Retracing Disappearance: Literary Responsibility and the Return of the Far Right: A review of Karen Elizabeth Bishop, The Space of Disappearance: A Narrative Commons in the Ruins of Argentine State Terror

IF 0.2 4区 社会学 0 HUMANITIES, MULTIDISCIPLINARY
Federico Pous
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SUNY Series in Latin American and Iberian Thought and Culture. <p><em>The Space of Disappearance</em> offers a profound reflection on the figure of disappearance as a literary mode of depicting, unraveling, and subverting the modus operandi of political life in Argentina. Through detailed analyses of singular literary works by Rodolfo Walsh, Julio Cortázar, and Tomás Eloy Martínez, Karen Elizabeth Bishop outlines a very suggestive hypothesis that traces a collective literary construction of different modes of disappearance. Following Maurice Blanchot's idea that \"the goal of literature is to disappear,\" Bishop identifies \"dissimulation\" (Walsh), \"doubling and displacement\" (Cortázar), as well as \"suspension\" and an \"embodied superabundant\" (Martínez) as literary modes of disappearance which are, at the same time, \"symptoms and products\" of the disappearance of literature itself. Ultimately, Bishops argues that there is a \"narrative commons\" in which disappearance operates, not only by denouncing the actual systematic killing and disappearance of dead bodies perpetrated by the state during the last dictatorship (1976-83), but also by putting to work an \"ethical commons\" that aims to dismantle, bear witness, and eventually cope with the profound terror generated during that historical period in Argentina. Bishop's interventions touch on multiple angles of the role of literature in the construction of political narratives with clever close-readings, relevant socio-political connections, and dense theoretical reflections that make the book worth reading. From my point of view, her most interesting reflections refer to the tensions between the role of the writer and the political interpellations at the time.</p> <h2>Grounding Disappearance</h2> <p>From a historical perspective, the <em>desaparecidos</em> have become a tragic imprint for recent Argentinean cultural and political history. The systematic production of enforced disappearance carried out during the last military and civic dictatorship included the political persecution of militants and political opponents, who were kidnapped, tortured, and assassinated, followed by the disappearance of their bodies. The proliferation of clandestine centers of detention and extermination (CCDE) was at the center of these repressive practices, leaving a profound wound in Argentinean society. A partial reconstruction of the events carried out by the CONADEP and published first in the book <em>Nunca Más</em> (1985), revealed that there were 340 CCDE, and it was calculated that 30,000 people disappeared at the time. Furthermore, the practice of disappearing bodies after killing political opponents by official repressive forces (or paramilitary groups) can be traced back at least to the beginning of the previous dictatorship (1966). However, the systematization of disappearance as the heart of the repressive system took place in the 1976–83 period, filling the whole society with fear and terror.</p> <p>In this context, grounding disappearance becomes quite paradoxical: on one hand, it requires proper investigation to both unravel and reconstruct the modus operandi of the state and its repressive system; on the other hand, the literary imagination grows in the space of disappearance, as it is an intangible terrain that cannot ultimately be grasped. Walsh's short story, \"Esa mujer\" (1965) about the handling of a woman's dead body is so effective because he doesn't mention who she is, even as the reader assumes she is Eva Perón. In contrast, the effects of Eva Perón's body's journey fulfilling and overflowing the figure of the desaparecidos in Martínez's novel seems to overwhelm the hole left by the real desaparecidos in Argentinean society. Bishop mentions the impossibility of burying Evita's body [in the ground] and its symbolic derivations. In these instances, literature puts to ground, or grounds, these modes of disappearance that cannot otherwise be grasped. By abstention or by excess, each writer appeals to the reader to bear witness and process what is missing. Bishop mentions that her intervention goes along with the <em>allegory of the crypt</em> (Avelar) that pinpoints the impossibility to complete the mourning process, and, of course, with the...</p> </p>","PeriodicalId":55953,"journal":{"name":"POSTMODERN CULTURE","volume":"1 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.2000,"publicationDate":"2024-07-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"POSTMODERN CULTURE","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1353/pmc.2023.a931366","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"社会学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"HUMANITIES, MULTIDISCIPLINARY","Score":null,"Total":0}
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Abstract

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

  • Retracing Disappearance: Literary Responsibility and the Return of the Far RightA review of Karen Elizabeth Bishop, The Space of Disappearance: A Narrative Commons in the Ruins of Argentine State Terror
  • Federico Pous (bio)
Bishop, Karen Elizabeth. The Space of Disappearance: A Narrative Commons in the Ruins of Argentine State Terror. SUNY P, 2020. SUNY Series in Latin American and Iberian Thought and Culture.

The Space of Disappearance offers a profound reflection on the figure of disappearance as a literary mode of depicting, unraveling, and subverting the modus operandi of political life in Argentina. Through detailed analyses of singular literary works by Rodolfo Walsh, Julio Cortázar, and Tomás Eloy Martínez, Karen Elizabeth Bishop outlines a very suggestive hypothesis that traces a collective literary construction of different modes of disappearance. Following Maurice Blanchot's idea that "the goal of literature is to disappear," Bishop identifies "dissimulation" (Walsh), "doubling and displacement" (Cortázar), as well as "suspension" and an "embodied superabundant" (Martínez) as literary modes of disappearance which are, at the same time, "symptoms and products" of the disappearance of literature itself. Ultimately, Bishops argues that there is a "narrative commons" in which disappearance operates, not only by denouncing the actual systematic killing and disappearance of dead bodies perpetrated by the state during the last dictatorship (1976-83), but also by putting to work an "ethical commons" that aims to dismantle, bear witness, and eventually cope with the profound terror generated during that historical period in Argentina. Bishop's interventions touch on multiple angles of the role of literature in the construction of political narratives with clever close-readings, relevant socio-political connections, and dense theoretical reflections that make the book worth reading. From my point of view, her most interesting reflections refer to the tensions between the role of the writer and the political interpellations at the time.

Grounding Disappearance

From a historical perspective, the desaparecidos have become a tragic imprint for recent Argentinean cultural and political history. The systematic production of enforced disappearance carried out during the last military and civic dictatorship included the political persecution of militants and political opponents, who were kidnapped, tortured, and assassinated, followed by the disappearance of their bodies. The proliferation of clandestine centers of detention and extermination (CCDE) was at the center of these repressive practices, leaving a profound wound in Argentinean society. A partial reconstruction of the events carried out by the CONADEP and published first in the book Nunca Más (1985), revealed that there were 340 CCDE, and it was calculated that 30,000 people disappeared at the time. Furthermore, the practice of disappearing bodies after killing political opponents by official repressive forces (or paramilitary groups) can be traced back at least to the beginning of the previous dictatorship (1966). However, the systematization of disappearance as the heart of the repressive system took place in the 1976–83 period, filling the whole society with fear and terror.

In this context, grounding disappearance becomes quite paradoxical: on one hand, it requires proper investigation to both unravel and reconstruct the modus operandi of the state and its repressive system; on the other hand, the literary imagination grows in the space of disappearance, as it is an intangible terrain that cannot ultimately be grasped. Walsh's short story, "Esa mujer" (1965) about the handling of a woman's dead body is so effective because he doesn't mention who she is, even as the reader assumes she is Eva Perón. In contrast, the effects of Eva Perón's body's journey fulfilling and overflowing the figure of the desaparecidos in Martínez's novel seems to overwhelm the hole left by the real desaparecidos in Argentinean society. Bishop mentions the impossibility of burying Evita's body [in the ground] and its symbolic derivations. In these instances, literature puts to ground, or grounds, these modes of disappearance that cannot otherwise be grasped. By abstention or by excess, each writer appeals to the reader to bear witness and process what is missing. Bishop mentions that her intervention goes along with the allegory of the crypt (Avelar) that pinpoints the impossibility to complete the mourning process, and, of course, with the...

追溯失踪:文学责任与极右翼的回归》:对 Karen Elizabeth Bishop《失踪的空间》的评论:阿根廷国家恐怖废墟中的公共叙事
以下是内容的简要摘录,以代替摘要: 追溯失踪:凯伦-伊丽莎白-毕晓普:《失踪的空间》(The Space of Disappearance:阿根廷国家恐怖废墟中的公共叙事 Federico Pous (bio) Bishop, Karen Elizabeth.The Space of Disappearance:阿根廷国家恐怖废墟中的公共叙事》。纽约州立大学出版社,2020 年。纽约州立大学拉丁美洲和伊比利亚思想与文化丛书》。失踪的空间》对作为描绘、揭示和颠覆阿根廷政治生活方式的一种文学模式的失踪形象进行了深刻反思。通过详细分析鲁道夫-沃尔什、胡里奥-科塔萨尔和托马斯-埃洛伊-马丁内斯的独特文学作品,凯伦-伊丽莎白-毕肖普勾勒出一个极具启发性的假设,追溯了不同失踪模式的集体文学构建。莫里斯-布朗肖认为 "文学的目的就是消失",毕肖普根据这一观点,将 "异化"(沃尔什)、"加倍和移位"(科塔萨尔)以及 "悬浮 "和 "体现的超级丰富"(马丁内斯)等文学消失模式视为文学本身消失的 "症状和产物"。最终,毕肖普认为,在失踪问题的 "叙事公地 "中,不仅要谴责国家在上一次独裁统治期间(1976-1983 年)实施的有系统的杀戮和尸体失踪行为,而且还要建立一个 "伦理公地",旨在拆除、见证并最终应对阿根廷在那段历史时期产生的深重恐怖。毕肖普的论述从多个角度探讨了文学在政治叙事建构中的作用,她巧妙的细读、相关的社会政治联系以及缜密的理论思考使本书值得一读。在我看来,她最有趣的思考是作家的角色与当时的政治干预之间的紧张关系。失踪的基础 从历史的角度来看,"失踪者 "已成为阿根廷近代文化史和政治史上的悲剧印记。在上一次军事独裁和公民独裁期间,阿根廷有计划地制造强迫失踪,包括对激进分子和政治反对派进行政治迫害,对他们实施绑架、酷刑和暗杀,然后将他们的尸体运走。这些镇压行为的核心是秘密拘留和灭绝中心(CCDE)的扩散,给阿根廷社会留下了深刻的创伤。国家人权事务委员会对事件进行了部分还原,并在《Nunca Más》(1985 年)一书中首次发表。此外,官方镇压部队(或准军事团体)在杀害政治反对派后失踪尸体的做法至少可以追溯到前独裁统治初期(1966 年)。然而,作为镇压系统核心的失踪系统化发生在 1976-83 年期间,整个社会充满了恐惧和恐怖。在这种情况下,失踪问题的立足点变得相当矛盾:一方面,它需要适当的调查,以揭示和重建国家及其镇压系统的运作方式;另一方面,文学想象力在失踪空间中生长,因为它是一个最终无法把握的无形领域。沃尔什的短篇小说《Esa mujer》(1965 年)讲述了如何处理一具女尸的故事,这篇小说之所以如此有效,是因为他没有提到她是谁,即使读者猜测她就是伊娃-庇隆(Eva Perón)。相比之下,伊娃-贝隆的遗体之旅在马丁内斯的小说中充实并充斥着失踪者的形象,其效果似乎压倒了阿根廷社会中真正的失踪者所留下的空洞。毕晓普提到不可能将艾薇塔的遗体[埋入地下]及其象征意义。在这些例子中,文学将这些以其他方式无法把握的消失模式付诸实践,或将其付诸实践。每一位作家都通过弃权或过度的方式,呼吁读者见证和处理缺失的东西。毕肖普提到,她的介入与地穴的寓言(《阿韦拉尔》)是一致的,后者指出了完成哀悼过程的不可能性,当然,也与......
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来源期刊
POSTMODERN CULTURE
POSTMODERN CULTURE HUMANITIES, MULTIDISCIPLINARY-
CiteScore
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期刊介绍: Founded in 1990 as a groundbreaking experiment in scholarly publishing on the Internet, Postmodern Culture has become a leading electronic journal of interdisciplinary thought on contemporary culture. PMC offers a forum for commentary, criticism, and theory on subjects ranging from identity politics to the economics of information.
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