Jose Ramon Ruisanchez Serra

A History of Mexican Literature

Francisco Tario lANTOLOGÍA Habrá que conformarse con decir que, como en todos los libros colectivos, tenemos textos –porque muy pocos aspiran a ser ensayos– de dulce, de chile y de manteca, aunque la obra entera responde a la lógica de los estudios culturales y no a la de la historia literaria (ni de la teoría literaria, lo cual a estas alturas es un alivio), de tal forma que el lector canónico y liberal –si lo hay– tendrá que tolerar no un capítulo, sino un gueto dedicado a la literatura escrita por mujeres, otro sobre la escena nacional –donde aparece Cantinflas pero no Juan José Gurrola o Ludwig Margulles–, la ausencia de Poesía en Voz Alta –vaya usted a saber por qué–, una enumeración de la discriminación y de los crímenes cometidos desde el virreinato contra homosexuales y lesbianas –sin que se nos diga con claridad si esas personas, además de su preferencia sexual, escribieron algo más allá de lo testimonial–. (Para lo cual podrían haber leído a Luis Felipe Fabre.) En cuanto a la bisexualidad y sus metamorfosis –quirúrgicas o simbólicas– se rescata, en buena hora pero como si del hilo negro se tratara, a la figura del andrógino (loado sea Amado Nervo) como puntual fantasma entre nosotros (y en el resto de las literaturas, por cierto). Se hace notar la reciente aparición de la literatura mexicana escrita en lenguas indígenas sin que los autores del apartado arriesguen juicios de valor –los cuales podrían ser leídos como “microagresiones”–, conformándose con asegurar que esos colegas están allí y tienen algo que decir. El problema mayor va más allá de los autores de A history of Mexican literature –algunos de los cuales hicieron bien su tarea–, pues se deriva de la contestación anticanónica de la Escuela del Resentimiento, en buena hora denunciada por Bloom. Debe JULI Ignacio M. Sánchez Prado, Anna M. Nogar y José Ramón Ruisánchez Serra (editores) A HISTORY OF MEXICAN LITERATURE Nueva York, Cambridge University Press, 2016, 448 pp. HISTORIA LITERARIA

Early Nineteenth-Century Nation-Building Prose

The era from the eve of independence to the consolidation of Mexicos first federal republic was that of the birth of its newspaper industry, the first Mexican novel, public opinion, and the nation itself. The increase in narrative prose during this era was inseparable from these political strivings as expressed in periodical publications. Certain crucial themes survived independence struggles into nationhood: from before the Napoleonic invasions of 1808, Creole writers were concerned with issues of equality and emancipation, with education and erudition, and relatedly with “exemplification” – projecting their own as equal to European models of civilization. These interests would intensify throughout the early nineteenth century, a period of nation building par excellence. The 1780 publication of Francisco Xavier Clavijeros Historia antigua de Mexico challenged European Enlightenment authors’ “scientific” assertions of the Americas’ inferiority by defending indigenous cultures and explaining American realities using experience as opposed to conjecture. Although Clavijero (1731–1787) did not begin publishing on matters of Creole identity until his 1767 exile to Bologna, he was present in the education of New Spains intellectual elite as an active pedagogue. Indeed, Clavijero and other Jesuit educators such as Jose Rafael Campoy Gastelum (1723–1777), Diego Jose Abad y Garcia (1727–1779), and Francisco Xavier Alegre (1729–1788) shaped an entire generation of Creole youth through their far-reaching pedagogical labors. Creole patriotism, which theorized the existence of a nation-in-waiting in New Spanish territory prior to the arrival of the Spaniards, was characterized by deep interest in pre-Columbian indigenous civilizations and in the study of history to shape or justify nations’ behavior. From the 1780s until the 1820s, a new generation of public intellectuals shaped nascent public opinion and developed protonational sensibilities through sustained diligence in the periodical press. They articulated their interests, molded by the previous generations pedagogical efforts, as those of educating and increasing readership, spreading “useful” knowledge, and promoting progress and civilization. These goals were accomplished through a growing number of publications – communiques, announcements, decrees, laws, maxims, precepts, almanac entries, estimates, letters, sermons, prayers, speeches, dialogues, and fables – issued as pamphlets, broadsheets, and periodicals that were read aloud in town squares, pulquerias (bars), barbershops, and other public spaces.