Myth and Archive A Theory of Latin American Narrative [Paperback]

This book offers a theory about the origin and evolution of the Latin American narrative, and about the emergence of the modern novel.This book offers a theory about the origin and evolution of the Latin American narrative, and about the emergence of the modern novel. The book contains readings of major works in the tradition such as Garcilaso el Inca's Comentarios reales, Sarmiento's Facundo, Carpentier's Los pasos perdidos and Garcia Marquez's Cien anos de Soledad.This book offers a theory about the origin and evolution of the Latin American narrative, and about the emergence of the modern novel. The book contains readings of major works in the tradition such as Garcilaso el Inca's Comentarios reales, Sarmiento's Facundo, Carpentier's Los pasos perdidos and Garcia Marquez's Cien anos de Soledad.Myth and Archive offers a new theory about the origin and evolution of the Latin American narrative, and about the emergence of the modern novel. Instead of following the traditional categories set up by literary history, Professor González Echevarría explores the relationship of the narrative to the language of authority: the law in the colonial period, science in the nineteenth century, and anthropology in the twentieth century. The book contains readings of major works in the tradition such as Garcilaso el Inca's Comentarios reales, Sarmiento's Facundo, Carpentier's Los pasos perdidos, and García Marquez's Cien años de soledad.Acknowledgements; Preface; 1. A clearing in the jungle: from Santa Monica to Macondo; 2. The law of the letter: Garcilaso's Comentarios; 3. A lost world re-discovered: Sarmiento's Facundo and E. da Cunha's Os Sertoes; 4. The novel as myth and archive: ruins and relics of TI?n; Notes; Bibliography; Index. ...a book that will have lasting value because it opens new exegetic horizons for the study of Latin-American narrative. Antonio Fama, Canadian Review of Hispanic Studies