I'm the one that wrote the piece on Latin American literature you've referenced. Key in understanding magical realism is that it was an August tradition, even at the time it gained ascendency. It exists in the midst of several discourses including natural history (Von Humbolt), social political tracts (Sarmiento), and, of course, the budding (then) Latin American boom. What Marquez did, then, was to provide a Latin American representative voice before an historical panorama, which came, of course, from his family's small town. This is represented in Macondo.
Corresponding with this (then) new perspective was an understanding of cultural blending or Latino "mestizaje." This is also a very lengthy tradition that goes back to the Spritual Conquest and even Bernal Diaz de Castillo's account of Gonzalo Guerrero's taking an indigenous wife and refusing to return to Spanish colonization. This account is provided in Diaz de Castillo in his mammoth "The true history of the conquest of New Spain."
Key in this represenation is the idea that a new culture had emerged that contained indigenous and European influences. Garcia Marquez's attempts at representation concur and echo other imporant attempts at a Latino representation of historical panorama's such as Diego Rivera's murals, David Siquiero's art, and historians writings such as Picon Salas's De la conquista a la independencia.
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I'm the one that wrote the piece on Latin American literature you've referenced. Key in understanding magical realism is that it was an August tradition, even at the time it gained ascendency. It exists in the midst of several discourses including natural history (Von Humbolt), social political tracts (Sarmiento), and, of course, the budding (then) Latin American boom. What Marquez did, then, was to provide a Latin American representative voice before an historical panorama, which came, of course, from his family's small town. This is represented in Macondo.
Corresponding with this (then) new perspective was an understanding of cultural blending or Latino "mestizaje." This is also a very lengthy tradition that goes back to the Spritual Conquest and even Bernal Diaz de Castillo's account of Gonzalo Guerrero's taking an indigenous wife and refusing to return to Spanish colonization. This account is provided in Diaz de Castillo in his mammoth "The true history of the conquest of New Spain."
Key in this represenation is the idea that a new culture had emerged that contained indigenous and European influences. Garcia Marquez's attempts at representation concur and echo other imporant attempts at a Latino representation of historical panorama's such as Diego Rivera's murals, David Siquiero's art, and historians writings such as Picon Salas's De la conquista a la independencia.
Interested in taking up this discussion.
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