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Violence in Argentine Literature: Cultural Responses to Tyranny. by David William FosterReview by: Marjorie AgosínThe Hispanic American Historical Review, Vol. 77, No. 2 (May, 1997), pp. 357-358Published by: Duke University Press

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BOOK REVIEWS I NATIONAL PERIOD 357

have in such results. Indeed, Ranis downplays the consequences of sampling error

forhis studyin anunconvincingfashion.Nevertheless,hisworkis an importantpoint

of departurefor more systematic, methodologicallyand theoretically grounded re-search on workers'attitudes and behavior,not only in Argentinabut also in the rest

of Latin America.

LUIGI MANZETTI, Southern Methodist University

Violence n ArgentineLiterature:CulturalResponses o Tyranny.By DAVID WILLIAM

FOSTER. Columbia: University of Missouri Press, 1995. Notes. Bibliography. ndex.

viii, 2o8 pp. Cloth. $37.50.

During the military dictatorshipsthat besieged the countries of the Southern Cone

in the 1970s, the Argentine literature of dissent became a way to survive life under

tyranny.The so-called Dirty War,with its litany of fierce authoritarianismdisguised

as "familyvalues," became almost a national obsession for Argentine writers. The

few citizens who defied literary censorship found salvationin reading amid chaos

and horror.Many scholars, literary critics, and historiansengaged in the painstaking

analysisof political repression, creativity under adversity,and the roles of citizens in

times of historical turbulence.

This book, by a distinguished scholar, is for this reviewer the most original and

thought-provoking ext to explore how "the violent" has always been a mysterious

andperverse constantin Argentina's ich literature.Often the concepts of redemoc-

ratization and democratic culture have obscured the previous political history of

Argentina,which consisted of tyrannyand fear in daily life since the Peronera. This

is among the many reasons Foster's work is important.Its eloquent text revisits and

exploresthe works of Enrique Medina, MartaLynch, GriseldaGambaro,Alejandra

Pizarnik, and many others. His analysis of each of these authors focuses on some

key aspect of their literary work, as well as the historical and political events that

overshadowedtheir writings.

One of the most fascinating chapters exploresPizarnik'sworld througha bizarre

and often neglected prose collection, La condesasangrienta (The Bloody Countess,

1971), a series of vignettes based on the real life of Erzbeth Bathory (d. 1614), who

would massacre young virgins and bathe in their blood. Througha brilliantanalysis

of Pizarnik'scomplete work, Foster illuminates the complex and arbitraryways of

absolute power. This particularwork he interprets as a meditation on horror. The

diabolical countess randomlykills six hundred women for the mere pleasure of it.

An obviousparallelcan be drawn with the random and perverse killingsof innocent

Argentinecitizens. Accordingto Foster, "thebloody countess embodies masculinist

violence, the rape of the other. In her activities as a rapist, she is a symbol both ofthe absolutepower of the aristocratsand her own historicalperiod (she is saved from

execution)" (p. 103). The pardoning of the countess despite her crimes resembles

the pardoningof the Argentine militaryfor the murderof almost 30,000 people.








358 | HAHR I MAY

Foster's meditation on Pizarnik'swork, as well as Marta Lynch's Informe bajo

Ilave (ReportUnder Lock and Key, 1983) and the plays of Griselda Gambaro,bring

to this book the important aspect of how women writers have responded to mili-tarism. I am glad that much of this text applies a feminist analysis to totalitarian

culture and brings the voice of often neglected authors such as Lynch to readers.

Informe bajo Ilave also exemplifies how repressive societies murder the individual

spirit, which is the fate of its protagonist. This important novel, which Foster notes

was written before Lynch'ssuicide, depicts the existential fate of a woman besieged

by her time and place.

The book's other chapters explore the relationshipsbetween culture and power

and official versus unofficial histories. The inclusion of texts that foreshadowed the

years of the militarydictatorshipmakes an importantcontribution to the literaryandhistorical understanding of the violence that permeated Argentine culture. Foster's

analysisof how writers and ordinarycitizens alike have survivedbeyond fear under

the darknessof absolute power makes this a major work on violence in Argentine

literature. It is a beautifully written and thought-provokingmeditation on violence

and the endangered spiritof creativity.

MARJORIE AGOSIN, Wellesley College

Moral Opposition to AuthoritarianRule in Chile, 1973-z9go. By PAMELA LOWDEN.

New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996. Appendixes. Notes. Bibliography.Index. xii,

216 pp. Cloth. $59.95.

The military dictatorshipsthat ruled in the Southern Cone of SouthAmerica in the

1970S and 1980s had many features in common: national security doctrine, torture,

the "disappeared," nd the near-destruction of civil society. The regime similarities

in Chile, Argentina, and Uruguaywere great, but there was one glaringexception-

the role of the Catholic church in Chile in documenting and bearing witness to

human rights violations. Pamela Lowden'sstudy focuses on the Vicariateof Solidarity

(referred to both in and outside Chile as the Vicaria) in the struggle against Pino-chet's bloody regime. Her work is an important contribution to our understanding

of the singularrole played by this institutionin the struggle to protect human rights

in Chile and to create an organized opposition to the regime. It is not difficult to

agree with the author'sassessment that "the Vicarla's ontribution to the opposition

to authoritarianism n Chile was unique, critical, and irreplaceable" p. 144).

The Vicariacarried out its work in an old ecclesiastical palace on Santiago'sPlaza

de Armas. The work consisted primarilyof documenting cases of the disappeared,

allegationsof torture,and other human rights abuses and presenting writs of habeas

corpus. As establishedby CardinalRaul SilvaHenriquez, the Vicariawas thereby inthe delicate but unassailable position of representing "the Catholic Church in the

Archdiocese of Santiago in the field of human rights" (p. 5). Some two hundred

people worked for the organization,with an annual budget of two million dollars.






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