterized by the incorporation of habits and values from two divergent cultures and by in complete assimilation in either. This marginal existence is reflected in the artistic works by Chicanos, especially by the linguistic hybridism produced by language contact. In relation to cuentos, they are normally written in English, Spanish, Spanglish, caló, and a variety of linguistic hybrids which depict the Chicano's reality. Reading Chicano cuentos in the Antología was like reading Chicano short stories in a foreign language which is only tangentially related to the language generally used by Chicanos.

Although the tone of the translations in the Antología is inept, the book does offer a good variety of themes which are developed within a Chicano and Native American ambient. For example, the exploitation of Hispanic females by society in general, and by Hispanic men in particular is explored in El vestido de París by Estela Portillo Trambley. The marginality of the Amerindian, as well as his suppression by the mestizo is exemplified in Tata Casehua, tragedian del noroeste by Miguel Méndez. Other themes and authors include homosexuality as treated by Sheila Ortiz Taylor, conflict produced by interethnic relationships interpreted by Laurence Gonzales, erotica viewed by Juan Bruce-Novoa, death contemplated by Rolando Hinojosa Smith and Helena María Viramontes, as well as a host of other topics. In essence, the thematic quality of the Antología is excellent in that the topics generate a panoramic view of the Chicano experience.

Unfortunately, the panorama does suffer from a scarcity of female perspectives. This limitation is due to the fact that the anthology contains twice as many cuentos written by males as by females. This sexist posture cannot be dismissed by the claim that there is a lack of female cuentistas, for nothing could be further from the truth. There are many fine female cuentistas and the inclusion of cuentos by writers such as Beverly Silva and Guadalupe Valdés would have given the Antología a much better balance. Regrettably, the Antología is characterized by the same shortsightedness that is typical of most anthologies, i. e., the relative exclusion of female writers.

Overall, the Antología is impressive in its choice of cuentos, especially, in relation to the thematic treatment of the Chicano experience; but unfortunately, it is characterized by too many shortcomings. First of all, the excessive use of inappropriate translations creates a false image of the inherent quality of Chicano short stories. Second, the disproportion of male and female writers has produced a gender bias as well as an improper perspective of the Chicano cuento. Third, the fact that each cuento was scarcely introduced in a footnote limits its usefulness to students of Chicano literature. In most cases, the explanation given in the footnote does not adequately describe the relative status of the author in Chicano literature, nor does it explain the relationship that the particular cuento has with respect to the author's artistic production. Only the reader with an extensive knowledge of Chicano literature would have a clear understanding of the relative position of the author and the particular cuento. Finally, the cuentos in the Antología have been altered for a Latin American audience in order to create a more universal appeal. Thus, its practical worth or applicability in the United States market is quite limited. Even its usefulness in a Latin American market is questionable. The universality of Chicano literature can only be generated by internal development. It cannot be imposed by foreign embellishment. The Antología has tried to expand the artistic space of Chicano literature, but it has done so by changing the intrinsic nature of the Chicano cuento, This unwarranted modification has resulted in a less than satisfactory product.

Eliverio Chávez

Texas Tech University

The essays in Writing the Apocalypse: Historical Vision in Contemporary U. S. and Latin American Fiction, are a solid blend of research and knowledge of examples and theory. The critiques look forward and backward, indulge in anticipation and retrospection, analyze examples which make possible generalizations and reach fitting conclusions about three Latin American and three North American novelists. The essays demonstrate that criticism of apocalypse is in a state of intellectual renovation. The main subject is not biblical apocalypse per se but rather the literary uses of apocalypse in selected works of contemporary fiction Zamora argues that apocalypse is the chronoscope of these novels, their organizing principle. It is what makes time invisible in them and determines their relation to historical reality.

The Colombian novelist Gabriel García Márquez utilizes the dissenting perspective of apocalypse to criticize political and social structures, and the eschatological perspective of apocalypse to comment upon the structures of time. Zamora agrees with other critics in affirming that the main problem of Cien años de soledad (One Hundred Years of Solitude) structurally and in its attitude toward history is duration. The novelist relates past incidents to subsequent ones even more remote, intermingling them rectilinearly. Memories are associated with death. In the deciphering of the family manuscript in García Marquez's novel, Zamora discloses that William Faulkner's Absalom, Absalom! is the work to which (One Hundred Years of Solitude) is most closely linked. In El otoño del patriarca (The Autumn of the Patriarch), the action

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moves round and round in time, backward, forward and sideways. The time is the modern age.

The myth of apocalypse is for the Argentine novelist Julio Cortázar a revitalizing force. It seeks to form a new synthesis from psychic or social revival, from an internal and external revolution and integrates social and political idealism. One of his first stories discloses the change in the Cuban revolution. Another results from his acquaintance with the Nicaraguan poet Ernesto Cardenal and a visit to Solentiname, an island where the poet had a commune. Cortázar saw there paintings done by peasants which pictured their surroundings and activities. In the paintings he perceived the anguish caused by repression and violence.

Carlos Fuentes of Mexico makes use of the historical patterns of apocalypse. He maintains that history has to be written by novelists. A number of his narratives have their basis in Mexican history or the history of literary relations between Latin America and Spain. Mexican and Latin American history are treated as a series of fragments, as a search for identity in his Terra Nostra, a narrative about sixteenth-century Mexico set in 1999 and ending January 1, 2000. Fuentes divides this novel into three sections: «The Old World», «The New World», and «The Next World», implying that history is futile and infinite, actual and ideal. He provides for simultaneity of beginnings and of backward and forward historical movement. Fuentes suggests that the eternal present will be realized in art rather than in utopian ideologies. He maintains that several contemporary Latin American writers are reconstructing the past in order to construct the future.

In the essays about the works of three North American novelists, Thomas Pynchon, John Barth and Walker Percy, Zamora examines their fictional structures, characters, style and treatment of apocalypse.

The essays of about the same length are clear in their expositions, rich in literary examples and manifestly are the result of wide reading. Because of reiteration in the discussions some repetition occurs in all the essays. The critical assessments of the various authors' works bring out clearly their similarities and dissimilarities. In analyses they are sympathetic toward the Spanish American novelists. Zamora who fully appreciates the literary quality of their works, steeped herself in their novels and her interpretations are intermingled. Her book shows amply the importance of the apocalypse in contemporary U. S. and Latin American fiction.

Harvey L. Johnson

University of Houston

1970, the date when Ned Davison published his excellent Eduardo Barrios in Twayne's World Author Series, appears to have marked the beginning of the end to the volume of works and articles concerning the Chilean cultivator of the psychological novel, Eduardo Barrios. Doubtless this is due in part to the displacement of pre-Boom writers by the force and brilliance of the likes of Carlos Fuentes, Vargas Llosa, García Márquez, et al. That this should have happened is understandable but lamentable; on the other hand, one might argue that rehashing earlier ideas really adds little that is new to our perception of pre-Boom literature.

Now, in a concise volume from Silvia Martínez Dacosta, comes an impressionistic study entitled Los personajes en la obra de Eduardo Barrios, whose back cover announces grandly that the work is «... el estudio más profundo sobre el tema. ...En este trabajo, notablemente original, perfectamente documentado, y singularmente acertado, la profesora Martínez Dacosta aporta ideas seminales que iluminan la creación protagónica de Barrios en todos sus aspectos. ...es un estudio definitivo que brilla por su profundidad, su estilo claro, preciso y armonioso, y la perfección de su estructura». Such accolades make the reader enthusiastic and apprehensive for what she will read: disillusionment can only follow if the study falls short.

Professor Martínez Dacosta's overview of Barrios's personages does not measure up to these expectations. Quoting extensively from, and relying heavily on Davison, Luis Alberto Sánchez, and Torres Rioseco, the study presents a plethora of mini-chapters (some so short as a few paragraphs; e. g., «Contenido historico») on such topics as «Contenido sociológico», «Lo descriptivo», and «Aspecto literario, lenguaje y estilo». These fragments create a sense of superficiality; they are annoyingly undeveloped and breezy. This, coupled with the extensive quoting, make the reader question the newness or originality of thought and organization that preceded the book's creation This reviewer also found the constant penchant for linking Barrios's personal life with his fictional characters a questionable exercise; after all, the literature is what lives in and of its own, and nothing is added to one's appreciation of Barrios's works by parallels drawn to his personal life.

Professor Martínez Dacosta's style, labeled as «armonioso» also proves to be a hindrance to the book's success; she repeatedly refers to Barrios euphemistically as «nuestro autor», creating a type of clubby, cozy atmosphere with her first person plural adjective. «Nuestro autor» appears so frequently that it becomes burdensome.

On the positive side, the last two chapters, studies on the child in El niño que enloqueció de amor and José Pedro Valverde in Gran señor y rajadiablos («nuestro personaje») are more complete. Also, the bibliography is extensive. The studies on the child and the huaso might make acceptable articles; they do not justify this book.

Thomas O. Bente

Temple University

Bajo el auspicio de la UNESCO, se ha inaugurado la Colección Archivos, un proyecto editorial que pretende salvaguardar y estudiar 120 de los textos más destacados de las letras latinoamericanas del siglo XX. Según Amos Segala, el director de la Colección Archivos, cada equipo encargado de los textos escogidos se caracteriza por su diversidad de perspectivas críticas y metodológias. Creo que la selección de El Chulla Romero y Flores (1958) del novelista ecuatoriano, Jorge Icaza, ha sido un gran acierto de la Colección Archivos. Aunque a Icaza se lo ha identificado principalmente con su novela indigenista, Huasipungo, desde hace muchos años los críticos más informados de la obra icaciana han insistido en la alta calidad de El Chulla Romero y Flores, una novela que posiblemente sea su mejor aporte a la narrativa latinoamericana.

El Chulla Romero y Flores trata del mestizaje en el contexto de la identidad nacional. Hijo ilegítimo de una india y de un blanco venido a menos, el personaje central de la novela se encuentra en una sociedad que lo rechaza doblemente: por indio y por pobre. Empujado por la vergüenza de sus raíces indígenas y la obsesión de fingir una nobleza ilusoria, Luis Alfonso se caracteriza por la constante lucha interna que imposibilita un mestizaje coherente y productivo. El lector se da cuenta de la representividad del chulla quiteño («la persona de clase media que trata de superarse por las apariencias»), ya que Icaza lo emplea como un instrumento de crítica y análisis social. A través de un procesa de autodescubrimiento personal, Luis Alfonso también descubre una sociedad mestiza desarticulada y victimizada por la negación de todo lo que no sea blanco y europeo (es decir, un rechazo total de lo ecuatoriano). La propuesta icaciana que se presenta en El Chulla Romero y Flores tiene sus raíces en la narrativa ecuatoriana de los 30. Básicamente, se busca aquí un concepto de cultura nacional popular que apunta hacia los grupos mayoritarios como verdadera fuente de ecuatorianidad.

La novela presentada aquí viene acompañada de un aparato crítico que se divide en dos secciones. La primera ofrece varios estudios históricos que pretenden trazar la evolución de la novelística icaciana al mismo tiempo que ubican a Icaza dentro de la época en que él escribió El Chulla Romero y Flores. La segunda parte incluye tres lecturas críticas de la novela, tocando temas como la intratextualidad del cholo icaciano, la autenticidad cultural, la solidaridad popular y la estructura del texto. También, la edición ofrece un cuadro cronológico sinóptico (vida y obras de Icaza, evolución de la narrativa ecuatoriana y acontecimientos históricos dentro y fuera del Ecuador) junto con una bibliografía de los principales textos escritos por Icaza y acerca de él.

Los estudios reunidos en la sección titulada, «Historia del texto», me parecen bastante irregulares en cuanto a su aporte a una mayor comprensión de El Chulla Romero y Flores, por un lado, y de la obra icaciana, por otro. Los comentarios rara vez superan el plano meramente anecdótico y personal. No hay un análisis riguroso de tales temas sugerentes como (1) Icaza frente a la eclosión de la novela ecuatoriana de los 30 y su supuesto receso de los 50, (2) los factores socioculturales y artísticos que marcaron la narrativa ecuatoriana e icaciana, o (3) El Chulla Romero y Flores como negación o comprobación del ya mencionado receso de la novela nacional. En cambio, la segunda sección de artículos, «Lecturas del texto», se caracteriza por su frescura de ideas y rigor analítico. En cuanto al cuadro sinóptico, la información sólo llega hasta 1958, fecha en que se publicó El Chulla Romero y Flores. Me parece que se debería haber completado el cuadro por razones puramente históricas.

El valor principal de esta edición es la de haber difundido, fuera del Ecuador, una novela clave de la narrativa ecuatoriana al mismo tiempo que ha despertado un nuevo interés en Icaza como intérprete de la cultura mestiza de América Latina. Aunque algunos de los textos críticos se limitan a comentarios biográficos y superficiales, creo que el saldo es bastante positivo si se piensa en los lectores que no conocen bien la obra de Jorge Icaza. Hay que felicitar a los coordinadores de la Colección Archivos por su iniciativa de incluir en su proyecto editorial a uno de los grandes novelistas del Ecuador y de América Latina.

Michael Handelsman

University of Tennessee

A la ya extensa bibliografía sobre la obra narrativa de Juan Rulfo hay que agregar estas dos recientes aportaciones, una en inglés (la de Rowe) y la otra en español; una publicada en Europa y la otra en Estados Unidos. La de Rowe es el tercer libro dedicado en su totalidad a los cuentos de Rulfo. No es un estudio, como el de Donald K. Gordon, Los cuentos de Juan Rulfo (Madrid, 1976) en el que se examinan todos los relatos de El llano en llamas, sino solamente aquellos, nos dice el autor, que le parecen más difíciles o notables. El método consiste en presentar dos o tres cuentos en cada uno de los siete capítulos en que se divide el breve estudio, seleccionando aquellos que ilustran algún aspecto particular de la obra en su totalidad. El elemento analizado en cada cuento -ya sea la violencia, la culpabilidad, el tiempo, los símbolos, los mitos o la lengua, entre otros- según el crítico, puede ser aplicado al análisis de los otros. Esto, sin embargo, no siempre da resultado. Nos parece

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que algunos cuentos sería mejor analizarlos a través del tiempo, mientras que otros, por ejemplo «Luvina», se prestan más al análisis a través del elemento espacial y no temporal. Los análisis de Rowe, sin embargo, son acertados. En el primer capítulo, «Reading Rulfo», se analizan los cuentos «Macario» -desde la perspectiva de los razonamientos del protagonista-, y «No oyes ladrar los perros», desde el punto de vista de las relaciones entre padre e hijo. No hay duda que estos dos cuentos tienen mucho en común, puesto que en ambos el tema gira en torno a las relaciones familiares. La misma técnica se apoca en los siguientes capítulos, analizando cuentos en los que el autor ve semejanzas, como «El llano en llamas» y «La noche que lo dejaron solo». Los capítulos menos logrados son los dos últimos, dedicados al examen de los mitos y el lenguaje. Pero aún aquí encontramos algunos aciertos, como la observación de que es Rulfo uno de los primeros autores hispanoamericanos que logran resolver el problemas de las relaciones entre lenguaje y realidad. El libro, sin duda, será de gran utilidad para aquellos lectores que se acercan a Rulfo por vez primera. Y nos parece que ése es precisamente su objetivo, ya que se publica en la serie «Critical Guides to Spanish Texts».

El libro de Peavler representa un enfoque enteramente distinto: el análisis textual de los cuentos de El llano en llamas (al cual se le dedica solamente un capítulo, el segundo) y de la novela Pedro Páramo. De las 188 páginas de que consta el libro, 124 van dedicadas al análisis; en las últimas 64, divididas en ocho Apéndices, se recogen las notas que le sirvieron al crítico para llevar a cabo el análisis textual. Dos de los ocho capítulos de la primera parte (el segundo y el tercero) ya habían sido publicados; el segundo en Hispania (diciembre 1986), y el tercero en la Revista de Estudios Hispánicos. El análisis de los cuentos de El llano en llamas es enteramente distinto del de Rowe; Peavler lo lleva a cabo a través de un enfoque estructural y no temático. El análisis de Pedro Páramo es también desde la perspectiva estructural: los textos (capítulo 3); perspectivas, voces, narradores y narratarios (capítulo 4); tiempo y temporalidad (capítulo 5); núcleos temporales y personales (capítulo 6), y duración, extensión textual y frecuencia, o sea el número de veces que se narra una acción (capítulo 7). El primero y último de los capítulos de la primera parte forman la Introducción y la Conclusión.

Además de la gran diferencia en cuanto al enfoque metodológico utilizado por estos dos críticos, notamos otra gran diferencia en su actitud ante las fuentes secundarias citadas. Rowe cita las observaciones de otros para apoyar sus conceptos, mientras que Peavler lo hace con el propósito de rebatirlas. No somos apaces de concebir dos libros más distintos sobre las obras de un mismo autor. Rowe presenta un enfoque cultural, tratando de interpretar los cuentos a la luz de la vida del autor y de la historia de su época. En cambio, Peavler se adentra en los textos sin preocuparle el contexto social o biográfico. La gran variedad sólo indica lo grande de la obra rulfiana, que da material (y seguirá dándolo) para tan diversas interpretaciones y análisis. Las dos obras, sin embargo, se complementan y nos ayudan a acercarnos a la polifacética obra de Juan Rulfo.

Luis Leal

University of California, Santa Barbara

Gabriel García Márquez's works are a reader's delight. Witty, hyperbolic, «fantastic», he nevertheless remains realistic, moving, and at times, sadly poignant in his recurrent evocation of his native Colombia and of Latin America in general. Because the latter focus is so important in his works, it is essential that the English-speaking reader understand the background from which his work emerges.

Understanding Gabriel García Márquez joins the growing bibliography of works introducing Ga cía Márquez to the English-speaking world. It provides a carefuly-researched background to García Márquez, a carefully-annotated Selected Bibliography, and comprehensive summaries of his plots. The book is particularly useful if read in conjunction with the Twayne 1984 publication, Gabriel García Márquez.

McNerney provides a very good introduction to Colombian history. She describes the pre-Colombian inhabitants, Colombia's civil wars, the diversity of its inhabitants, the history of the United Fruit Company, and the contrast between highlanders and coastal dwellers -a contrast crucial to the author's works, and especially to One Hundred Years of Solitude. McNerney's book is especially helpful in two areas. The first is its focus on the importance of selected fictional incidents in the light of «the silenced history of Latin America» (31), thereby underlining García Márquez's all-pervasive social consciousness. For example, the make-up of the Buendía household receives added extra-textual importance when McNerney explains that «given the Colonial situation and the efforts to annihilate the Indians, one is not surprised to see two Indians of royal blood as servants in the Buendía house hold; nor is it strange that they should be repeatedly associated with memory and its loss, both personally and collectively» (30). The second example is the description of the magic realism of Latin America itself. McNerney's description of García Márquez's blurring of story and history what Hayden White calls the blurring of contours between historical «artefact» or construct and fictional «fact» -is well done. She is insightful at describing the «real» magic and adventure already inherent in Colombia's history and in Latin America's

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literary tradition.

McNerney is at her very best when she pinpoints the social consciousness which permeate García Márquez's work and when she remain close to his texts in discussing literary techniques that is: the effectiveness of his circularity, his deliberate undermining of linear time, and his magic realism. McNerney is weakest, however, when she departs from the texts themselves either to bring in seemingly extraneous material or to intrude upon the text. For example, R. D. Laing is brought in to support McNerney's weakly-argued case for Garcia Márquez's supposed concept of madness as «a form of knowledge unperceived by the sane» (36-37). Bizarre behavior is consequently seen a positive and the critical observer of that behavior as somehow unenlightened. For McNerney, «Remedios the beauty», who certainly exhibits rampantly eccentric behavior including walking about in the nude and writing her name with her own excrement, is simply «considered insane for not wishing to wear clothing in a tropical climate» (37). McNerney's intrusions on the text can be irritating. Sometimes it is because of her hyperbolic colloquialisms: «he [García Márquez] fell in love with Woolf» (9) or «in addition to his love for Mercedes, his son, and poetry Gabriel García Márquez was also addicted to film» (10: italics mine). At other times the linkage between McNerney's cause-and effect explanations are at best tenuous. This is how she explains García Márquez's magic realism and his use of non-linear time-two techniques that have permeated Latin American literature of the «Boom»: «if, after all, Kafka could turn a person into a bug, maybe his [García Márquez's] ideas weren't so farfetched» (9), or «Einstein's formulation of the theory of relativity led him [García Márquez] to the conclusion that time itself is relative and has no absolute sense» (25).

By and large, the usefulness of Understanding Gabriel García Márquez outweighs the above mentioned weaknesses. McNerney's work provides English-speaking readers with a very good introduction to the Colombian and Latin American background that is essential to understanding Gabriel García Márquez.

Yvonne Jehenson

State University of New York College at Oswego

Lydia Cabrera (n. 1900) ha dedicado su vida a la investigación de un segmento esencial de la sociedad cubana, la raza negra. A través de sus investigaciones etnográficas y de su recreación literaria del folklore afrocubano, la autora se considera hoy -como una figura primordial en lo que toca a la divulgación documentada de la etnografía afrocubana. Hoy, ya casi a los noventa años, continúa su labor intelectual, escribiendo y publicando textos de índole investigadora así como textos de carácter literario.

Los animales en el folklore y la magia de Cuba, una de sus publicaciones más recientes, es un texto de género híbrido estructurado a la manera de un diccionario zoológico en el que se describen 107 animales que pertenecen al folklore afrocubano. Su Preámbulo establece claramente la intención didáctica de Lydia Cabrera de compartir con el lector «estas historias, que recogimos por nuestros campos regresando al poético y maravilloso mundo interior de nuestra infancia, en el que también hablaban un mismo lenguaje, los animales y las cosas» (11).

Cada historia es en realidad la historia folklórica de animales que pertenecen a la fauna cubana y que han sido a su vez parte de los ritos religiosos de las razas negras en la isla. Dichos segmentos poseen un carácter variado ya que a algunos se les dedica un breve párrafo mientras que otros poseen varias páginas de extensión. Sin embargo en todos se mezclan la leyenda, los recuentos provenientes de informantes, los conocimientos antropológicos de la autora, y hasta digresiones de carácter biográfico que a veces pertenecen a su presente de exiliada política en los EE. UU.

El capítulo dedicado al majá (serpiente o culebra cubana) es típico en su estilo y forma y puede ser considerado representativo de otras descripciones de animales encontradas en este tratado. No existe en el capítulo una estructura fija sino que su desarrollo es más bien guiado por la asociación de conceptos y la intensidad del recuerdo de la narradora. El punto de vista narrativo no asume autoridad alguna ya que la narradora se sitúa en papel de vehículo trasmisor de aquellos conocimientos que le fueron dados a ella por sus informantes. Se nos ofrece primero un recuento de leyendas escuchadas por ella sobre este animal que también subraya la importancia que posee este reptil en las creencias religiosas de los negros cubanos.

Después de repasar la significación que el majá posee dentro del folklore de pueblitos como Regla y Limonar, el segmento concluye con una meditación lingüística que corrobora el impacto tan importante del majá dentro del marco cultural cubano: se trata aquí del cubanismo «majasear», el cual, según Lydia, hoy ha perdido todo sentido dentro del español cubano hablado en los Estados Unidos.

Los animales es un texto diverso y difícil de clasificar bajo género alguno. Lydia Cabrera lo describe como «notas» en su Prólogo y es cierto que la sensación de fragmentación está siempre presente en su lectura. Sin embargo, dentro de cada capítulo o viñeta existe la unidad conferida por una especie de tejido de fábulas y leyendas sacadas de

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informantes anónimos provenientes de las regiones más remotas de la isla. El texto es fascinante no sólo por su carácter híbrido de tratado antropológico y obra creativa sino también por su utilidad como documento informativo sobre el significado oculto que estos animales pueden poseer en la literatura de otros autores cubanos. ¿Cómo entender el «Sensemayá» de Guillén sin leer el capítulo del majá encontrado en este texto?

Si la obra creativa de Lydia Cabrera continúa publicándose con gran vigor, la bibliografía crítica en torno a su obra también crecerá y se multiplicará como lo ilustran la publicación de la tesis doctoral de Sara Soto y el texto biográfico/epistolar de Roserio Hiriart.

En Cartas a Lydia Cabrera, Rosario Hiriart presenta la correspondencia inédita entre Lydia Cabrera y sus dos mejores amigas: Teresa de la Parra y Gabriela Mistral. En una corta introducción, Hiriart nos dice que Lydia le ha pedido que publique estas cartas como homenaje o tributo a sus dos queridas amigas. Hiriart describe aquí la amistad entre Teresa y Lydia, especialmente los últimos días de la vida de Teresa durante los cuales Lydia se mantuvo cerca de ella, la cuidó, e hizo su enfermedad mucho más llevadera. La segunda parte de esta informativa introducción nos brinda una cronología biográfica sobre Lydia Cabrera y sitúa el orden en que las cartas publicadas fueron recibidas por Lydia incluyendo la época de su estadía en Francia y sus viajes entre Cuba y Europa.

El volumen en sí es de gran valor biográfico en lo que respecto a Teresa de la Parra. De Lydia no sabemos nada ya que el volumen sólo incluye cartas escritas a ella, omitiéndose siempre las respuestas de Lydia a sus dos amigas. Por esta razón, el lector muchas veces se queda algo desilusionado y a la vez curioso sobre la posible respuesta de Lydia a estos documentos. Evidentemente Teresa de la Parra era el eslabón que unía la amistad entre Lydia y Gabriela Mistral ya que la correspondencia escrita por Gabriela a Lydia no es numerosa y casi siempre se limita a su interés y preocupación por la salud de Teresa.

Las cartas de Teresa son el realidad el centro del texto y quizás el título del libro debería de haber sido «Cartas de Teresa de la Parra a Lydia Cabrera». De gran interés feminista son aquí sus muchos comentarios sobre la falta de libertad femenina en los países latinoamericanos los cuales ella contrasta de manera negativa con las ciudades europeas que ella conocía y frecuentaba. Algunas de sus cartas son también de valor literario, como la que describe y critica las escrituras de Colette. Por estas interesantes escrituras podemos apreciar los dones de Teresa de la Parra como lectora crítica de otras escritoras importantes de su época.

Lydia, Teresa, y Gabriela se presentan mediante estas cartas como mujeres fuera de su tiempo, escritoras excepcionales quienes se rebelan en contra de las restricciones impuestas por el conservadurismo cultural que existía en sus países natales. Como testimonio de la situación de la mujer intelectual latinoamericana durante los años 20, estas cartas son invaluables. Claramente las tres escogen salir de sus países respectivos y refugiarse en el ambiente tolerante de la sociedad intelectual parisiense, como la única opción de libertad que en aquel momento existía para ellas.

Desde el punto de vista biográfico podemos apreciar el respeto y el cariño que existía entre estas mujeres y el aprecio que profesaban de La Parra y Mistral a Lydia Cabrera. Se debe añadir que Rosario Hiriart ha escrito otros textos biográficos sobre Lydia Cabrera y quizás estos deben de ser leídos en conjunto para recibir una impresión más completa sobre la interesante colaboración intelectual de estas tres escritoras. Por último, la presentación del volumen es impecable ya que se nos brindan facsímiles de las cartas originales así como también fotografías de las escritoras durante sus viajes por los países europeos.

El texto de Sara Soto, Magia e Historia en los Cuentos Negros, Por Qué y Ayapá de Lydia Cabrera es un estudio que propone examinar el tema de la magia en tres colecciones de cuentos de Lydia Cabrera. El problema central del texto de Soto está en que los objetivos que se propone no están definidos claramente. Por una parte nos dice que quiere estudiar las manifestaciones literarias de la cultura afrocubana, por otra dice que quiere estudiar el elemento mágico en la obra literaria de Lydia Cabrera. En mi opinión, Soto no logra hacer ninguna de las dos cosas ya que el texto salta de un tema a otro sin profundizar en los temas que se propone investigar.

El estudio en general podía haber ganado valor considerablemente si la autora se hubiera concentrado en quizás un aspecto de los muchos que intenta abordar y si hubiese establecido relaciones entre la magia y la cultura afrocubana. Igualmente, los capítulos dedicados a los cuentos de Lydia carecen de análisis y se convierten en listas de cualidades observadas por la autora.

En suma, el estudio no hace lo que propone en su provocativo e interesante título. Esto es una lástima ya que el tema en sí es de gran valor y necesita de críticos que se dediquen a explorarlo. Un texto que en su potencial podía haber sido uno de los primeros estudios analíticos sobre la obra literaria de Lydia Cabrera, no llega a serlo en su realidad. La obra de Lydia Cabrera queda por ser analizada y estudiada y en ese sentido el trabajo de Sara Soto es una aportación bienvenida aunque quede corto en su labor.

Isabel Álvarez-Borland

College of the Holy Cross

The music of Brazil has long been regarded as a national treasure by some, a major exportable commodity by others. All too often, however, it has been immersed by Brazilians and non-Brazilians alike in stereotypes of the kind that have historically skewed many European and Anglo-American views of «Latin America». Brazilian art music was at best seen as something peripheral to the Eurocentric canon. Villa-Lobos was but an anomaly in a civilization not given to producing great works of «high» art, music and literature. Brazilian musical creativity was better suited to the pulsating samba rhythms popularized by Carnival and Carmen Miranda or to the bittersweet strains of bossa-nova tunes than to «nobler» endeavors. Such popular music was heavy on percussion and good to dance to -so the notion goes- but lacked the sophistication and lasting appeal of many of its Euro-American counterparts.

To the extent that this image prevailed among Brazilians themselves, it served to perpetuate xenophilia and what some have called a «national inferiority complex». Outside of Brazil, it was simply part of a larger picture of an «exotic Other», which, in the end, said more about Euro-American cultural narcissism than it did about Brazilians. Moreover, the realities of Brazilian art music and popular song were often only further obscured by the commercial projects of a popular-culture industry bent on exploiting this exoticism and creating what Oswald de Andrade was wont to term a «candomblé para turistas».

It is within this context, I believe, that the two works in question should be judged. Appleby's Music of Brazil, published originally in 1983 and now released in paperback, goes a long way toward dispelling the stereotypes of Brazilian musical «low browism». Covering the period from 1500 to 1980, it presents an admirable panorama of the country's música erudita from its religious and courtly roots to its later nationalist, nativist and modernist phases and beyond. The operas of the nineteenth century romantic Carlos Gomes are accorded their due in the survey, as are the works of modernists such as Villa-Lobos and Camargo Guarnieri. So too is there a discussion of the lundus, sambas, modinhas, choros and other Afro- and Luso-Brazilian popular-music genres that have left their imprint on Brazilian art music.

Yet special attention is also given to the early development of music in the colony, to the patron age of Dom Pedro II, to lesser-known composers such as Chiquinha Gonzaga, Nepomuceno, Mignone and Levy, and to the later representatives of such currents as música viva, música nova and postnationalism. The work also contains a glossary, a bibliography and numerous examples of the music in question. Among the author's many observations, three are particularly worthy of note. It is stated that European music was already being taught in Brazil by Jesuits less than fifty years after the Portuguese discovery. Indeed, by the early nineteenth century, performance, teaching and composition of such music in the royal court in Río rivaled that of much of Europe. And, finally, so thorough was the desculturação of Amerindians in the colony that among the influences on Brazilian art music only European and African traditions are today extant.

Perrone's Masters of Contemporary Brazilian Song may be said to perform an equally important function for the ream of Brazilian popular music. Indeed, it could not have come at a more propitious moment in light of the renewed attention that Brazilian popular song has begun to receive in the United States in recent months. Unlike the Appleby work, it does not seek to paint a broad historical overview, concentrating instead on the works of six poet-composers whom the author regards as representative of contemporary MPB (música popular brasileira): Chico Buarque, Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil, Milton Nascimento, and the team of João Bosco and Aldir Blanc. The author does, however, provide ample background information in an introductory chapter, ranging from discussions of the modinha, the chorinho, the samba de morro, the samba-canção, Carnival and the Northeastern baião to treatment of such signal figures as Noel Rosa, Luiz Gonzaga, Vinicius de Moraes, João Gilberto and Tom Jobim. Considerable space is also devoted to the bossa-nova and Tropicalista movements of the 1960s and to the important role played by music festivals in launching the careers of such artists as Jair Rodrigues, Edu Lobo, Jorge Ben and Elis Regina. There is, moreover, an attempt throughout the work to foreground the essential sophistication of MPB.

It is no coincidence that the time period with which Perrone deals, 1965-85, is largely coextensive with the succession of military dictatorships only recently ended. Nor is it mere chance that the final year marks both the beginning of the «Nova República» and the ascendancy of the so-called «Tupiniquim rock» of the jovem guarda. Indeed, MPB, as it developed during the two decades examined, is shown to have been often as much a discourse of political and social protest as a vehicle for lyric virtuosity and aesthetic experimentalism.

The linguistic adroitness of Chico Buarque's «Construçāo», «Deus Lhe Pague» and «Meu Caro Amigo» coexists quite comfortably with the social and political messages expressed therein. Likewise, his «Apesar de Você», a close cousin of the literatura amordaçada of the period, is as accomplished lyrically as it is contentwise. So too the concretist affiliations of Caetano's «Batmacumba», his and Gil's stubborn fusion of rock with traditional Brazilian forms and Tropicalismo's open espousal of much of Oswald's antropofágico

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program are steeped in cultural satire (Caetano, Gil), racial protest (Gil) and sociopolitical intentions. Much the same can be said of the songs of Milton Nascimento or of those of the João Bosco Aldir Blanc partnership.

Like The Music of Brazil, Masters of Contemporary Brazilian Song contains a bibliography and glossary. Perrone has also included in the work a number of interesting photographs of some of the composers and performers treated, along with a discography of MPB artists cross-referenced with the individual texts discussed. While Appleby's approach is as historical as it is specifically musical, Perrone seeks in the main to analyze the lyrics of songs, treating them as poetic texts. It should be noted, in this regard, that, although the original Portuguese lyrics are not included, the author is to be commended for the high quality of many of his English translations.

There are those who would probably fault both of the works in question for their lack of significant theoretical grounding even though the two authors are quite clearly well-versed in the scholarship of their respective topics. To do so, however, would be to ignore the researchers' stated intentions and, indeed, the fundamental importance of such ground-breaking projects to the dissemination of a Brazilian and Latin American culture free of the usual stereotypes. In the end, such works must, of course, be judged as much for the quality of their expression as for the new ideas and information they set forth. Well-written and thoroughly researched, both books, I think, will be regarded as welcome additions to the bibliographies of Brazilian and Latin American culture courses. The Perrone work in particular should also be especially valuable to Portuguese language instructors who regularly make use of the lyrics of Brazilian popular songs for pedagogical purposes.

Bobby J. Chamberlain

University of Pittsburgh

Aprendiario is a textbook for intermediate students of Spanish. As its title suggests, it is presented in the form of a diary in which Sara, an American college student, has written down her experience during a semester of study abroad in Seville, Spain. The book consists of fourteen chapters, each containing a narrative section, vocabulary list, exercises, and reading comprehension questions. Its appendix presents an alphabetical list of idioms used in the text, and a Spanish-English dictionary, On pages ix-xi, the author offers suggestions to instructors as to how to incorporate this text into their Spanish language classes.

The point from which Spanish society is viewed, that of an average, female, American college student who has never been abroad and is not familiar with other cultures, is quite realistic and very useful for students who want to study in Spain. But it is mostly restricted to Seville and Andalusia, yet generalizes some customs and character traits that are different in other parts of Spain. The author provides interesting background information, in the text as well as in footnotes, which will help students to appreciate and understand many cultural features better.

The main flaw of the book is the considerable amount of grammatical errors and inappropriate uses of colloquialisms. This could, however, be turned to advantage by a capable instructor who is either a native of Spain or is otherwise completely knowledgeable on the subject of conversational Castilian. It is very common for a foreigner who has become somewhat familiar with a language to use certain idioms in the wrong situations. Directly relevant to this is the incorrect use of prepositions. To give a few examples: page 1 -«me fui para hablar con él», instead of «fui a hablar con él»; «Sólo que tengo que pagar» instead of «Sólo tengo que pagar»; page 2 -«Nunca he estado aparte de mi familia»; instead of «Nunca he estado separada de mi familia»; page 5 -«la gran mayoría de pasajeros» instead of «la gran mayoría de los pasajeros»; page 6 -«trastornada» has a much stronger meaning than «upset» or «confused», as it is supposed to me an here; «renuncié el proyecto»; instead of «renuncié al proyecto». The expression «¡Qué va!» is incorrectly used as an interjection on several occasions. These are only a few among numerous instances that make the book inappropriate for use without the proper guidance. But for those who are willing and able to point out the errors and misuses to their students, it can be an excellent guide to proficiency in Spanish language and to the cultural differences between Spain and the United States.

Lastly, the quality of cover and print, as well as Robert G. Mowry's illustrations, leave much to be desired.

Alma Amell

Josephinum College

The textbook, part of a second-year language program

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which includes a workbook and a laboratory manual and tapes, is divided into ten chapters, each containing three reading selections (experiencias) as well as review grammar sections. The reading selections highlight the following topics: the individual (chapters 1-3); interpersonal relationships (chapters 4-5); society (chapters 6-8); fantasy, imagination and beyond (chapters 9-10). A grammatical «Apéndice» and a bilingual «Vocabulario» are found at the end of the book.

In addition to the readings, each chapter contains two vocabulary sections, «Definiciones» and «Palabras similares a las equivalentes en inglés». The words included in «Definiciones» are boldfaced in the reading selections. Woven into each chapter is a rather complete grammar review, a welcome expansion of the grammar in the authors' previous first-year book, Dicho y hecho. Instructors bent on teaching grammar may be tempted to dwell exclusively on the grammatical presentations and exercises. Each chapter includes a very useful section, «Clarificaciones» which groups words of common, related, or unrelated meaning in the reading. Examples: «hablar», «decir», «contar»; «apoyar», «mantener», «aguantar», «soportar». The instructor should prepare this section very carefully and add more examples in order to promote active learning.

The core of the textbook (is it a reader, a grammar review, a conversation or composition text, or a combination of all the above?) is the readings, comprising selections from Twentieth-Century authors such as Anderson-Imbert, Azuela, Benedetti, Blasco Ibáñez, Denevi, García Márquez, Matute, Pemán, Poniatowska, and Storni. Nineteenth Century authors represented are Bécquer, Martí and Zorrilla. The readings also include a piece of Casals's autobiography and journalistic accounts of the Mexican revolution and earthquake, the Spanish Civil War, the immigrant experience, social violence, and the after-life. Finally, illustrated art works by Picasso, Goya and Dalí are used to elicit composition and conversation activities. The guidelines on page 26 help students to read the selections and prepare for a discussion of the readings. One wonders why these guidelines were not introduced in the Preface or in conjunction with the very first reading selection («El rescate-vocación de héroes») on pp. 1-27.

Vida: experiencia y expresión is worth trying for a second year course, whatever the emphasis of this course may be. It is teacher-oriented (albeit not teacher-friendly!). All of the explanations are in Spanish. The authors en courage conversation practice in some of the exercises (especially, those entitled «Asociación» and «Actividad»). The ultimate success of the book depends on how the instructor and students handle the reading selections. These are not necessarily presented in order of their difficulty. Perhaps the authors had little choice once they decided to group selections thematically. However; if language is looked upon as a continuum and as a sea of associations, even juxtaposing the easy and the difficult may not be so bad after all.

Jorge J. Rodríguez

Florido Chicago State University

Innovaciones sufijales en el español centroamericano is a survey of the forms, uses, and meanings of derived morphemes in Central American Spanish. The author suggests three main causes for these innovations: first, the liberties that Spanish speakers take in creating new words; second, the geographic separation of Latin America from Spain, and finally, the influence of indigenous languages.

In the chapter entitled «Los usos de sufijos peninsulares» Scavnicky cites authorities such as Menéndez Pidal and Rufino Cuervo to make the point that derivational suffixes play an important role in the evolution of the language. Reasons given include analogy, semantics, sociology, psychology, and geography. He follows with an overview of the most productive suffixes in Spain and a summary of the least frequently used suffixes.

In «Los usos sufijales del español hispanoamericano», the author contrasts peninsular uses of suffixes with uses common to all of Latin America. The following chapter, «Los elementos sufijales no españoles y los usos nuevos» presents an analysis of suffixes and roots from indigenous, African, or unknown sources in Central America. These non Spanish suffixes comprise the first category of innovation in the use of the suffix in Central America.

«Las formaciones centroamericanas de raíz y sufijo españoles: usos tradicionales y las innovaciones» discusses the second category, which involves the application of Spanish suffixes to Spanish roots in innovative ways. The author contrasts traditional and non-traditional morphological processes.

Each chapter contains a numerous listing of derivational suffixes and specific examples of their uses. Each entry identifies the country or area where the term is used, gives a definition, and states whether the meaning differs from standard usage. The author does not provide any type of generative analysis of the data. There is an extensive bibliography that includes traditional references as well as more current linguistic analyses.

The book contains an enormous quantity of valuable lexical and morphological data. Readers may be distracted, however, by the numerous typo graphical errors and instances of poor editing. For example, in the first paragraph of page 6 a line of text is printed twice. A sampling of other errors include «... una especiel [sic] de festividad...» (50), «... pero no es eguro. [sic]» (82), «... cuyas terminaciones o sufixoides [sic] no es pueden clasificar...» (151), and «... ningún aspecto de la semántesa [sic] o lingúísteca [sic] generativa. Los usos

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semántecos [sic] nuevos...» (155).

Notwithstanding the aforementioned problems, Innovaciones sufijales en el español centroamericano should prove to be a valuable reference tool to Spanish linguists interested in dialectology, morphology, and semantics.

Rosslyn Smith

Texas Tech University

Both these works are aimed at professionals in international studies, especially those working in linguistics with a public policy or administrative component. Both collections of essays serve more of an introductory function for novices in these fields rather than for those already versed in them, so documentation tends to be slight. Readers of Hispania, however, will benefit from the comparisons between Hispanic situations and those from other lands, and from some very sound insights in both works.

Global Demands is an ambitious anthology that sketches major programs and initiatives meant to overcome barriers to communication between nations. Lihani believes that world languages are currently manifesting traits suggestive of convergence (xi); true enough, but only lexically, the first point of entry for most interlinguistic influences, but not necessarily for profound nor durable ones.

Eight of the eighteen essays are devoted to formally organized national academies, and tend to confirm our fears that they are, for the most part, distinguished relics of the Enlightenment, disgruntled with evolving patterns of usage but dutifully resolved to fight a sort of cold war against the «degeneration» of their languages (i. e., modification of lexicon) by producing (mostly prescriptive) official dictionaries. The haughty, censorious attitude of these august bodies is sadly confirmed for both France (by American scholars) and Spain (by none other than Francisco Ayala, member of the Real Academia Española).

More useful dictionaries are described by collaborators on the Miriam-Webster English and Quebec French projects, totally nonjudgmental in concept, and happily validating in the case of the Canadian venture: it turns out that many supposed Anglicisms in Français Québécois have perfectly respectful French roots, data that allows sensitive French-speaking natives to consolidate their linguistic identity and affirm their speech habits with out feeling inferior to francophones educated in France.

The one essay that does make a compelling case for a language academy deals with the National Swahili Council of Tanzania, a modest but earnest initiative to standardize and facilitate the growth and refinement of an artificial language that serves as a common tool in the life of a multilingual population. Its lexical endorsements and inventions, issued in dictionaries and special glossaries, are crafted on principles of transparency of meaning, ease of pronunciation and appropriateness of usage in scientific or technical fields. While it cannot anticipate all the lexical needs of an emerging tongue, nor even disseminate adequately what it has accomplished, the Swahili Council serves a vital national need while shrewdly allowing for some long term compatibility with the other major languages present in its environment, English and Arabic. Similar efforts for speakers of Quechua and Guarani, for example, could take their lead from Tanzania's insightful linguistic and governmental policy structures.

Five more essays review aspects of machine translation. Long touted as a key component for future world understanding, a notion embraced by Lihani as well, computer assisted translation has taught us much about language, but has also revealed its circumscribed utility, mostly for technical applications. The cultural understanding that humanists -and most far-sighted internationalists- seek deals with more subtle, more elusive personal contacts. Significantly, the lexical/syntactic refinement needed is far less, but the demands on the interpretative skills of the interlocutors is much higher. In machine translation, what happens to irony? Or for that matter, to playful misstatement (which may after all be a gambit to prompt trust), understatement, exaggeration, non-standard inflections, contradictory body language (also different for each speech community) or any of the other linguistic and paralinguistic features that immediately come into play when people are negotiating a personal stance with each other, rather than a business deal or a chemistry experiment? These essays explore promising advances that will facilitate global communication; global understanding among nations will still demand as much effort and good will as ever.

The contributions to the volume on Crisis, Emergencies and the Study Abroad Program tend to be uneven and anecdotal, although there is plenty of good advice by professionals with broad experience in directing student programs, and again not only in Hispanic countries. Three essays on «Safety» make a somewhat dramatic but not unwarranted plea for common sense and caution. (The piece on «Common Mishaps» deserves a law suit for its irresponsible medical advice: lots of liquor and chicken soup). The two articles on «Mental Health» and the five under «Crisis Prevention» are full of practical insights and suggestions: nothing surprising perhaps, except the consistent sensitivity of these authors for young adults immersed

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in a new language and culture. From facing the media after a disaster to the ultimate step of sending a student home, all the contributors stress the importance of thinking through policies and procedures before a crisis presents itself. As an eminently practical guide, this slender volume should be read by every educator and administrator involved in study abroad programs, preferably before they sign up their first participant.

George D. Greenia

College of William and Mary

The purpose of A Contrapuntal Method is to describe and put into practice a specific approach to interpret individual literary texts. The major theoretical reference of the book is Northrop Frye's Anatomy of Criticism. In addition to Frye's book, Ullman uses Spengler's The Decline of the West. Thus two classical works of twentieth-century aesthetic and cultural thought constitute the theoretical grounds of the book. This fact is a source of strength of A Contrapuntal Method but it is at the same time the reason for some of its insufficiencies.

On the one hand the extensive and knowledgeable use of the ideas of two powerful thinkers allows Ullman to advance a rigorous view of literature that benefits from the authority of highly regarded sources. The good command of those sources and the meticulous utilization of the ideas contained in them allows for clarity and consistency of interpretation and produces coherent readings. Ullman takes advantage of the categories and methodology of Frye's major work and carefully applies them to the texts he analyzes. In the current epistemological environment in which a pervading eclecticism and the absence of well-delimited and generally agreed upon methodological guidelines may provoke the frustration of the reader, Ullman's well structured and accessible book may be seen as a welcome relief to what otherwise may be viewed as a hopelessly disorderly axiological world. But, by the same token, the inner logic of the book is at the origin of its limitations. The book restricts itself to a narrow conceptual repertoire and in fact does not seem to acknowledge the existence of any theoretical literary grounds other than Frye's Anatomy. If we consider that Frye's book was written in 1957 and that the other major theoretical source of Ullman's book, The Decline of the West, appeared in the 1920's we may realize that the book places itself outside the present critical environment.

Furthermore, Ullman does not present his classical sources with a critical perspective that would allow him to discuss their validity and pertinence to today's concerns. On the contrary, both authors seem to be accepted at face value as if they could be linked with the discourse of contemporary thought without any justification. In a contrasting way, Hegel and Heidegger have been enjoying a strong comeback in literary studies but that phenomenon has taken place only after a process of profound reconsideration and updating of their thought rather than by an unquestioned acceptance. A similar reconsideration is lacking in Ullmans approach and therefore his book does not display a dynamic and innovative perspective and it tends to the repetition of methodological procedures. Its interpretive achievements are not negligible but the theoretical framework in which they are placed is at the fringes of today's critical orientation. Let us specify the main content and characteristics of the book.

The first chapter is a summarized account of Frye's concept of literature and methodology as presented in Anatomy of Criticism. The other chapters are devoted to the practical analysis of several works of Spanish literature from different periods and authors: from Cervantes's Don Quixote and Lope de Vega's El caballero de Olmedo to Clarin's «Adiós, Cordera» and Juan Ramón Jiménez's Platero y yo.

The method of practical analysis is applied in the same fashion to all the texts under consideration regardless of whether they are classical fiction, modern novellas or poetry. Ullman centers his analysis on two of Frye's broadest concepts: modes and symbols and the subcategories belonging to them. Under modes he includes the notions of myth, romance, high mimetic, low mimetic, and ironic. The symbols are studied according to various phases: anagogic, mythic, formal, descriptive, and literal. Charts appear at the beginning of most chapters displaying in a graphic manner how the basic categories are exemplified in a particular text. The function of the individual readings is to elucidate and develop the meaning of the introductory chart, filling in the information the charts do not provide. The readings concentrate on the nature of the personal traits of the characters and they often follow the plot's line in a rather literal way. The analysis of the characters is subject to a precise but also deterministic interpretation whereby every act or attitude is explained according to the archetypal slots in which that act or attitude is included. Thus, in Don Quixote, the book discusses whether Sancho is a high mimetic or a mock high mimetic figure as if those concepts could give us the ultimate key to his behavior and they were primordial and atemporal notions and were not historically dependent.

Ullman's interpretations are carefully presented and they show a precise knowledge of the texts he studies. Those interpretations are doubtlessly the consequence of a prolonged acquaintance with the texts that has allowed him to carefully verify his ideas. The reader does not necessarily have to dispute the consistency and thoroughness of Ullman's

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application of primordial types to the analysis of the characters' behavior. But I do not think that those particular qualities of that application are the most appropriate criterion to judge the book. There are other is sues and questions that are more decisive in the evaluation process. As an illustration I will mention some of those questions: do the readings advance ideas that further the aims of the contemporary critical discourse? Do they increase our appreciation of the texts making them more vital and challenging to us? Do they dynamize the texts enriching them and expanding the paths of signification that they initiate? In these areas, Ullman's book does not prove sufficiently satisfactory. His readings are effective but they follow somewhat mechanical reading procedures whose essential function seems to be the justification of the conceptual superstructure that is imposed upon the texts. The reader of Ullman's book often finds himself trying to verify the correctness of Ullman's charts rather than seeing himself inspired by powerful and provocative ideas.

Thirty years after its appearance, Frye's system needs to be made problematic, showing the way in which it unmistakably belongs to a particular phase of critical thinking that was fixated upon taxonomy and the reduction of discourse to supposedly universal categories. Frye should not be exempt from a revision similar to the one structuralism has gone through in the last fifteen years whereby its purportedly scientific aspirations have been questioned and have been replaced by a plural orientation that incorporates the philosophical and ethical interests of a period in which knowledge and values have been energized with a wealth of multiple and heterogeneous but complementary drives.

Ullman's book can be considered legitimate and even successful judged strictly from its own premises. Within them it can be seen as methodical and logically presented. But, we know well enough by now that logic, although necessary, needs to be shown in all its limitations which are the consequence of its figurative and historical determinations.

Gonzalo Navajas

University of California, Irvine

ARGULLOL, RAFAEL. Desciende, río invisible. Barcelona: Destino, 1989. 163 pp.

BEAN, FRANK D., JURGEN SCHMANDT AND SIDNEY WEINTRAUB, editors. Mexican and Central American Population and U. S. Immigration Policy. Austin, University of Texas Press, 1989. 211 pp.

CONDE, ALFREDO. El Griffon. Barcelona: Destino, 1989. 309 pp.

CHÁVEZ, GENET. La Comunicación (Curriculum Unit). Santa Cruz, California: ETR Associates/ Network Publications, 1989. 196 pp.

_____. La Comunicación (Student Work-book). Santa Cruz, California: ETR Associates/ Network Publications, 1989. 82 pp.

DE LAS CASAS, WALTER. Libido. Princeton, NJ: Linden Lane Press, 1989. 61 pp.

ESCARPANTER, JOSÉ. ABC de la ortografía moderna. Madrid: Playor, 1989. 254 pp.

FEINBERG, ELLEN O. Following the Milky Way (A Pilgrimage Across Spain). Ames: Iowa State University Press, 1989. 307 pp.

HARRISON, REGINA. Signs, Songs, and Memory in the Andes (Translating Quechua Language and Culture). Austin: University of Texas Press, 1989. 233 pp.

KIM, SOON JIN. EFE: Spain's World News Agency. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, Inc., 1989. 268 pp.

MADRID, LEILA. El estilo del deseo: La poética de Darío, Vallejo, Borges y Paz. Madrid: Editorial Pliegos, 1988. 149 pp.

MAYO, W. J. Cómo dominar la lectura activa. Madrid: Editorial Playor, 1989. 166 pp.

MICHENER, JAMES A. AND JOHN KINGS. Six Days in Havana. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1989. 144 pp. Color photographs.

MORO, LILIAM. Poemas del 42. Madrid: Editorial Playor, 1989. Nueva Poesía Playor. 55 pp.

PALMER, JR., BRUCE. Intervention in the Caribbean: The Dominican Crisis of 1965. Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1989. 226 pp.

PERRONE, BOBETTE, HENRIETTA STOCKEL AND VICTORIA KRUEGER. Medicine Women, Curanderas, and Women Doctors. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1989. 272 pp., illustrations, notes, bibliography.

PLA, JOSEP. Vida de Manolo. Barcelona: Ediciones Destino, 1989. Translation from the Catalan Vida de Manolo contada por ell mateix by Joan Vinyoli. 293 pp.

PONCE DE LEÓN, JOSÉ LUIS S. El arte de la conversación/El arte de la composición. 4 ed. New York: Harper & Row, 1987. 367 pp.

PUJOL, LOUIS. Tres visiones del amor en la obra de José Martí. Miami: Ediciones Universal, 1989. 85 pp.

RICCI, JULIO. Falling Through the Cracks. Fredonia, NY: White Pine Press, 1989. 81 pp.

ROMERO, ARMANDO. Las combinaciones debidas. Buenos Aires: Ediciones Ultimo Reino, 1989. 63 pp.

TORRES, CARMEN L. La cuentística de Virgilio Piñera: Estrategias humorísticas. Madrid: Editorial Pliegos, 1989. 133 pp.

Traymoya (Cuaderno de Teatro), 19-20 [abril-sept. 1989]. Universidad Veracruzana/Rutgers University, Camden. 211 pp.

VALDMAN, ALBERT, ed. Proceedings of the Symposium on the Evaluation of Foreign Language Proficiency (1987). Bloomington: Indiana University (Committee for Research and Development in Language Instruction), 1988. 312 pp.

Hispania [Publicaciones periódicas]. Volume 73, Number 2, May 1990