Miguel Ángel Asturias

From Hispanopedia
Miguel Ángel Asturias
Miguel Ángel Asturias in 1925
Born
Miguel Ángel Asturias Rosales

(1899-10-19)October 19, 1899
Guatemala City, Guatemala
DiedJune 9, 1974(1974-06-09) (aged 74)
Madrid, Spain
Alma materSchool of Law of the University of San Carlos of Guatemala
OccupationsWriter, diplomat, poet, novelist
Spouse(s)Clemencia Amado
Blanca Mora y Araujo
ChildrenRodrigo Asturias Amado,
Miguel Ángel Asturias Amado
Writing career
GenreMagic realism
Notable awardsNobel Prize Nobel Prize in Literature (1967)
Lenin Peace Prize (1965)
Movement
Generation of '20

Miguel Ángel Asturias Rosales (Guatemala City, October 19, 1899 – Madrid, June 9, 1974) was a Guatemalan writer, journalist and diplomat who contributed to the development of Hispanic American literature, influenced Western culture and, at the same time, drew attention to the importance of indigenous cultures, especially those of his native country, Guatemala.

Although Asturias was born and raised in Guatemala, he lived a significant part of his adult life abroad.[1] During his first stay in Paris, in the 1920s, he studied anthropology and indigenous mythology.[2] Some scholars consider him the first Hispanic American novelist to show how the study of anthropology and linguistics could influence literature.[3][4] In Paris, Asturias also became associated with the surrealist movement. He is credited with introducing many features of the modernist style into Hispanic American letters.[5]

In El señor presidente, one of his most famous novels, Asturias describes life under the dictatorship of Manuel Estrada Cabrera, who ruled Guatemala between 1898 and 1920. His public opposition led him into exile, so he had to spend much of his life abroad, above all in South America and Europe. The novel Hombres de maíz, which is sometimes considered his masterpiece, is a defense of Maya culture. Asturias synthesizes his broad knowledge of Maya beliefs with his political convictions in order to channel both toward a life of commitment and solidarity.[6] His work is often identified with the social and moral aspirations of the Guatemalan population.[7]

After decades of exile and marginalization, Asturias finally gained wide recognition in the 1960s. In 1965 he won the Lenin Peace Prize of the Soviet Union. Then, in 1967, he received the Nobel Prize in Literature, thus becoming the second Hispanic American author to receive this honor, after Gabriela Mistral in 1945.

Asturias spent his last years in Madrid (Spain), where he died at the age of 74. He was buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.

Biography

Family and formative period

He was born in Guatemala City on October 19, 1899, the first son of Ernesto Asturias Girón, a lawyer and judge, and María Rosales de Asturias, a schoolteacher.[8] His brother Marco Antonio was born two years later. Asturias's parents were of Spanish descent and relatively distinguished: his father could trace his family line back to the settlers who had arrived in Guatemala in the 1660s; his mother, of more diffuse ancestry, was the daughter of a Colonel. In 1905, when Asturias was six years old, the family moved to his grandparents' house, where they lived a more comfortable lifestyle.[9]

Despite his relatively privileged position, Asturias's father opposed the dictatorship of President Manuel Estrada Cabrera, who had come to power in February 1898. As Asturias later recalled: "My parents were rather persecuted, but they were not conspirators or anything of the sort."[10] After an incident in 1904, in which Asturias's father, in his capacity as a judge, released some students who had been arrested for causing disturbances, he clashed directly with the dictator and lost his job.

In 1905, the family was forced to move to the town of Salamá, the departmental seat of Baja Verapaz, where Miguel Ángel Asturias lived on his grandparents' farm.[8][11] It was here that Asturias first came into contact with the indigenous population of Guatemala[11] through his nanny, Lola Reyes, a young indigenous woman who told him stories, myths and legends of her culture, which would later have a great influence on his works.[12]

In 1908, when Asturias was nine years old, he returned with his family to the outskirts of Guatemala City. They set up a supply store in the neighborhood of La Parroquia Vieja, where he spent his adolescence.[11][13] Asturias attended the Colegio del Padre Pedro and then the Colegio del Padre Solís;[13] as a student he began to write and produced the first draft of a story that would later become the novel El señor presidente.[14] Finally, he obtained his baccalaureate in Sciences and Letters at the Instituto Nacional Central para Varones.[11][15]

In 1922, together with other students, he founded the Popular University of Guatemala,[16] a community project whereby "the middle class is encouraged to contribute to the general welfare by teaching free courses for the most disadvantaged."[8]

He spent a year studying medicine before moving to the School of Law and Notarial Studies of the National University.[lower-alpha 1][17] He obtained his law degree in 1923 and received the Gálvez Prize for his thesis on the problems of the indigenous people.[8] He also received the Falla Prize for being the best student of his faculty. It was at the National University that he founded the Association of University Students and the El Derecho Students' Association, in addition to taking an active part in La Tribuna of the Unionist Party.[18] This last group was the one that ultimately overthrew the dictatorship of Manuel Estrada Cabrera in 1920.[18] With regard to his literary work, Asturias's participation in all these organizations influenced many of the scenes in the novels El Señor Presidente[18] and Viernes de Dolores.[15]

Asturias became involved in politics working as a representative of the General Association of University Students, and he traveled to El Salvador and Honduras for his new job. In 1920, while at the Instituto Nacional Central para Varones, he took part in the uprising against Manuel Estrada Cabrera, organizing strikes.[19] Asturias and his classmates formed what is now known as "the Generation of '20."[20]

Asturias's university thesis, "El problema social del indio" ("The Social Problem of the Indian"), was published in 1923.[21][22][23] In 1923, after receiving his law degree, he traveled to Europe. In Paris he studied ethnology at the Sorbonne —the University of Paris—[17] and became a dedicated surrealist under the influence of the French poet and literary theorist André Breton.[24] In Paris he was also influenced by the circle of writers and artists of Montparnasse and began to write poetry and fiction. During this time he developed a deep concern for Maya culture, and in 1925 he began the translation into Spanish of the Popol Vuh, the sacred text of the Maya, a project to which he devoted himself for forty years.[25]

Miguel Ángel Asturias also founded the magazine Nuevos Tiempos while he was in Paris,[26] where he remained for ten years.

In 1930 he published his first book, Leyendas de Guatemala.[27] Two years later, in Paris, Asturias received the Sylla Monsegur Prize for the French translation of Leyendas de Guatemala,[28] and on July 14, 1933, he returned to Guatemala.

Political career

Miguel Ángel Asturias in front of the Western Wall in Israel.
Miguel Ángel Asturias in his time as a university student.

When Asturias returned to his native country in 1933, he had his first encounter with the dictator Jorge Ubico and his regime, which was not going to tolerate his political ideals. Ubico closed the Popular University that Asturias had founded in 1922.[27] In 1933 Asturias worked as a journalist. He founded and edited a radio "magazine" called El diario del aire.[24] He wrote several volumes of poetry at this time, Sonetos being the first, published in 1936.[24]

In 1942, he was elected deputy to the National Congress.[29] After the fall of the regime of Jorge Ubico and the election of the reformist President Juan José Arévalo in 1944, Asturias began a diplomatic career in 1946, continuing to write during his service in several countries of Central America and South America. Asturias held diplomatic posts in Buenos Aires in 1947 and in Paris in 1952.[30]

Family

Miguel Ángel Asturias married Clemencia Amado (1915–1979) in 1939. They had two sons, Miguel Ángel and Rodrigo. They divorced in 1947. Asturias married for the second time, to Blanca Mora y Araujo, in 1950.[31] Since Mora y Araujo was Argentine, when Asturias was expatriated from Guatemala in 1954, they went to live in Buenos Aires, where they remained for eight years. Asturias dedicated his work Week-end en Guatemala to his wife, Blanca, after its publication in 1956.[27] They remained married until Asturias's death in 1974.

Rodrigo Asturias Amado, son of his first marriage, was a guerrilla commander of the ORPA and a member of the Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unity (URNG). Rodrigo Asturias adopted the nom de guerre Gaspar Ilom, the name of an indigenous rebel in Hombres de maíz, his father's novel. The URNG was a guerrilla organization that opposed the military governments of the 1980s during the Guatemalan Civil War. After the signing of the peace accords in 1996, the URNG became a political party.[32]

Exile and rehabilitation

Tomb of Miguel Ángel Asturias in Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris, France, crowned with a replica of Stela 14 of Ceibal.

Miguel Ángel Asturias devoted much of his political energy to supporting the government of Jacobo Arbenz, the elected successor of President Juan José Arévalo.[33] After the fall of the government of Jacobo Arbenz, the new ruler, Colonel Carlos Castillo Armas, ordered that Asturias be stripped of his Guatemalan nationality and expelled from the country for his support of the previous government. For the next eight years Asturias lived in exile in Buenos Aires and Chile. After a change of government in Argentina, he once again had to look for a new home and moved to Europe.[34] During his stay in Genoa his reputation as an author grew with the publication of his novel Mulata de tal (1963).[35]

In 1966 the elected President Julio César Méndez Montenegro came to power in Guatemala and rehabilitated Asturias: his Guatemalan citizenship was restored to him and he was appointed ambassador to France, a post he held until 1970, taking up permanent residence in Paris.[36] In 1967 the English translation of Mulata de tal was published in Boston,[27] and Asturias was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature "For his vivid literary achievements, strongly rooted in the national traits and traditions of the indigenous peoples of Latin America."[37]

Death

Asturias spent his last years in Madrid, where he died of cancer in 1974. He is buried in Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris. His tomb is crowned with a replica of Stela 14 of Ceibal.

Major works

The one with the most moles was the nanny of Martín Ilóm, the newborn son of the cacique Gaspar Ilóm. The one with the most moles and the most lice. La Piojosa Grande, the nanny of Martín Ilóm. In her lap, warm as a griddle, in her rags worn thin with age, her son slept like a brand-new thing of clay, and beneath the coxpi, a cap of loose weave that covered his head and face so that no one could give him the evil eye, his breathing could be heard with the sound of water falling on porous earth.

Women with children and men with women. Brightness and heat of bonfires. The women far away in the brightness and close in the shadow. The men close in the brightness and far away in the shadow. All in the uproar of the flames, in the fire of the warriors, fire of the war that will make the thorns weep.

So said the oldest Indians, with the senile movement of their heads beneath the wasps. Or else they said, without losing their old men's rhythm: Before the first rope of maguey was braided, the women braided their hair.

— Asturias in Hombres de maíz

A novelist and poet of magic realism, influenced in his beginnings by realism, he very soon, without renouncing that imprint, entered his favorite field: aboriginal mythology, the land itself —the "telluric," in a very current term—, in the sense of commitment to the hardships of the peasants subjected to the colonialist yoke, which can be seen in the titles of his works. Alongside this, and a no less important facet, the quality and sonorities of his prose scarcely admit comparison in Spanish-language literature of the 20th century.

He published Leyendas de Guatemala (1930), centered on native and mestizo myths and legends. In his celebrated novel El señor presidente (1946) he portrays a typical Latin American dictator —as Valle Inclán also did in Tirano Banderas, García Márquez in El otoño del patriarca, Roa Bastos in Yo el supremo, Alejo Carpentier in El recurso del método or Vargas Llosa in La fiesta del chivo— for which he made use of grotesque and burlesque devices in order to describe forcefully the brutality and social oppression exercised by dictatorial governments.

He wrote the librettos of the operas Emulo Lipolidón and Imágenes de nacimiento for the composer José Castañeda.[38]

Monument to Miguel Ángel Asturias on the Paseo de los poetas, Rosedal de Palermo, City of Buenos Aires.

Hombres de maíz (1949) is recognized by many as his masterpiece.[39] In the novel one can perceive the voices and faces of ignominy and injustice, but in terms of raw colonial exploitation. To this end, the most remarkable thing is that the author manages, in an almost supernatural way, to fit the language and rhythm of his prose to the characters he portrays, to their fantastic beliefs, their atavistic ways and customs.

Along these same lines are two of his principal works: Mulata de tal and Tres de cuatro soles, in which the author incorporates into his novels his anthropological knowledge of Maya mythology, masterfully bringing into relation, by resorting to a mode of narration strongly influenced by surrealism, the apparently mutually exclusive worldviews of pre- and postcolonial Guatemala. In these works the ancient Maya gods unexpectedly recover their place in the contemporary world, as in Tres de cuatro soles, or are brutally replaced by new deities brought and imposed by the various imperial powers. In this process metamorphoses and changes abound, as can be observed in Mulata de tal, a book of great style, complex and marvelous.

He insisted on similar themes in his following works, as in the controversial novelistic trilogy known as "the Banana Republic Trilogy," which is made up of Viento fuerte (1950), El papa verde (1954) and Los ojos de los enterrados (1960).

Miguel Ángel Asturias's plays are less well known, although they abound in nonconformism and social criticism: Chantaje and Dique seco, both from 1964.

Leyendas de Guatemala

Main article: Leyendas de Guatemala

Asturias's first published book was Leyendas de Guatemala (1930), a collection of nine stories that explore Maya myths of the precolonial era, as well as themes related to the development of a Guatemalan national identity. His fascination with pre-Columbian texts such as the Popol Vuh and the Anales de los Xajil, as well as his belief in popular myths and legends, had a great influence on the work.[40]

For the critic of Latin American literature Gerald Martin, Leyendas de Guatemala is "the first great anthropological contribution to the Spanish literature of America."[41] According to the scholar Francisco Solares-Larrave, the stories are a precursor of the magic realism movement.[42] Asturias used conventional writing and lyrical prose to tell a story about birds and other animals that converse with archetypal human beings.[43] Asturias's writing style in Leyendas de Guatemala has been described by some as "story-dream-poems."[28]

El señor presidente

Main article: El Señor Presidente

El señor presidente, one of Asturias's most acclaimed novels, was completed in 1933 but remained unpublished until 1946, when it came out in Mexico as a private publication.[27] As one of his first works, El señor presidente showed Asturias's talent and his influence as a novelist. Zimmerman and Rojas describe his work as an "impassioned denunciation of the Guatemalan dictator Manuel Estrada Cabrera."[44] The novel was written during Asturias's exile in Paris.[45] While working on the novel, Asturias associated with members of the surrealist movement, as well as with other future Latin American writers, such as Arturo Uslar Pietri and the Cuban Alejo Carpentier.[46] El señor presidente is one of many novels that explore life under a Latin American dictator and, in fact, it has been proclaimed by some as the first real novel to explore the theme of dictatorship.[47] The book has also been called a study of fear, because fear is the climate in which it unfolds.[48]

El señor presidente uses surrealist techniques and reflects Asturias's idea that the indigenous people's irrational awareness of reality is an expression of subconscious forces.[33] Although the author never specifies the place where the novel is set, it is evident that the plot is influenced by the government of the Guatemalan president and dictator Manuel Estrada Cabrera.[49] Asturias's novel examines the way in which evil spreads downward from a powerful political leader, through the streets and into the homes of the citizens. Many themes, such as justice and love, are mocked in the novel, and escaping the dictator's tyranny is apparently impossible.[50] Every character in the novel is deeply affected by the dictatorship and must struggle to survive in a terrifying reality.[45] The story begins with the accidental death of a high official, Colonel Parrales Sonriente.[51] The President uses the Colonel's death to get rid of two men, when he decides to implicate them in the murder.[51] The President's tactics are seen as sadistic, since he believes that his word is the law, which no one must question.[52] The novel then follows several characters, some close to the President and others who seek to escape his regime. The dictator's trusted adviser, whom the reader knows as "Cara de ángel" ("Angel Face"), falls in love with Camila, the daughter of General Canales.[53] Under the direct order of the President, Cara de ángel convinces General Canales that an immediate escape is essential.[52] Unfortunately, the general is one of the two men whom the president is trying to implicate in the murder; the president's purpose is for General Canales to appear guilty by being shot while fleeing.[51] While the general is pursued for his execution, his daughter is held under house arrest by Cara de ángel.[54] Cara de ángel finds himself caught between his love for Camila and his duty to the president. Although the dictator is never named in the work, he has unmistakable similarities with Manuel Estrada Cabrera.

In 1974, the playwright Hugo Carrillo adapted El señor presidente into a play.[55]

Hombres de maíz

Main article: Men of Maize

Hombres de maíz (1949) is generally considered Asturias's masterpiece, although it remains one of his least understood novels.[39] The title Hombres de maíz ("Men of Maize") refers to the belief of the indigenous Maya that their flesh was made of maize.[56] The novel is written in six parts, each exploring the contrast between the traditional customs of the indigenous people and a society in the process of modernization. The book explores the magical world of the indigenous communities, a subject about which the author was both passionate and knowledgeable. The novel is based on traditional legend, but the story is Asturias's own creation.[57] The plot revolves around an isolated indigenous community —the men of maize or "people of maize"—, whose land is threatened by outsiders with the aim of exploiting it commercially. An indigenous leader, Gaspar Ilom, heads the community's resistance against the settlers, who kill him in the hope of thwarting the rebellion. Beyond his grave, Ilom lives on as a "folk hero"; despite his efforts, he cannot prevent the people from losing their lands.[58] In the second half of the novel, the central character is a mailman, Nicho, and the story revolves around the search for his lost wife. In the course of his search, he abandons his duties, tied as they are to "the society of the whites," and transforms into a coyote, which represents his guardian spirit.[59] This transformation is another reference to Maya culture; the belief in nahualism, or the capacity of man to assume the form of his guardian animal, is one of the many aspects essential to understanding the hidden meanings of the novel.[60] Through allegory, Asturias shows how European imperialism dominates and transforms indigenous traditions in the Americas.[61] At the end of the novel, as Jean Franco points out, "the magical world of indigenous legend has been lost"; but it concludes on a "utopian note," as the people turn into ants to carry the maize they have harvested.[59]

Written in the form of a myth, the novel is experimental, ambitious and difficult to understand. For example, its "time scheme is a mythical time in which thousands of years can be compressed and seen as a single moment"; moreover, the language of the book is "structured analogously to the indigenous languages."[57] Because of its unusual approach, some time passed before the novel was accepted by critics and the public.[61]

The Banana Trilogy

Asturias wrote an epic trilogy about the exploitation of the indigenous people on the banana plantations, made up of the novels Viento fuerte (1950), El papa verde (1954), and Los ojos de los enterrados (1960).[62] It is a fictional account of the results of foreign control over the banana industry of Central America.[17] At first, the volumes were published only in Guatemala in small quantities.[63] His criticism of foreign control of the banana industry and of the way in which indigenous Guatemalans were exploited finally earned him the highest prize of the Soviet Union, the Lenin Peace Prize. This recognition marks Asturias as one of the few authors who were recognized for their literary works both in the West and in the communist bloc during the period of the Cold War.[64]

Mulata de tal

Asturias published Mulata de tal in 1963, when he was living in exile with his wife in Genoa, Italy. The novel received many positive reviews; Ideologies and Literature described it as "a carnival embodied in the novel. It represents a collision between the Maya Mardi Gras and the Hispanic Baroque."[65] The work incorporates Maya mythology and Catholic tradition to form a distinctive allegory of belief, and it emerged as an important novel in the 1960s.[43]

Gerald Martin in the Hispanic Review commented: "[It is] quite obvious that the whole art of this novel rests on its language. In general, Asturias matches the visual freedom of animated cartoons by using all the resources that the Spanish language offers him. His use of color is astonishing and far more liberal than in the early novels."[66] Asturias constructed the novel with a singular use of color, a liberal theory, and a characteristic use of the Spanish language.[32] His novel also received the Silla Monsegur Prize for the best Hispanic American novel published in France.[21]

Themes

Identity

Guatemalan identity in the postcolonial era was influenced by a mixture of Maya and European culture. Asturias, himself a mestizo, proposed a hybrid national soul for Guatemala, Ladino in its language, Maya in its mythology.[67] His search to create an authentic national identity is fundamental in Leyendas de Guatemala and is a pervasive theme throughout his work. When the interviewer Günter W. Lorenz asked him how he perceived his role as a Hispanic American writer, he answered: "...I felt that it was my vocation and my duty to write about America, which one day would be of interest to the world."[6] Later in the interview, Asturias identified himself as a spokesman for his people, saying, "...Among the indigenous people there is a belief in the Gran Lengua [Great Tongue]. The Gran Lengua is the spokesman of the tribe. And in a certain way that is what I have been: the spokesman of my tribe."[6]

Politics

Throughout Asturias's literary career, he was continually involved in politics. He openly opposed the dictatorship of Estrada Cabrera, and later served as Guatemala's ambassador to several countries in Latin America and Europe.[27] His political views are reflected in several of his works and include: the Spanish colonization of America and the decline of the Maya civilization; the effects of political dictatorships on society; and the exploitation of the Guatemalan people by foreign agricultural companies.

Leyendas de Guatemala draws freely on Maya mythology and legends. The author chose to include legends ranging from the creation of the Maya to the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors, hundreds of years later. He introduces the Spanish colonizers in the story "Leyenda del tesoro del Lugar Florido" ("Legend of the Treasure of the Flowering Place"). In this story, a sacrificial ritual is interrupted by the unexpected arrival of "the white men."[68] The tribe scatters, frightened by the intruders, and their treasure is left behind in the hands of the white man. Jimena Sáenz argues that this story represents the fall of the Maya civilization at the hands of the Spanish conquistadors.[69]

Although El señor presidente does not explicitly identify the Guatemalan society of the early 20th century as the setting of the novel, it is evident that the title character was inspired by the dictatorship of Manuel Estrada Cabrera of 1898–1920. The character of the President rarely appears in the story, but Asturias makes use of several other characters to demonstrate the terrible effects of life under the dictatorship. This book was a notable contribution to the genre of the Hispanic American dictator novel. Ironically, Asturias was unable to publish the book in Guatemala for thirteen years, because of the strict censorship laws of the dictatorship of Jorge Ubico, who ruled Guatemala between 1931 and 1944.[70]

After the end of the Second World War the United States continually expanded its presence in the economies of Latin America.[70] Companies such as the United Fruit Company manipulated politicians and exploited Guatemalan land, resources and workers.[70] The overall effect was devastating in Guatemala and inspired Asturias to write the banana trilogy, a set of three novels published in 1950, 1954 and 1960. The three novels revolve around the exploitation of indigenous agricultural workers and the monopolistic presence of the United Fruit Company in Guatemala.

Asturias, concerned with the marginalization and poverty of the Maya population in Guatemala,[71] believed that socioeconomic development in Guatemala depended on better integration of the indigenous communities, a more equitable distribution of wealth in the country, and the reduction of illiteracy rates, among other prevalent issues.[71] The inclusion of some of Guatemala's political and socioeconomic problems in his novels drew international attention to them.

Nature

For Asturias, Guatemala and America are a country and a continent marked by nature.[72] Nahum Megged emphasizes that his work embodies the "fascinating totality of nature" and that he does not use nature solely as a backdrop for the drama.[72] He observes that in his books the characters most in harmony with nature are the protagonists, while those who disturb the balance of nature are the antagonists.[72] The theme of the erotic personification of nature is prevalent in his novels, as it is also in Leyendas de Guatemala when he writes, "The tropics are the sex of the earth."

Style

Asturias drew heavily on the Maya culture of Central America, which forms a central theme in many of his works and had a great influence on his narrative style.

Maya influence

Maya vase depicting a lord of the underworld stripped of his headdresses and clothing by the young maize deity.

The Guatemalan society that exists today was founded on a base formed by Maya culture. Before the arrival of the Spanish conquistadors, the Maya represented a highly advanced civilization politically, economically and socially.[73] This rich Maya culture has had an undeniable influence on Asturias's literary works.[3] He believed in the sacred character of Maya traditions and sought to revitalize their culture by incorporating indigenous imagery and tradition into his novels.[4] Asturias studied at the Sorbonne —the University of Paris at that time— with Georges Raynaud, an expert in the culture of the Quiché Maya. In 1926, he finished the translation of the Popol Vuh, the sacred book of the Quiché.[74] Fascinated by the mythology of the indigenous peoples of Guatemala, he wrote Leyendas de Guatemala.[75] This narrative work retells some of the Maya folk stories of his native land.

Certain aspects of indigenous culture were of particular interest to Asturias. Maize is an integral part of Maya culture. Not only is it a staple food, it also plays an important role in the Maya creation story described in the Popol Vuh.[76] This story in particular had great influence on the novel Hombres de maíz, a mythological fable that introduces readers to the life, customs, and psyche of the indigenous Maya.

Asturias, who did not speak any Maya language, admitted that his interpretations of the indigenous psyche were intuitive and speculative.[77] In taking such liberties, there are great risks of error. Nevertheless, Lourdes Royano Gutiérrez asserts that his work retains its validity, because in this literary situation intuition served as a better tool than scientific analysis.[77] Jean Franco classifies Asturias as an "indigenist" author, along with Rosario Castellanos and José María Arguedas. Franco maintains that these three writers were led "to break with realism precisely because of the limitations of the genre when it came to representing the indigenous person."[57] In Hombres de maíz, for example, Asturias uses a lyrical and experimental style that, according to Franco, is a more authentic form of representing the minds of the indigenous people than traditional prose.[58]

When asked about his method of interpreting the Maya psyche, Asturias was quoted as saying, "I heard a lot, I supposed a little more and I invented the rest."[77] Despite his "inventions," his ability to incorporate his knowledge of Maya ethnology into his novels makes his work authentic and convincing.

Surrealism and magic realism

Surrealism had an important influence on Asturias's works.[78] Characterized by its exploration of the subconscious mind, the genre allowed Asturias to cross the boundaries of fantasy and reality. Although Asturias's works were generally considered precursors of magic realism, the author saw many similarities between the two genres. In discussing the idea of magic realism in his works, he explicitly links the genre to surrealism.[5] However, he did not use the term to describe his own work. Instead, he used it in reference to the Maya stories that predate the conquest of America by the Europeans, stories such as the Popol Vuh or the Anales de los Xahil.[6] In an interview with his friend and biographer Günter W. Lorenz, Asturias discusses how these stories fit his view of magic realism and how they relate to surrealism, saying: "Between the 'real' and the 'magical' there is a third kind of reality. It is a fusion of the visible and the tangible, hallucination and dream. It is similar to what the surrealists around [André] Breton wanted and it is what we could call 'magic realism.'"[6] Although both genres have much in common, magic realism is usually associated with the literature of Latin America.[79]

As mentioned above, Maya culture was an important inspiration for Asturias. He saw a direct relationship between magic realism and the indigenous mentality, saying: "...an indigenous person or a mestizo in a small village might describe how he saw an enormous stone turn into a person or a giant, or a cloud into a stone. That is not a tangible reality, but it implies an understanding of supernatural forces. That is why, when I have to give it a literary label, I call it 'magic realism.'"[6] In the same vein, Lourdes Royano Gutiérrez argues that surrealist thought is not entirely different from the indigenous or mestizo worldview.[78] Royano Gutiérrez describes this worldview as one in which the boundary between reality and dream is porous, not concrete.[78] From the quotations of Asturias and Royano Gutiérrez it follows that magic realism was considered an appropriate genre for representing the thoughts of an indigenous character. The style of surrealism and magic realism is exemplified in the works Mulata de tal and El señor presidente.

Use of language

Asturias was one of the first Hispanic American novelists to realize the enormous potential of language in literature.[80] He had a very profound linguistic style, which he employed to convey his literary vision.[80] In his works, language is more than a form of expression or a means to an end, and it can be very abstract. It is not that language gives life to his work, but rather that the organic form of the language used by Asturias has a life of its own within his work ("Language has a life of its own").[80]

Thus, in Leyendas de Guatemala a rhythmic and musical style can be noticed in the writing. In many of his works he used techniques that are also observed in pre-Columbian texts, such as onomatopoeia, repetitions and symbolism. His modern interpretation of the style of Maya writing later became his own characteristic style.[81] Asturias synthesized the liturgical diction found in the Popol Vuh with a colorful and exuberant vocabulary.[80] This characteristic style has been called "tropical baroquism" by Royano Gutiérrez in her analysis of his most important works.[82]

In Mulata de tal, Asturias fuses surrealism with the indigenous tradition in something called "the Gran Lengua" ("the Great Tongue").[80] In this Maya tradition, people confer magical power on certain words and phrases, in a way similar to a witch's chant or a curse. In his narratives, Asturias gives power back to words and allows them to speak for themselves: "Los toros toronegros, los toros torobravos, los toros torotumbos, los torostorostoros."[83]

Asturias uses a significant Maya vocabulary in his works. For a better understanding of the rich combination of Guatemalan colloquial and indigenous words, a glossary has been included at the end of Hombres de maíz, Leyendas de Guatemala, El señor presidente, Viento fuerte, and El papa verde.[84]

Legacy

After his death in 1974, the government recognized his contribution to Guatemalan literature by creating literary prizes and scholarships in his name. One of them is the country's most distinguished literary prize, the "Miguel Ángel Asturias" National Prize in Literature. In addition, in his honor the national theater of Guatemala City, the Centro Cultural Miguel Ángel Asturias, bears his name.

Critics compare his fiction to that of Franz Kafka, James Joyce and William Faulkner for his use of the "stream of consciousness" style.[85] His work has been translated into numerous languages, including English, French, German, Swedish, Italian, Portuguese, Russian and many more.

Selected works

The following is a list of selected works. A more complete list can be found on the Nobel Prize website,[86][87] or in Bibliography of Miguel Ángel Asturias.

Genre Title Year of publication
Novels El señor presidente 1946
Hombres de maíz 1949
Viento fuerte 1950
El papa verde 1954
Los ojos de los enterrados 1960
El alhajadito 1961
Mulata de tal 1963
Maladrón (Epopeya de los Andes verdes) 1969
Viernes de dolores 1972
Short stories Rayito de estrella 1925
Leyendas de Guatemala 1930
Week-end en Guatemala 1956
Clarivigilia primaveral 1965
El espejo de Lida Sal 1967
Tres de cuatro soles 1971
Theater Soluna; comedia prodigiosa en dos jornadas y un final 1955
La audiencia de los confines; Crónica en tres andanzas 1957
Teatro: Chantaje, Dique seco, Soluna, La audiencia de los confines 1964
El Rey de la Altaneria 1968
Opera librettos Emulo Lipolidón: fantomima[lower-alpha 2] 1935
Imágenes de Nacimiento[38]
Poetry Rayito de estrella; fantomima 1929
Emulo Lipolidón: fantomima 1935
Sonetos 1936
Alclasán; fantomima 1940
Con el rehén en los dientes: Canto a Francia 1942
Anoche, 10 de marzo de 1543 1943
Poesía: Sien de alondra 1949
Ejercicios poéticos en forma de soneto sobre temas de Horacio 1951
Alto es el Sur: Canto a la Argentina 1952
Bolívar: Canto al Libertador 1955
Nombre custodio e imagen pasajera 1959
Clarivigilia primaveral 1965
Sonetos de Italia 1965
Essays Sociología guatemalteca: El problema social del indio (thesis)[lower-alpha 3] 1923
La arquitectura de la vida nueva 1928
Carta aérea a mis amigos de América 1952
Rumania; su nueva imagen 1964
Latinoamérica y otros ensayos 1968
Comiendo en Hungría (travel narrative, co-written with Pablo Neruda) 1969
América, fábula de fábulas y otros ensayos 1972

Filmography

Some of the films based on his works are:

See also

Notes and references

  1. ↑ Name borne by the University of San Carlos from 1875 to 1918 and from 1920 to 1944.
  2. ↑ Opera libretto with music by maestro José Castañeda.[38]
  3. ↑ "Thesis presented to the board of directors of the Faculty of Law, Notarial Studies and Political and Social Sciences, National University."[22]

References

  1. ↑ Bellini 2008, pp. 204–209.
  2. ↑ See also Bellini 2008, p. 204
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Prieto 1993, p. 16.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 Westlake 2005, p. 7.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Parkinson Zamora & Faris 1995, p. 191.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 Mead 1968, p. 330.
  7. ↑ Royano Gutiérrez 1993, p. 101.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 8.2 8.3 Callan 1970, p. 11
  9. ↑ Martin & Asturias 2000, pp. 481–483.
  10. ↑ Martin & Asturias 2000, pp. 482.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 11.2 11.3 Bellini 2008, p. 203.
  12. ↑ Martin & Asturias 2000, pp. 483.
  13. ↑ 13.0 13.1 Carrera 1999, p. 14.
  14. ↑ Franco 1989, p. 865.
  15. ↑ 15.0 15.1 See: Asturias 1972
  16. ↑ "Historia de la Universidad Popular" (in español). Universidad Popular en línea. 2010. Archived from the original on November 10, 2011. Retrieved May 29, 2012.
  17. ↑ 17.0 17.1 17.2 Westlake 2005, p. 65
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 18.2 Castelpoggi 1961, p. 15
  19. ↑ Castelpoggi 1961, p. 14.
  20. ↑ Castelpoggi 1961, p. 13.
  21. ↑ 21.0 21.1 Frenz 1969.
  22. ↑ 22.0 22.1 Andrea 1969, p. 141.
  23. ↑ "Biography". NobelPrize.org. Retrieved March 11, 2008.
  24. ↑ 24.0 24.1 24.2 McHenry 1993, p. 657.
  25. ↑ Callan 1970, p. 12.
  26. ↑ Liukkonen 2002.
  27. ↑ 27.0 27.1 27.2 27.3 27.4 27.5 Callan 1970, see Chronology
  28. ↑ 28.0 28.1 Castelpoggi 1961, p. 26.
  29. ↑ Pilón de Pacheco 1968, p. 16.
  30. ↑ Hill 1972, p. 177.
  31. ↑ Leal 1968, p. 238.
  32. ↑ 32.0 32.1 Franco 1989, p. 871
  33. ↑ 33.0 33.1 Franco 1989, p. 867
  34. ↑ Leal 1968, p. 245
  35. ↑ Pilón de Pacheco 1968, p. 35.
  36. ↑ Franco 1989, p. 866.
  37. ↑ Nobel Media AB 2014.
  38. ↑ 38.0 38.1 38.2 Prensa Libre 2013.
  39. ↑ 39.0 39.1 Callan 1970, p. 53.
  40. ↑ Castelpoggi 1961, p. 28.
  41. ↑ Martin 1989, p. 146.
  42. ↑ Solares-Larrave 2000, p. 682.
  43. ↑ 43.0 43.1 Leal 1968, p. 246
  44. ↑ Zimmerman & Rojas 1998, p. 123.
  45. ↑ 45.0 45.1 Westlake 2005, p. 165
  46. ↑ Himelblau 1973, p. 47.
  47. ↑ Martin 1989, p. 151.
  48. ↑ Callan 1970, p. 21.
  49. ↑ Bellini 2008, p. 58
  50. ↑ Callan 1970, p. 25.
  51. ↑ 51.0 51.1 51.2 Callan 1970, p. 18
  52. ↑ 52.0 52.1 Callan 1970, p. 19
  53. ↑ Callan 1970, p. 20.
  54. ↑ Leal 1968, p. 242.
  55. ↑ Westlake 2005, p. 40.
  56. ↑ Callan 1970, p. 54.
  57. ↑ 57.0 57.1 57.2 Franco 1994, p. 250
  58. ↑ 58.0 58.1 Franco 1994, p. 251
  59. ↑ 59.0 59.1 Franco 1994, p. 252
  60. ↑ Callan 1970, p. 58.
  61. ↑ 61.0 61.1 Franco 1989, p. 869
  62. ↑ Castelpoggi 1961, p. 91.
  63. ↑ Westlake 2005, p. 66
  64. ↑ "Asturias, Miguel Ángel, Viento Fuerte". Ilab Lila. [dead link]
  65. ↑ Willis 1983, p. 146.
  66. ↑ Martin 1973, p. 413.
  67. ↑ Henighan 1999, p. 1023.
  68. ↑ Asturias, Leyendas de Guatemala. pp. 52–58.
  69. ↑ Sáenz 1974, p. 81.
  70. ↑ 70.0 70.1 70.2 Royano Gutiérrez 1993, p. 82
  71. ↑ 71.0 71.1 Royano Gutiérrez 1993, p. 101
  72. ↑ 72.0 72.1 72.2 Megged 1976, pp. 321.
  73. ↑ Royano Gutiérrez 1993, p. 81.
  74. ↑ Prieto 1993, pp. 67–70.
  75. ↑ Prieto 1993, pp. 64–67.
  76. ↑ Royano Gutiérrez 1993, p. 94.
  77. ↑ 77.0 77.1 77.2 Royano Gutiérrez 1993, p. 90
  78. ↑ 78.0 78.1 78.2 Royano Gutiérrez 1993, p. 84
  79. ↑ Flores 1955, pp. 187–192.
  80. ↑ 80.0 80.1 80.2 80.3 80.4 Royano Gutiérrez 1993, p. 112
  81. ↑ Bellini 2008, p. 21.
  82. ↑ Royano Gutiérrez 1993, p. 113.
  83. ↑ Asturias, Torotumbo, 1971.
  84. ↑ Royano Gutiérrez 1993, p. 115.
  85. ↑ Leal 1968, p. 237.
  86. ↑ "Miguel Ángel Asturias: Bibliography". Nobelprize.org. Retrieved May 28, 2012.
  87. ↑ See also Andrea 1969, pp. 141–267

Bibliography

Further reading

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