Surrealism in Latin American Literature Searching for Breton's Ghost [Hardcover]

Charting surrealism in Latin American literature from its initial appearance in Argentina in 1928 to the surrealist-inspired work of several writers in the 1970s, Melanie Nicholson argues that surrealism has exercised a significant and positive influence over twentieth-century Latin American literature, particularly poetry.PART I: CONTEXTS AND CONTOURS Surrealism is Dead: ?Viva el surrealismo! The Latin American Connection PART II: THE EMERGENCE OF SURREALISM IN LATIN AMERICAN LITERATURE, 1928-1950 Initiations: Aldo Pellegrini and the First Surrealist Group in Argentina Neruda and Anti-Neruda, or the Case of Chile's Mandr?gora Poets Peru: The Surrealist Space between Mari?tegui and Vallejo The Two Faces of Early Surrealism in Mexico PART III: A SURREALISM OF ONE'S OWN, 1950-1980 The Argentine Surrealist Journals 'Another Ship Must Be Launched': Surrealism in Argentine Poetry, 1950-1970 Chile: The Avatars and the Antagonists of Mandr?gora Octavio Paz, Surrealism's Favorite Son

Nicholson offers an excellent, very useful work that traces a line of surrealist and surrealist-inspired texts in Latin America from 1928 to 1980. Scholarly studies exist of surrealism across various countries, or of poetry or painting alone in a single country (e.g., Argentina, Mexico). But few (perhaps none) have tried to analyze succinctly in a short work so many decades, countries, and genres. - CHOICE

Melanie Nicholson is an Associate Professor of Spanish at Bard College, USA.