Book Reviews

Reviews

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La amplia perspectiva que nos ofrece este título no es exagerada. Zelda Brooks se ha propuesto la difícil tarea de compendiar, en un solo volumen, tres aspectos que, por separado, podrían constituir, cada uno en sí, una obra. Hay que avisar al lector de que no está ante un libro de crítica textual. Ni tampoco se trata de una sede de relatos más o menos históricos. Incapaz de separar vida y obra en este autor, Brooks ha ido explorando ambas de manera simultánea. Su contenido se ofrece de forma inversa a lo que anuncia el encabezamiento. El prólogo, que cobra aquí más importancia de lo habitual, nos sitúa en la perspectiva de la insólita personalidad de Fernando Rielo. Un extenso número de fundaciones de contenido cultural y humanitario forman parte de la creatividad de este poeta y filósofo: una escuela de pensamiento, una fundación de ayuda social y sanitaria, una asociación internacional de jóvenes, una fundación cultural con la inclusión de un premio internacional de poesía mística... Con todas ellas justifica Brooks el calificativo de «héroe» que le otorga al autor.

El tema de la comunicabilidad en la poesía abre el estudio propiamente literario de esta obra. Partiendo del sufrimiento universal, el amor divino se presenta para el místico como fórmula incluso de una poética: «The power of Rielo's techniques lies in its perfect blending of form and content with the perspective or persona of the voice of God speaking to man...» (19). Una distinción importante establece la autora desde el inicio: la que surge entre poesía religiosa -que aún busca a un Dios contra el que frecuentemente se rebela-, y la poesía mística, que nos habla desde la posesión del amor. Mientras el poeta religioso parte de la distancia entre su persona y la divinidad, el poeta místico, situado ya en ésta, describe líricamente lo que contempla.

En los dos capítulos que siguen, Brooks demuestra que ha sabido detectar el punto central del pensamiento rieliano: la metafísica, concepción genética del principio de relación, que el autor establece corroborado por la congenitud divina del Padre con el Hijo. Esta aportación se presenta además comparada con los puntos claves de la mística clásica. Si la poesía ha sido siempre una forma de comunicarse, en el caso de Rielo se produce de manera descendente: desde su comunión con la absoluta unidad y distinción de las personas divinas, a la comunión con la humanidad, con el lector concreto, con la historia, con la naturaleza... La palabra del poeta místico surge desde dentro; ha estado siempre ahí, desde el primer momento de su concepción. Viene ahora moldeada, metaforizada por el contenido evangélico. Rielo lleva el lenguaje simbólico a su cima más espectacular, que aquí se estudia bajo un doble proceso de «raptus» y «excesus». El simbolismo se afirma entonces, nos dice Brooks, como la expresión necesaria del lenguaje místico. Es un lenguaje siempre abierto al infinito. La obra de Fernando Rielo gira en definitiva en torno al destino. Un destino eterno que se une al mismo origen y que comunica una poesía instantáneamente eterna. En el último capítulo se trata dicho tema desde diversas perspectivas.

El estudio de Brooks es una buena guía sobre la compleja personalidad de Fernando Rielo y su amplia obra; un claro exponente de lo que la «contemplación activa» significa para el poeta místico contemporáneo.

Pilar Martín Espíldora
St. John's University

With the welcome exception of one newcomer to Galdosian studies, the authors of the ten articles published in this volume have been studying and publishing on the work of Galdós for between fifteen and thirty years. Without exception they bring to their articles the kind of reading and thorough familiarity with their subject that only intelligence in conjunction with long experience and dedication can bring to bear on a given subject.

The greatest defect of the volume is caused by the interval between August 1986, date of the colloquium and the 1991 publication of the papers. The specialist readers for whom this volume, qua volume, will be most interesting will invariably miss references to studies published on similar themes since 1986. Nonetheless, as stated above, the so very solid Galdosian background of most of the contributors is such as to much diminish this shortcoming.

James Whiston's piece is «"Ficción verosímil" and "realidad documentada" in the Second Series of Galdós' Episodios Nacionales». He explores how Galdós incorporates, but then goes beyond the historically documented people, times and places of Spain. Salvador Monsalud, global protagonist of the Series, exemplifies especially well this fictionalizing. In «Narrative Ambiguity and Situational Ethics in La de Bringas», Maurice Hemingway reassesses the eponymous protagonist. Rather than join the chorus of critics who condemn her, Hemingway examines the very difficult family and social situation that explains, not justifies, Rosalía's recourse to prostitution. Karen Austin's «Madness and Madmen in Galdós' Early Fiction and in La desheredada» shows how the author uses dementia in different forms and characters as a metaphor for the extremism of all kinds and as a «cautionary lesson» (40) regarding the need for all to maintain personal and social balance. In «El audaz: historia de un radical de antaño», Brian Dendle rejects the criticism which has relegated Galdós' second novel to near oblivion. Instead he delves into «the ambiguity of narratorial viewpoint» (53) about Muriel and Susana, the count's daughter. Dendle concludes that these early figures demonstrate Galdós' creation of «inner-directed characters» not limited by authorial symbolism and meaning.

In «Social Document or Narravive Discourse? Some Comments on Recent Aspects of Galdós' Criticism», Geoffrey Ribbans touches upon some of the same issues as Whiston. Reprising the 1966-68 debate between Gilman and Blanco Aguinaga concerning Fortunata y Jacinta, Ribbans addresses the powers and limitations of intrinsic and extrinsic criticism. He concludes that critics must follow Galdós' own lead in their study by identifying the fictive and documentary aspects of Galdosian texts, especially in trying to find the Galdosian synthesis specific to each work. Peter Bly's «El caballero encantado: Galdós' Ironic Review of "Regeneracionistas"» documents the Galdosian pique and scepticism with the younger, Generation of 1898 type critics of Spanish national life. While they tended to blame the principal figures of the Restoration for national ills, Galdós suggested that the problem was in the people themselves and that the leaders merely reflected deeper, abiding defects among Spaniards as a group. Lisa Condé synthesizes her M. Phil. and Ph. D. dissertations of 1983 and 1987. She traces how Galdós went from portraying the limits society imposed upon women to liberating women from them in his 1895 drama Voluntad

Eamonn Rodgers' «The Unfinished Anagnorisis: the Illness and Death of José María Bueno Guzmán in Galdós' Lo prohibido» shows how Galdós «has managed to make [the narrator/ protagonist] seem simultaneously reliable and unreliable about the same things» (131). As a result the «equivocal writing» about himself forcefully seconds his «equivocal living» (140), particularly as regards the extent to which he has truly received insight into his errors and been converted to a better life. In «The Fictional Plenitude of Ángel Guerra», Nicolas Round touches upon issues found in Whiston, Dendle and Ribbans' pieces. Round agrees with others concerning the aesthetic excesses of the «mimetic copiousness» of Ángel Guerra (143), but studies how Galdós' «narrative control» corrects this and other defects. By the end of the novel the reader has gone through the fictive process of subjecting Ángel's imperfect and uncompleted projects and motivations with an imaginative critique of what more perfect and complete ones might have been. Finally, Anthony Percival provides a very brief, somewhat updated condensation of his monumental Galdós and His Critics (1985).

Stephen Miller
Texas A&M University

Antonio Colinas, one of Spain's most highly acclaimed contemporary poets, began writing his Tratado de armonía in 1986, and in the summers of 1989 and 1990, during an extended tour of many important landmarks of Spanish mysticism, prepared the second part titled «Tratado de signos (Homenaje a San Juan de la Cruz)». The latter, written in commemoration of the saint's death (1591), complements the more personal reflections of the first part. Both sections consist of short meditations, similar to entries in a diary, in which the author probes the meaning of something he has read or of something he has seen, such as a tree, an animal, or an artifact. His reveries often lead him to pose questions which he cannot or does not answer, and in many instances they are stated in terms of opposites, for example, «¿La extremada sensibilidad es un don o una condena?» (20), or «¿Existe una sola verdad o muchas verdades?» (22). It is, in fact, Colinas's method to allow knowledge to fluctuate between one extreme and the other, like a shimmering moon sailing behind black clouds or dolphins emerging from a dark sea into the light. In this regard his approach owes much to oriental mystical philosophy and religion (Taoism, Buddhism, Zen), whose conceptualizations of universal harmony permeate the text.

In «Tratado de signos», Colinas applies his meditative approach to many facets of the Christian mystical experience in Spain, and organizes his entries according to the itinerary of the trip in which he retraced the steps of San Juan de la Cruz from his childhood in Medina del Campo to his death in Úbeda. As in the first part, Colinas is intuitive and indirect, suggesting by juxtaposition the many points of contact between universal mysticism and its Spanish counterpart. He also addresses several aspects of San Juan's life: the possibility of a marginal social status, his problems with Catholic orthodoxy, his travels from one monastery to the next, his poetry and commentaries, and finally, the distribution of his bones as religious relics.

José Ángel Valente's Variaciones sobre el pájaro y la red. Precedido de «La piedra y el centro», which also commemorates the death of San Juan de la Cruz, includes two collections of essays on the mystics and related topics. The first part titled «La piedra y el centro», first published in 1983, concerns itself less with the mystical experience per se and more with the commonality which in Valente's mind unites mysticism with poetry. Beginning with San Juan's words from his commentary on Cántico espiritual, «Como la piedra cuando se va más llegando a su centro» (16), Valente discusses the rock -a universal symbol of wholeness- the rock's exile from its own center, and eventual reunion with the center. The poet's voice is similar to the rock, he says, «Porque la copla, hasta llegar a esta voz, ha rodado tiempo y tiempo, al igual que la piedra» (16). The author's use of the word voz throughout the essay implies not only «voice» but «word», suggesting perhaps that he is building up a theory of poetic language. Although in the prologue he has stated that theorizing is not his intention, these initial essays address the nature of poetry and the characteristics of the poet, whom the author, again basing himself on San Juan, compares to the «pájaro solitario», who flies high, rejects companionship, even that of his own kind, holds his beak in the air, is of no particular hue, and sings softly (21). Many of the fifteen essays follow this general format: the author, choosing a motif or symbol common to universal mysticism, explicates it in such a fashion as to underscore the commonality between the poet and the mystic.

In a few of the essays from «La piedra y el centro» and the majority of those from «Variaciones sobre el pájaro y la red», the author exercises his skills as a literary scholar. In «Ensayo sobre Miguel de Molinos», for example, he offers us a well-documented study of the persecution of this Spanish Quietist, and in «Una nota sobre relaciones literarias hispano-inglesas en el siglo XVII», he discusses the proliferation of Spanish religious works in England during the seventeenth century. Ascetic treatises, prayer books, and sermons were especially popular, a fact that, according to Valente, may explain some of the similarities between British and Spanish Baroque poetry. «Sobre el lenguaje de los místicos: convergencia y transmisión» examines the occurrence of mystic phenomena in various cultures, both ancient and modern, concluding that transmission was likely in some cases and highly unlikely in others. In this regard, he pays special attention to the Christianization of the cabala and its influence among Spanish mystics of converso heritage.

Two distinct visions of human existence dominate Valente's collection of prose poems, No amanece el cantor. Divided into two parts, «No amanece el cantor» and «Paisaje con pájaros

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amarillos», the first develops an image of human beings which is strangely unfamiliar: people are de-centered, abstract entities in search of their centers. They consist of «capas de tiempo» and «húmedos, demorados depósitos de luz» (13). Readers stand before a being that is essentially a psyche, one in which the vastness of the unconscious is allowed to manifest itself and to overwhelm the limits of the body. Poems that draw heavily on the mystic tradition, these texts may seem less ambiguous to readers who first familiarize themselves with some of Valente's essays, such as «La piedra y el centro», which may provide a basis for interpreting the highly ambiguous language of the poems, especially those of the first part. In «Paisaje con pájaros amarillos», on the other hand, the imagery is less ambiguous, the experiences more familiar, for here each poem is an expression of some facet of the process of grieving. The entire section, consisting of thirty-one short compositions, is addressed to the poet's dead companion with whom he wants to be reunited. Although this is impossible in a physical sense, his imagination allows him to create a realm or image in which the two friends, «pájaros amarillos», are brought together. These are beautifully simple, poignant texts whose lack of a poematic format does not diminish in any sense their poetic essence.

All three books from Tusquets', Nuevos Textos Sagrados collection deserve our attention. Not only are they successful works by very skillful writers, they retrieve and carry forward Spain's invaluable contribution to universal mysticism. As Valente writes in No amanece el cantor, «No dejéis morir a los viejos profetas» (17).

Kay Pritchett
University of Arkansas

«This collection of eight critical essays examines the last five decades of Spanish poetry. As Debicki indicates in his introduction, we find ourselves at a moment when history and literary interpretation collide, merge, and offer new syntheses. The Spanish Civil War is now no longer active in memory, for the last generation of poets presently writing was born after the war. It is also significant that in the last decade or so, criticism of Spanish literature has been subjected to a considerable demand for revision. Such a revision would necessitate new perspectives and strategies. This perceptive and well-written volume represents an innovative and substantial contribution to the study of contemporary Spanish poetry.

In his introduction to critical perspectives, Debicki again questions the sufficiency of a generational methodology applied to the period, as Carlos Bousoño had done some three decades previously. Certainly, one must interrogate a system of periodization in which poets of different ages and «generations» promoted and participated in a shared similarity of aesthetics and style, while their contemporaries spoke with a distinctively divergent poetic voice. Yet, literary history has continued to canonize and anthologize using such terminology as «The generation of 1936» or even the first and second «post-war generations». Debicki's introduction prefaces the focal essay of the work in which José Olivio Jiménez provides a cogent reappraisal of Spanish poetry from 1939, the beginning of the post-civil war period, until 1990.

Jiménez skillfully initiates an ironic counterpoint. While following the traditional generational scheme, he simultaneously invalidates its rigid perspectives which are often equivocal and, in the case of poets «marginalized» by the system, clearly unjust. The reassessment of the generational systematization and its limitations by Jiménez leads to his suggestion of several possible solutions. One possibility of organization would be represented by the identification and definition of «poetic stages of time» (or «stages of poetic time») in a continuous evolution of poetic expression relating aesthetics to the historical context apart from generational considerations. Jiménez notes that this method has been followed in the two published volumes of La poesía española de 1935 a 1975 by Víctor García de la Concha; it is also the method Jiménez employs in the essay. Jiménez also indicates the increasing interest in the concept of «postmodernity» and provides a rationale for its potential as an integrating function in both cultural and aesthetic interpretation. Such an approach, he observes, is evident as early as 1964 in the studies of Carlos Bousoño, and has continued in the criticism of Dionisio Cañas and Andrew Debicki among others.

Two essays involve the reappraisal of Spanish women poets. John Wilcox perceptively investigates the process of demystification and confrontation with androcentric culture in the works of Ángela Figuera Aymerich and Francisca Aguirre; clearly, both these poets deserve considerably

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more critical attention. As Wilcox admits, the creation of a gynocentric voice would be more expected of Aguirre, given the protestations of Figuera that she did not believe in feminism. However, Wilcox makes a strong case for the implied feminist vision in her poetry. Sharon Keefe Ugalde provides a meticulous yet very readable commentary on the feminist revision of such cultural and literary figures as Eve, Lot's wife (nameless in her lack of identity and her sin), and Ophelia in Spanish women's poetry of the 1980s. Ugalde interprets a series of complex stages in which women poets recapture a subjectivity immersed in despair and non-being, reclaiming the power of self and Eros.

Three essays evaluate the group of poets generally referred to as the «novísimos» or «promoción de 1970». Margaret Persin employs a post-structuralist technique to reveal the «snares» of language inherent in the deceptive nature of communication in her very original reading of Pere Gimferrer's bilingual Els miralls/Los Espejos. This was the first work of the poet to be written in Catalan, and was translated to Spanish by the poet himself. Creating a new perspective regarding the equivocal concept of «culturanism», the poet Guillermo Carnero, himself a member of the «novísimo» group, reveals how the «culturalist» aesthetic, using the intertextuality of historical figures and works of art, engages the response of the reader and produces deeper levels of variable meaning. The poet centers his study on the poem «Cascabeles» from Gimferrer's Arde el mar. The latest work of Carnero himself, Divisibilidad indefinida, is the focus of an engaging essay by Ignacio Javier López, who views the poetry of Carnero as grounded in the aesthetics of the «novísimos», but with a new commitment to the human experience and a new expressive freedom.

An essay by Biruté Ciplijauskaité encloses the poetic circle. The evolution of contemporary Spanish poetry continues to break the restraints of geometrically conceived critical strictures. In her analysis of the most recent poetry, Ciplijauskaité perceptively envisions a new «essentialism» in the pursuit of eternal values by these poets -the bond of world and word. Particularly with such poets of the 1980s as María Victoria Atencia, Jesús Munárriz, and Luis Suñén, the critic interprets a new simplicity accompanied by a return to a more personal poetry.

In conclusion, the volume presents an impressive contribution to the criticism of contemporary Spanish poetry. The essays included are of an unusually high calibre of scholarship, reflecting originality, depth, and clarity. Because the study is in English, it invites colleagues in other disciplines to share the experience of an exceptionally rich period of Spanish literature. It also represents an opportunity to strengthen the presence of contemporary critical strategies practiced in other Western literatures.

Jerry Phillips Winfield
Mercer University

Although very different in approach, both La práctica escénica cortesana and After Its Kind make significant contributions to the study of the comedia. While Teresa Ferrer Valls is interested in the historical development and the staging of court plays, James A. Parr concentrates on new critical methods. And yet, Parr's book also includes a historical perspective since it is a collection of essays compiled by three editors as a tribute to Parr. They were originally published between 1979 and 1990. The book also includes a new essay.

After Its Kind is divided into three sections. The first is more traditional in approach. Students of Ruiz de Alarcón will be pleased to find that all five essays in this section deal with this playwright. For Parr, one of the essential traits of Ruiz de Alarcón's comedias is the presentation of «Stoic-Christian self-control» (30). Protagonists of La verdad sospechosa and Las paredes oyen lack self-control while in plays such as Los favores del mundo and El dueño de las estrellas the central characters exhibit this Stoic virtue. Parr rightly views Lycurcus' suicide in El dueño de las estrellas as a «moral triumph» (45). The inclusion of this cluster of articles that foreground Stoicism in the comedia may give new impetus to the comparative study of Seneca's tragedies and Spanish Golden Age plays, a topic that has been neglected since the publication of Karl Alfred Blüer's comprehensive book on the subject.

While Section Two of the book contributes to our understanding of genre, focusing on concepts such as Christian tragedy and broaching suggestive topics such as the misogyny implicit in Golden Age comedy (100), it is Section Three that contains Parr's most original insights. This section is composed

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of three articles, including the once polemical 1974 piece, «An Essay on Critical Method Applied to the Comedia». It would have been useful to include some of the published reactions to this essay (particularly E. M. Wilson's reply) in an appendix. This third section also includes a 1990 article which gives an impressionistic outline of the changes that have occurred in literary criticism, and theory in this century. The juxtaposition of the two articles shows how quickly theories and fallacies change. While in 1974 Parr was decrying intentional fallacy, he notes that for many it is the referential fallacy that matters now. Some critics even revel in the «vindication of authorial intention as ultimate grounding» (109). The final article, written for this volume, is a personal assessment of current criticism on the comedia. Parr attempts to craft a vision of where critics should be heading. He cites recent studies attempting to assess their contributions while also cautioning about certain pitfalls. In this panoramic vision he focuses, for example, on both the scholarship that attempts to ascribe the authorship of El burlador de Sevilla to Andrés de Claramonte and on the theoretical proclamations of the «death of the author». Stressing the importance of scholarship, criticism and theory, Parr argues that they cannot exist independently. Both the article and the book as a whole delight in heterogeneity, an element that, for Parr, is at the center of the Humanities.

While Parr's book moves easily from theory to scholarship, it is so wide-ranging that at times we wish for more specificity and focus. On the other hand, Ferrer Valls's study excels in its scholarly investigations of the stage, but is at times overwhelmed by data. La práctica escénica cortesana is a very focused attempt to re-write theater history from the sixteenth century to the reign of Philip IV, when Italian engineers such as Cosimo Lotti and Cesare Fontana transformed the stage. The author begins by studying certain equestrian tournaments, showing how these court feasts became more and more elaborate, including different scenes, dialogue, action and spectacle. The motifs utilized were often derived from classical mythology and the chivalric romances. Ferrer Valls charts a path from a 1549 torneo which includes an enemy enchanter, a «castillo tenebroso» (24), and a boat that takes the hero down river to a magical island, to the 1570 representation of what she labels a comedia based on Amadís and which ends with a torneo. These festivals, in turn, are related to early chivalric plays, from Rey de Artieda's lost Amadís and Los encantos de Merlín to Cervantes' La casa de los celos and El laberinto de amor. In addition to the torneos, the máscaras are also seen as precursors of court plays. A 1564 feast, organized by the ladies of Princess Juana and Queen Isabel de Valois, includes a scene of the «paradise of Niquea» which is clearly the precursor to Villamediana's 1622 play, La gloria de Niquea (43).

Ferrer Valls carefully documents the close relationship between Spain and Italy during the sixteenth century, focusing on the Italian nobility in Valencia, the knowledge Charles V and Philip II had of Italian spectacles, and the presence in Spain of Italian actors. This, together with circumstancial evidence gleaned from descriptions of certain representations in Spain, allows Ferrer Valls to posit that Italian stage practices, such as the use of «un decorado en perspectiva», were used in Spain as early as the 1548 fiestas of Valladolid and the 1570 Amadís (75). She also shows how artificial lighting was common in the peninsula. The Amadís play, for example, utilizes «la técnica de cubrir los diferentes puntos de iluminación con recipientes de vidrio repletos de agua, teorizada por los escenógrafos italianos del XVI» (92). Ferrer Valls argues that we need not explain the use of spectacle in later plays by the influence of the «comedias de santos». There was, she shows, a continuing tradition of court spectacles which at times used Italian innovations. She also claims that criticism of «tramoyas», as typified in Lope's, Prólogo dialogístico of the 16th Part of his comedias, was not directed at court spectacles, but at the corrales, where the «pobreza de recursos provocaba la burla» (103). A dense chapter on court spectacles during the reign of Philip III completes the historical panorama. Here, Ferrer Valls shows how much the Conde de Lemos contributed to the development of theater and spectacle during this period. She goes on to prove that La casa confusa was actually written by Lemos. A detailed study of nine plays in terms of their contribution to court spectacle rounds out the book. In this last chapter, Ferrer Valls discusses, for example, the influence of the popular theater on Lope's Fábula de Perseo, and a key innovation in Vélez's El caballero del sol, the «cambio global del escenario» (192).

James Parr and Teresa Ferrer Valls present us with books that deal with the comedia using radically different approaches. Those interested in a very personal vision of comedia theory and criticism through the eyes of one of the more perceptive American critics will enjoy the suggestive After Its Kind, while those who wish to delve into the realm of scholarship and discover the pleasures of reconstructing the history of the court spectacles

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through very detailed information on representation during the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries will be pleased with Ferrer Valls' book.

Frederick A. de Armas
The Pennsylvania State University

Studies of the Don Juan figure have become increasingly sophisticated in recent years as critics have mastered the demanding discourse of modern theory in its several dimensions: literary, cultural, ideological, and psychological, in particular. Mandrell's contribution is, in my estimation, the most sophisticated of the lot. This is so because he is able to join together into a seamless whole so many seemingly disparate strands of theory: feminist, neo-Marxian, Lacanian, and Derridian, to mention only a few, while also offering compelling close readings. The book represents a culmination of work done previously, by him and by others, while showing the way to an enhanced appreciation of this Protean figure and the writing within which his seductive presence is encoded.

Of the several refinements in thinking about Don Juan brought to the fore in this book, one that seems to me particularly felicitous is the distinction proposed between «myth» (which has its origins in orality), «mythology» (a special kind of discourse that is written), and «mythography» (the writing of or on myth). «Thus», concludes Mandrell, «the literary and critical versions of Don Juan's story, the written texts per se, constitute not myth and mythology respectively, but always a kind of mythography, a writing that always refers to some other like or related text» (38).

It is fair to say that Mandrell's study deals with writing and rewriting, although, stated baldly in that manner, it is impossible to convey the complexity and richness of the argument. Complementary to writing is, of course, the act of reading, and here some of the subtleties of both deconstruction and phenomenology come into play. Suffice it to say that Mandrell has mastered not only his primary sources -to the extent that one can be said ever to master a text- and also the theories that are judiciously brought to bear in order to highlight aspects that have escaped less discerning readers. Several of the guild are queried and found wanting at opportune moments, and there is a running dialogue with Carlos Feal's utopian perspective.

The study progresses nicely and logically from the stage to the page, that is, from theatrical representation, as in El burlador de Sevilla and Don Juan Tenorio, to novelistic representation, as in La Regenta and Doña Inés. There is a corresponding shift in emphasis from authorship and writing to readership and response to the seductive strategies of the narrator. Don Juan is additionally presented as a principle of exchange in the economy of desire and as a force serving patriarchal ends from his very inception and, ultimately and Perhaps Paradoxically, ethical ends (as in Unamuno's and Azorín's Hermanos Juan).

Then the study takes the further step -perhaps one too many- of pursuing seduction into the culture at large, hazarding, for instance, that «the emphasis on rhetorical effect, on manipulation and persuasion as seen most obviously in advertising and most insidiously in politics, ...can be read as a logical extension of the types of concerns present in Don Juan's story» (271). Clearly there is a grain of truth here, but this sort of «logical extension» into the real world could also be seen as a quixotic quest for relevance -a late 1960s throwback at best

A more significant problem may have to do with origins. Don Juan is presented throughout as a symbol for seduction -and surely there is no denying that feature in the two most widely disseminated versions of the myth, Don Juan Tenorio and Don Giovanni -but the generalization hardly holds true for the original text, El burlador de Sevilla, with its «title figure», its burlador, a demonic trickster of both men and women but only tangentially a seducer. In El burlador, seduction (and there are only two instances, Tisbea and Aminta) is invariably subordinated to the burla, involving a mockery of established values. The character's energies come to be focused more on sexuality per se in subsequent rewritings, leading us now to equate «Don Juan» and «seducer». Nevertheless, if the ground(ing) is shaky, the structure of argumentation built on it may show stress cracks under close scrutiny (I refer exclusively to the equating of «Don Juan» and «seduction»).

The more important dimension of seductiveness lies in the fact that Don Juan has for centuries seduced both writers and readers within the realm of literature-a much larger and far more malleable universe than that of everyday reality. It is Mandrell's elegant and penetrating commentary on what he calls «the mechanisms of seduction as they operate in literature» (272) that has undeniable value and unquestionable pertinence.

James A Parr
University of California, Riverside

Esta colección de ensayos sobre el exilio español en las Américas reúne las ponencias del Simposio Internacional del mismo título que tuvo lugar en la Universidad de Maryland (College Park) en octubre de 1989, año en que «se celebra» el cincuentenario de la victoria franquista en la Guerra Civil española. Se centra la obra en torno a tres áreas de indagación: la historia de la diáspora, que procura aportar datos y estadísticas antes desconocidos; el testimonio personal de los protagonistas del exilio, con todo su drama humano; y el análisis de los productos culturales de los desterrados en América. El contacto mutuo entre la España peregrina y el ámbito americano sirve como el marco unificador de la colección. La obra ofrece una multiplicidad de perspectivas y acercamientos al tema del exilio español, estructurándose según un criterio que va de lo general a lo particular.

Cabe destacar entre la diversidad de trabajos, todos de una gran calidad, el de Miguel Ugarte, que abre la colección con una reflexión sobre los escritos producidos en los campos de concentración, subrayando a la vez la imposibilidad de teorizar sobre la diversa literatura del exilio; el de Eugenio F. Granell, que critica duramente a los estalinistas, tanto en la República de la pre-guerra como en el exilio de la posguerra; los ensayos de Roberto Ruíz y Susana Rivera, que recuperan la historia en el campo del análisis literario de la generación de los «cachorros» hispanomexicanos; el testimonio personal de Guillermina Supervía y el ensayo de Kathleen M. McNerney, a través de los cuales se resalta el papel divergente de la mujer en el exilio; las nuevas aportaciones al estudio del impacto del exilio en la poesía de Juan Ramón Jiménez ofrecidas por Graciela Palau de Nemes, Antonio Sánchez Romeralo, y Arturo del Villar; y el excelente artículo de Randolph D. Pope, cuya indagación en la autobiografía del exilio, centrándose en las memorias de Rafael Alberti y María Teresa León, plantea nuevas preguntas sobre el género.

Asimismo, cabe señalar el rescate de datos y análisis sobre el exilio de Catalunya (McNerney y Jaime Ferrán), Euskadi (Martín de Ugalde) y Galicia (Luis Martul Tobío, Kathleen N. March, y Estelle Irizarry). Entre los últimos se destaca el trabajo de March, que ahonda en el caso particular de Galicia, ya que su literatura del exilio se sitúa dentro de una tradición literaria de ausencia y pérdida expresada por la «saudade». De particular interés también es la polémica que aparentemente se levantó en el Simposio en torno a la debatible categoría de «exilio interior» (concepto propuesto por Paul Ilie en su obra del mismo título de 1981), y cuya defensa más elocuente se halla en el artículo del poeta Ángel González.

Esta colección representa una aportación imprescindible del estudio del exilio español de 1939, tanto en su historia particular y general como en los acercamientos a sus productos culturales. Los testimonios personales de algunos de sus protagonistas (Manuel Andújar, José Prat, Granell, Ruíz, Javier Malagón, Supervía, González, Manuel Durán y Ugalde), llenos de dramatismo humano, enriquecen los datos históricos y analíticos ofrecidos en el tomo. Pero sobre todo, al enfocar el grado de diálogo entre la España peregrina y los países receptores, la obra plantea nuevos caminos a seguir en el estudio del exilio español.

Nancy Vosburg
Stetson University

Henry Thurston-Griswold offers Valera scholars an opportunity to reconsider the credibility of the aesthetic creed of Spain's Don Juan Valera. Pursuant upon the fact that numerous critics and scholarly studies have attempted in vain to classify Valera's eclectic style, Thurston-Griswold chooses instead to reevaluate the nineteenth-century author's writings in light of the philosophical stance he held. By capitalizing on Valera's eclecticism and what has been called Valera's «panfilismo», Thurston-Griswold's study presents convincing evidence of a correlation between Valera's aesthetics and his writing.

The book is divided into four long chapters with an introduction and a conclusion, a list of works consulted, and a limited index. Written in clear, crisp prose, this Valera study begins with a precisely stated premise, followed by well-organized, well-documented chapters on Valera's biography and aesthetic creed, critical commentary on the author's philosophy, and a discussion of the novels. Critical works cited range from the earliest writings by Pérez de Ayala and Clarín to a critical edition of Juanita la Larga by Rubio Cremades in 1985. Thurston-Griswold skillfully matches previous critical stances with citations from primary sources to come to grips with the often-cited divergence between Valera's aesthetic creed and his writing.

While this work is primarily intended as a study of Juan Valera's aesthetics, the excellent treatment of nineteenth-century «isms», and the discussion of each of Valera's eight complete novels make it a good source of information for the nineteenth-century literary landscape as well as information about Valera's less-studied novels. It should be noted that while Thurston-Griswold refers often to Valera's critical writing and touches all bases when discussing the novels (characterization, themes, plots, use of language, and narrative technique), there is scant reference to Valera's poetry or drama. The discussion of the theme of love fails to cite directly Carole Rupe's study, although the work is listed in the bibliography. Reference to Gonzalo Torrente Ballester's discussion of Valera's theory of art in Literatura española contemporánea might have added another dimension to the carefully crafted study written by Professor Thurston-Griswold.

Teresia Taylor
Hardin-Simmons University

This is a most welcome volume. Peñas-Bermejo has edited a generous selection of poetry by Seville-born Julia Uceda, along with a substantial introduction (11-71) to her work and bibliographical references. The introduction is mainly thematic and is divided into the following sections: «Julia Uceda, poeta sevillana»; «El mundo poético de Julia Uceda -el amor; la preocupación social; la huella existencial; los sueños; la voluntad de estilo»; and «Conclusiones». Peñas-Bermejo dwells on Uceda's existentialist tendencies, which many critics have called an «existencialismo social». He describes her poetry as a «búsqueda epistemológica, de exploración de la realidad o de lo que pueda ser la realidad...» (71). While he does not analyze the poetry in depth, he offers a useful introduction to readers unfamiliar with Uceda, often considered chronologically part of the Generation of the 1950s, along with Ángel González, Manuel Mantero, Gloria Fuertes, and Claudio Rodríguez.

The anthology includes poems from Uceda's first published volume, Mariposa en cenizas (1959), to her latest work, Del camino de humo (in press). Other selections are taken from Extraña juventud (1962), Sin mucha esperanza (1966), Poemas de Cherry Lane (1968), Campanas en Sansueña (1977), and Viejas voces secretas de la noche (1981).

I would especially recommend reading «Eterno oleaje», «Una patria se ve desde la cumbre», «Condenada al silencio», «España, eres un largo invierno», and the selection from Viejas voces secretas de la noche, all poems of exceptional strength and feeling.

Uceda's poetry is dense, especially from the Poemas de Cherry Lane on. This is difficult and disturbing writing, reflecting a private struggle with the largest question of all, the question of Being. And behind this question, the perplexities of naming and identity. As a passionate, uneasy meditation on the enigma of existence, such poetry challenges us to go beyond naming, beyond the certainties of categories and schema, for a kind of understanding that partakes of the vivid clarity of dream.

Uceda sees her poetry along such visionary lines. She has been compared to José Hierro, with his quasi-surreal technique of the hallucinatory (in Libro de las alucinaciones, 1964). But she says, «... para mí el sueño es un ordenador del caos. La realidad puede ser caótica y un sueño puede ordenarla... La diferencia es que Hierro sueña despierto y yo dormida. Yo quitaría, en mi caso, la a- privativa de "alucinación" y lo dejaría en "lucinación". Hierro... [omite] el plano temporal que corresponde al presente... Yo no suprimo el plano real cotidiano... Mis poemas "lucinados" son con frecuencia sueños auténticos. Sueños que unas veces entiendo y otras no...» (Peñas-Bermejo 62).

Uceda, who is an original and intensely visionary poetic voice of contemporary Spain, deserves far more recognition than she has so far received. This volume amply demonstrates that originality.

Noël Valis
The Johns Hopkins University

A pesar del título de esta monografía, muchos estudios sobre ciertos temas tratados aquí ya existen. La novedad acaso reside no en el tema sino en el método crítico de algunos ensayos sobre el genial escritor español. A la vez, debe subrayarse que varios de los colaboradores se encuentran entre los más distinguidos estudiosos del hispanismo mundial. De especial interés y mérito son: «La persistente presencia de la guerra civil española en la obra de Camilo José Cela» por Robert Kirsner; «Papeles de Son Armadans en la obra de

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Camilo José Cela» por Darío Villanueva; «Camilo José Cela, viajero por España» de José María Martínez Cachero; y «La creatividad léxica de Camilo José Cela» por Ignacio Soldevila Durante. Dichos ensayos coinciden en enfocarse sobre sutilezas en la oeuvre celiana no elucidadas a pesar de estudios anteriores. Soldevila Durante subraya lo poco escrito sobre el léxico celiano en los últimos veinticinco años (a partir del estudio de Suárez Solís, con el cual Soldevila Durante no concuerda totalmente), afirmando que por «su riqueza, variedad y representatividad», un estudio definitivo de la creación léxica celiana está todavía por hacerse. Kirsner insiste en que la obra de Cela está mucho más entrelazada en tiempo y tema con la contienda civil de lo visto anteriormente, y procede a examinar varias novelas cuyos motivos bélicos se han ignorado. Darío Villanueva apunta que, irónicamente, muchas revistas que habían luchado por la democracia han desaparecido con el desvanecimiento del régimen que combatían. Villanueva señala el compromiso editorial de Cela que presenta ideas sobre el escritor, la literatura y la sociedad en Papeles. Haciendo eco del libro pionero de Kirsner sobre el tema, Martínez Cachero investiga cómo Cela se suma a una tradición literaria antigua y prestigiosa con sus libros de viaje, que transforman y renuevan el género en la literatura de la posguerra. Ángel Iglesias Ovejero en «Cela Onomaturgo: Los nombres propios en el gallego y su cuadrilla (sic)», presenta como tesis la afirmación que el «componente onomástico constituye un elemento clave de la figuración literaria». Iglesias analiza un amplio muestrario onomástico, analizando su insólita importancia en la obra de Cela. Ángel Abuin en «"No una vez, sino ciento": La frecuencia narrativa en La colmena», utiliza la teoría de Genette presentada en «Discurso del relato» (Figuras), para analizar la importancia estructural de tal fenómeno en dicha novela. Según Genette, la frecuencia narrativa consiste en la relación cuantitativa entre las veces que algo sucede y el número de veces que dicho suceso es narrado; Abuin sugiere que los capítulos de La colmena muestran una especie de «zigzag» narrativo que facilita interpretaciones variadas de la novela, haciendo posible ver su final como optimista, sin el pesimismo que tendría de otra manera.

No es posible citar todos los ensayos por falta de espacio, pero se recomiendan a todos los estudiosos de la obra celiana para futuras investigaciones sobre el genial gallego.

Genaro J. Pérez
The University of Texas of the Permian Basin

In the Introduction to Criticism in the Borderlands, a collection of fifteen essays, the editors recognize that over the last two decades Chicano criticism has become a reality and now «constitutes a body of work with a variety of theoretical tendencies» (5). They follow this by characterizing their collection as, «Dialogic in intention, our book gathers a range of varying ideological, feminist, and cultural studies perspectives. That is, we present Chicano/ a theory and theorists in our global borderlands: from ethnographic to postmodern, from Marxist to feminist, from cultural materialist to New Historicist critical perspectives» (6). Thus, readers might expect to find essays representative of a variety of theoretical tendencies, but they may be disappointed by the narrower criteria more accurately delineated by the second quote. Save the brief forward by Rolando Hinojosa and Luis Leal's contribution, the rest were penned by practitioners of historically based cultural critique. Yet, while no one should judge the greater spectrum of Chicano criticism on the basis of this collection, the essays are generally informative, and a few, like Genaro Padilla's study of New Mexican women's autobiography or Elizabeth J. Ordóñez's on Alma Villanueva's poetry, are essential reading for specialists. Most significantly, the collection displays the talents, interests, and methodology of some of the leading figures of what can be called the second generation of Chicano critics, those who, unlike critics of the first, have had the benefit of Chicano studies courses in their training.

The second book is an example of the maturing of that second generation. Saldívar has been working on Chicano literature since the mid-seventies when his undergraduate focus at Yale combined U. S., Latin American and Chicano literatures, the basis of his comparativist orientation. Yet what defines his approach in The Dialects is the theory of cultural resistance which leads more to contrast than comparison. He structures the ideological question in terms of two opposing visions

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of America. On the one hand is the U. S. mainstream tradition, treated as inherently negative, bourgeois and colonizing; in opposition is the other America consisting of those who have resisted U. S. expansion, like the Cubans José Martí and José Fernández Retamar, who serve him as paradigms for the rest of his analysis. On the basis of this neat opposition, he performs interesting ideological readings of García Márquez, Américo Paredes, Tomás Rivera, Rolando Hinojosa, Gloria Anzaldúa, Ntozake Shange, Arturo Islas, Richard Rodríguez and Ernest Garza.

However, despite a sophisticated display of current critical sources, the interpretations feel somehow dated by a bipolar division of ideological forces into good and evil reminiscent of the cold war years or when siding with the Cuban Revolution was the politically correct position for liberal U. S. intellectuals. Here this position leads to uncritical use of Martí as a patron saint of «indigenous America», without notice, for instance, of Martí's rather patronizing stance with respect to Native Americans; or a privileging of Retamar's writings without historically contextualizing the revolutionary intellectual's own bourgeois origins. In general, the image of Latin America is monolithic and uncritical, focusing only on the leftists' tradition of anti-U. S. writing. Strangely enough, the critic's rhetoric empowers the very writing he wishes to attack by making the U. S. mainstream tradition the source of Latin American thought. He then posits a model for the U. S. examples of Latin Americanized writing to which he dedicates most of his book.

Most telling is the underlying irony of a Chicano text, a hybrid product of on-going cultural fusion, arguing in such clear-cut binary terms. The irony surfaces openly in the «Afterword» when Saldívar focuses on two performance artists, Guillermo Gómez-Peña and Rubén Blades -and a startling thing happens. The author admits that this kind of cultural production, arising from a fluid border existence which he has attributed to Chicano writers and even to his own critical position, no longer fits within the oppositional structure he has used throughout the text. Their work «decenters» traditional concepts of criticism, which then forces the author to question his own position and project leading him to a striking statement in the very last paragraph. «In light of such decentering, to "theorize" becomes a newly problematic activity, for theory is now written not from a condition of critical "distance", but rather from a place of hybridity and «betweenness» in our global Borderlands composed of historically connected postcolonial spaces» (153). Theorizing is, however, always problematic and much more so in our present condition of multiple and mass competition for critical positioning, that is, unless one brackets the field into unproblematic units through the imposition of some abstract formula or ideology extraneous to the material studied, principles which resolve problems a priori. However, from the position of the last paragraph it becomes impossible to speak of our and their Americas, thus placing the entire text into an idealized space outside the reality of the historical period in which it appears. We must admire Saldívar's courage to undermine his own project with this last, postmodern admission, but one wonders what kind of text he would have written had he begun from this discovery instead of ending with it.

Both books are necessary reading for anyone who intends to keep abreast of developing Chicano critical thought.

Juan Bruce-Novoa
University of California Irvine

Este libro constituye el tercer tomo de otros dos ya publicados por los autores en la misma editorial. El lector necesita tener a mano ambos tomos, debido a las referencias que se hacen a menudo en este nuevo volumen.

Cultura Afrocubana 3 consta de una nota preliminar en la que se anticipa un cuarto y último volumen que promete abarcar la influencia del negro en las letras, la música y las artes plásticas de Cuba, cuatro capítulos, fuentes, una valiosa bibliografía, un glosario que identifica los vocablos de origen lucumí, congo y abakúa (ñáñigo) y un apéndice con «Gráficos Congos» por Lydia Cabrera, casi todos inéditos y dibujados por la propia escritora cubana bajo la supervisión de sus informantes.

El primer capítulo se ocupa de la Regla de Ocha, la religión lucumí conocida en Cuba como santería, de origen yoruba. Los autores discuten detalladamente el panteón lucumí con sus principales deidades (Obatalá, Eleguá, Ogún, Ochosi, Orunmila u Orula, Changó, Oyá, Oba, Ochúb, Yemayá, Babalú-Ayé y otras orichas). A continuación, se discute la mitología (patakies o appatakis), el sacerdocio y ritual y los ritos adivinatorios.

En el segundo se examinan las características generales de las Reglas Congas: La Regla de Palo

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Monte o Mayombé, sus dioses, su magia y rito y la mitología conga llamada kutuguango. Se dedica un acápite especial a la Regla Kimbisa del Santo Cristo del Buen Viaje, organización sincrética fundada a finales del siglo diecinueve por André Petit, y que contiene elementos de fuentes tan diversas como el catolicismo, las religiones yorubas, el espiritismo y la masonería.

El tercero cubre la Sociedad Secreta Abakuá de origen carabalí. Los autores estudian las raíces y los antecedentes históricos de los ñáñigos cubanos, seguido de los dignatarios de la potencia y los ritos. Se incluye en el capítulo dos apartados: uno sobre el sincretismo religioso cubano y otros sobre las dimensiones de lo sagrado en la cosmovisión afrocubana, basado en el neologismo hierofanía, acuñado por Mircea Eliade.

La última selección de la obra se dedica al aspecto lingüístico de la cultura afrocubana y la importancia del Cabildo en la preservación de la misma. El análisis enfoca las tres lenguas afrocubanas: la lucumí o anagó usada en los ritos de la Regla de Ochoa, la abakuá empleada por la Sociedad Secreta y la conga de procedencia bantú. Los ejemplos utilizados sirven para ilustrar el grado de semejanzas y diferencias léxicas entre estas lenguas, y provienen de Anagó: Vocabulario lucumí de Lydia Cabrera y Vocabulary and Dictionary of the Yoruba Language del Obispo Samuel Crowther. Se discute también otro código conocido en Cuba por el nombre de habla bozal, lenguaje pidginizado y más tarde adaptado al criollismo por los esclavos en la Isla, Puerto Rico, Panamá y otras colonias españolas en América. El capítulo termina con una explicación detallada de la influencia del bozal y de las lenguas africanas en el habla popular cubana.

El libro está bien estructurado y ampliamente documentado. Contiene relatos de los informantes, anécdotas y comentarios recogidos por expertos en la materia como Lydia Cabrera, Mercedes Sandoval, Julio Sánchez, Fernando Ortiz y la tesis de grado inédita de Guillermo Calleja Leal, entre otros.

Dada la originalidad y seriedad del estudio, es de esperar que adquiera la difusión que se merece. El texto, uno de los más completos sobre la cultura afrocubana hasta la fecha, es fuente indispensable para los eruditos de la materia. El estilo en que está escrito permite que otros lectores menos especializados puedan aprovecharlo como medio de investigación y documentación. Se puede recomendar como libro de consulta para cualquier curso subgraduado o graduado que trate el tema afrocubano.

Luis A. Jiménez
Florida Southern College

El libro de Octavio Costa constituye una apreciación histórica erudita, aunque sin bibliografía ni notas al pie de página, relacionada con la aportación de España en las Indias que cubre temas políticos, religiosos, de organización colonial, entre otros, y en la que se informan datos pertinentes a las culturas amerindias. Sobre esto último se aplaude su suplantación por la de los europeos. Asume Costa una postura que tiende a ensalzar el lado positivo de los españoles en sus hazañas de conquista en América en contraposición a cómo se ha ilustrado en historias afines al tema. Aunque Costa asegura su adhesión a la imparcialidad, lo cierto es que se muestra muy a favor de la ideología de los conquistadores.

Es por ello que defiende la «lengua de Castilla y la religión de Cristo». Arguye que el castellano «desplazó el infinito repertorio de dialectos» indígenas y que «abolió el idólatra paganismo que se practicaba con implicaciones criminales» (277). Por otra parte, sobre estos puntos mencionados, y otros omitidos en esta reseña, se puede alegar que todavía viven muchas de esas lenguas, y que los académicos las aprenden, las estudian y las enseñan en universidades y además, que por la religión de Cristo se actuó en las Indias, en muchas circunstancias, sin misericordia. Recordemos las actuaciones inquisitoriales del fraile Francisco de Ávila en el siglo XVII contra los descendientes de Inti.

Alega asimismo Costa que la riqueza cultural, legal y económica que los españoles implantaron en América era muy superior a la de los amerindios. Es claro que hubo notables aportaciones, sin embargo criticamos el que se obvien los testimonios indígenas que cuestionan lo anterior. A modo de ejemplo, sirve el cronista andino Guamán Poma de Ayala. Para este asunto son fundamentales los trabajos de Rolena Adorno. Resiente Costa que se acuse a los españoles de un «criminal genocidio» en América; de otro lado, defiende que «fueron los indios los que ante la presencia de gente extraña lanzaron sus flechas» (274). Costa no alude a las narraciones colombinas que

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relatan la cordialidad de los nativos en su encuentro con Cristóbal Colón en el ya imborrable 12 de octubre ni a la hecatombe humana que propició el requerimiento. Para entender lo grave de estos abusos en América, vale aludir al triste caso de Puerto Rico y de las Antillas en donde antes de que concluyese el siglo XVI la población aborigen había sido prácticamente exterminada.

Contra lo que piensa Costa, rechazo las motivaciones religiosas de Colón a la hora de promover el patrocinio real para su misión exploradora. Manuel Giménez Fernández ha negado este propósito y observa que el tema religioso no se tocó en las Capitulaciones de Santa Fe ni tampoco se preocupó el navegante genovés por auspiciar la compañía de sacerdotes en su primer viaje. En contraposición al espíritu religioso, Richard Konetzke ha puntualizado el carácter económico. Tampoco acepto el que se les atribuya a unos sacerdotes jerónimos y franciscanos (97) la recomendación del traslado de esclavos negros a Indias. Sabemos que fue obra del dominico Bartolomé de Las Casas, hecho sobre el cual el fraile se lamentó siempre.

Pese a muchas de nuestra objeciones a la obra de Costa, hay que insistir en su valor por ofrecer una visión panorámica histórica de España en América. Sirve muy bien para repasar de manera conjunta la realidad americana del siglo XVI. Se debe volver a subrayar que es obra de considerable erudición.

Centrado sólo en un autor en el contexto de las ideas humanistas en España y su proyección en la Nueva España, el libro de Dianne M. Bono consta de cuatro capítulos y una edición comentada del Diálogo de la dignidad del hombre, la cual contiene las añadiduras de Francisco Cervantes de Salazar a la obra del mismo título de Francisco Pérez de Oliva. Hay, además, una bibliografía. Se incluyen noticias biográficas fundamentales sobre Cervantes de Salazar alusivas a sus estudios en Salamanca y a su puesto de enseñanza en la Universidad de Osuna. En particular, Bono resalta su atracción por los estudios clásicos y humanísticos. También la huella de Luis Vives, de quien tradujo Introducción a la sabiduría y de quien adoptó el espíritu social y pedagógico. Añadimos a lo expuesto que Cervantes de Salazar se distingue por haber reforzado el castellano, pero alentando los estudios latinos. El vernáculo garantizaba el contacto con el pueblo. Continúa con estos proyectos en la Nueva España donde llega en 1550. Aquí funge de profesor en la recién fundada universidad, lo que le facilita extender las corrientes humanísticas europeas y españolas. Señala Bono que su Exercitatio induce a pensar en Vives por la educación humanística que Cervantes de Salazar ambiciona para los jóvenes de la Nueva España.

Bono reconoce las expresiones de la literatura renacentista italiana y del arte de la retórica en la literatura española del siglo XVI y diferencia el humanismo europeo del español. Valoriza la reorientación filosófica que alienta Cisneros con repercusiones en Cervantes de Salazar. La Universidad de Alcalá de Henares, fundada por el cardenal, pasa a ser un centro del estudio de la Biblia identificado con la reforma religiosa y las humanidades.

En México, se distingue Cervantes de Salazar por haber diseminado la filosofía de Vives y por su énfasis en la pedagogía. El que fuese funcionario del virrey agilizó el que sus fórmulas pedagógicas obtuvieran aprobación oficial. Es debido a su contribución que el humanismo mexicano adquiere matices profundos con tonos morales y filosóficos y en el que asume valor la trascendencia del individuo.

Con referencia a la enseñanza de la retórica, sus diálogos son los primeros textos empleados en la Nueva España que ayudaron al trasplante de la cultura española al Nuevo Mundo. Pero pese a su educación europea, simpatizó con la cultura amerindia. Más aún, tanto el Viejo como el Nuevo Mundo participan en sus cursos académicos. No sorprende que México se convierta en tema literario. Describe la capital de este virreinato y le atribuye su esplendor y sabiduría a Hernán Cortés. Sugiere la noción renacentista de la planificación urbana.

En cuanto a recursos, temas e innovaciones de Cervantes de Salazar, Bono enriquece su edición con una breve pero fuerte sinopsis literaria del diálogo. Estipula que el mismo conecta el desarrollo literario de la península italiana en los siglos XIV y XV con el de España del siglo XVI gracias a que la geografía y la vida política y religiosa alientan el intercambio literario y filosófico entre ambos países. Es por esto que Cervantes de Salazar se familiarizó con el diálogo italiano en latín y el vernáculo. En efecto, la aportación literaria y filosófica de Cervantes de Salazar de mayor impacto ocurre en la forma dialogada cultivada en latín y castellano. Pero también había diferencias entre el diálogo español y el producido en la Nueva España. Considera Bono que el escrito en el virreinato se realizaba en español. Asimismo, asevera que el de la metrópoli era pedante; el del virreinato mexicano, pragmático. Prosigue apuntando Bono que a pesar de que su Diálogo representa una pieza valiosa de enseñanza ética tradicional, los diálogos que

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más interesan son los didácticos con carácter pedagógico.

Observa Bono que los diálogos de Cervantes de Salazar plantean temas claves típicos de base moral, religiosa y social del Renacimiento español. El autor propugna el nuevo espíritu crítico del Renacimiento en cuanto a la libertad de confrontar problemas morales tradicionales y religiosos, y su examen de preguntas filosóficas. Agrega Bono que con Cervantes de Salazar la dignidad humana se pone en práctica con un ideal humanístico cívico.

La importancia que concede Bono a Cervantes de Salazar la induce a refutar a Francisco Rico, quien cuestiona los méritos del Diálogo. Indudablemente, hay que aplaudir el acceso de Dianne M. Bono a la obra de Cervantes de Salazar por facilitarnos observar más de cerca las particularidades del humanismo mexicano en el siglo XVI y su desarrollo en el virreinato.

William Mejías López
University of New Hampshire

Latin America and the Caribbean is the result of years of collaboration among librarians and other scholars to compile a complete interdisciplinary guide to Latin American Studies. Much of the credit for this effort goes to the editor, Paula Covington and her professional organization, (SALALM) Seminar on the Acquisition of Latin American Library Materials.

This reference has 5,924 annotated entries describing the major reference sources of all of the Latin American countries including former possessions of England and Holland. Arranged by subject areas, the entries fit into fifteen chapters: general, anthropology, art and architecture, databases, economics, education, geography, history, literature, performing arts (dance, film, music and theater), philosophy, politics, religion, sociology, and women's studies. Noted specialists have written introductory essays establishing the major contours of each field for the past twenty-five years; major bibliographies fist and annotate these key sources. Author, title, and subject indexes plus a detailed table of contents multiply access to all the materials.

A glance at two areas, Spanish American and Brazilian Literature, provides a sampling by which to judge the entire book. Enrique Pupo-Walker, of Vanderbilt University, and Roberto González Echevarría, of Yale University, composed the thirteen-page introductory essay to Spanish American Literature. In concentrating on literature since 1970, these two scholars profile the field with a thoroughness satisfying both to experts and to beginners. Hensley C. Woodbridge, the doyen of Spanish American bibliographers, again evidences his expertise in the entries that cover this diverse field: linguistics, first by general reference books and then by country; literature, first through its numerous reference forms, then by geography and genre, e. g., Chile-Novels. While K. David Jackson, of the University of Texas, Austin, introduces Brazilian Literature in a preliminary essay, the Brazilianist and noted bibliographer, Lawrence Hallewell, of the University of Minnesota, selected and annotated the materials for literature and linguistics of this country.

There is no separate section and essay for linguistics, although it is included for both Spanish America and Brazil. In other words, for reasons undoubtedly related to space, this subject matter, in spite of receiving individual attention to the Handbook of Latin American Studies since 1966, is divided between two separate if cognate disciplines, literature and anthropology. The editors fist all the references to linguistics in the index under that label or under «Portuguese Language» or «Spanish Language».

The most obvious comparison for Latin America and the Caribbean is the standard Sheehy's Guide to Reference Books (American Library Association, 1986). And although the present volume compares well both in the humanities as well as the social sciences, it has almost nothing on applied arts or the sciences. Like every good reference book, Latin America and the Caribbean has the extrinsic value of describing the state of a field. Clearly the sciences in Latin America (even ecology) do not command world attention. The applied arts have not as yet deserved scholarly focus. The absence of these fields represents a reality, not interpretation or selection.

In an effort to categorize neatly, perhaps the compilers have inadvertently overlooked some highly useful if not always credentialed fields that could perhaps be comfortably labeled «Miscellanea»: bullfighting, literary awards, cookbooks, holidays and fiestas, gazetteers, medicinal herbs, national anthems and postage stamps. These popular items probably appear indirectly within the references listed in the included categories.

The editors are to be commended, however, for the new fields meriting attention: Women's Studies

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has an essay and 315 entries. Although dispersed throughout the text; Blacks and Indians are not neglected, e. g., six bibliographies on Black authors appear under Spanish American Literature. Databases, a small section with seven entries on the Humanities, reflects the growing technology of Latin American Studies. Film, under performing arts, receives due space. Finally, each section fists «Resources», such as library collections especially strong in the focused field.

Unequalled in Latin American reference books to date, the present work is a landmark of information and coordination. Surely anyone can quibble with the criteria for excluding or privileging certain fields. In this case, the compilers have satisfied mainly academia but in so doing they accommodate other clienteles as well. Editor Covington and the forty-nine contributors deserve congratulations.

Richard D. Woods

We are all aware that Simón Bolívar's military exploits and Andrés Bello's intellectual vitality combined to help free America from the shackles of political and cultural domination by Spain. Yet the two great leaders could not have been further apart ideologically, and the legendary alliance we have come to associate with their names becomes shattered when we examine the manuscripts of Bello's unfinished poem América. This is the thesis around which Antonio Cussen has constructed a fascinating account of the Revolution from Bello's perspective as a statesman and writer who sought to reconcile his faith in the Augustan model of power and his desire for po