Argentinian Children's Literature and Independent Publishing Houses: Emerging Forms in the Re-editions of María Teresa Andruetto's Poems

Abstract

This article addresses the relationship between children's literature and the ecosystem of independent publishing houses in Argentina. The first part of the article focuses on describing the editorial operations carried out by independent Argentinian publishers and, by virtue of the examination of their editorial practices, it is argued that their interventions (i.e., their re-editings of literary works) seek to introduce both textual and material innovations to Argentina's editorial landscape. It is also argued that the emergence of these editorial practices manages to resignify literary textualities and book materialities, as well as reading practices. The second half of the article offers an analysis of two works by María Teresa Andruetto that have been re-edited by independent presses in Argentina: Peras and Poesía a la carta. Both re-editions are analysed in view of their editorial kinship to their corresponding collections and catalogues. The analysis of these works (re-edited in picturebook and playbook formats, respectively) illuminates and acknowledges the existence of editorial gestures that, in their mediations/modulations of the canon, strive to challenge age boundaries and intended readerships, as well as conventions on literary genres and their materialities. Ultimately, these features profile the re-editions of Peras and Poesía a la carta as disruptive literary artefacts, insofar as they manage to challenge aesthetic and editorial orthodoxies.