Hildebrando Fuentes’s Peruvian Amazon: National Integration and Capital in the Jungle

Abstract

In this essay Cardemil-Krauze reconstructs the life and writings of Peruvian politician Hildebrando Fuentes during and after his tenure as mayor (Prefecto) of Iquitos, the most important Amazonian riverine port in Peru. Fuentes’ rarely studied memoirs, Iquitos: Apuntes geográficos (1908) are explored here, exposing the sordid years of the Rubber Boom from the perspective of one of the members of the city’s governing elite. Written contemporaneously with Euclides’ texts, Iquitos attests to Peru’s nationalizing plans for the Amazonian region and its indigenous population. Cardemil-Krauze’s analysis portrays the painful and oftentimes contradictory impulses Fuentes navigates as he tries to negotiate Loretano regionalism (Loreto is an Amazonian department of Peru) with Lima’s centralism, while simultaneously attempting to create a viable state presence in Iquitos.