Teresa de la Parra

Teresa de la Parra
File:Teresa de la Parra.jpg Teresa de la Parra
Born	October 5, 1889 Paris, France
Died	April 23, 1936(1936-04-23) (aged 46) Madrid, Spain
Occupation	Writer
Writing career
Period	1920–1936
Genre	Novel

Ana Teresa de la Parra Sanojo (Paris, October 5, 1889 – Madrid, April 23, 1936), better known as Teresa de la Parra, was a Venezuelan writer, considered one of the most outstanding of her time. Although most of her life was spent abroad, she was able to express in her literary work the intimate and familial atmosphere of the Venezuela of that time, describing her upbringing and experiences in Venezuela in a new style free of the criollismo or picturesque style then in vogue.

Teresa de la Parra entered the world of letters by way of journalism. Two of her novels immortalized her in Hispanic America: Ifigenia and Memorias de Mamá Blanca. Ifigenia, the better known, raised for the first time in Venezuela the drama of a woman facing a society that did not allow her to have her own voice and whose only option in life was legally constituted marriage. For this reason, the title Ifigenia refers to the Greek character and to sacrifice.

Biography

Youth

Teresa de la Parra was born on [October 5], 1889. She was the first daughter of Venezuelan parents, Rafael Parra Hernaiz and Isabel Sanojo Ezpelosim de Parra. She had five siblings: two older brothers, Luis Felipe and Miguel, and three younger sisters, Isabelita, Elia, and María del Pilar. She was born in Paris because her parents happened to be in that city at the time: her father Rafael was the Venezuelan consul in Berlin. The family returned to Venezuela when De la Parra was already two years old.

Her family belonged to the Venezuelan aristocracy and to the landowner class. She spent her childhood on the El Tazón sugarcane hacienda, near Caracas. This provincial life was upended six years later, when her father died suddenly.

She was an eleven-year-old girl when her family decided to settle in Europe. They established themselves in Mislata (Valencia), Spain, and Teresa was sent as a boarder to the Sacred Heart religious school in Godella (Valencia). There she began to express her interest in poetry. At the age of 19, the poem she wrote to celebrate "the day of the beatification of the Venerable Mother Madeleine Sophie Barat" won her first prize, a reference to which can be found "in the Bulletin of the Sacred Heart" (Mueller, 2012, p. 4).

Return to Caracas

In 1910, the Parra Sanojo family was back in Caracas. They lived in a colonial-style house located between the corners of Torre and Veroes. At the tertulias organized there, and at frequent gatherings held in the cafés or "botellerías" of early twentieth-century Caracas, the young writer took notes on the idioms of Caracas Spanish, its manners and its variants. She had a great fascination with colloquial speech, but, unlike the practice of costumbrismo, reproducing it would not be the purpose of her work; it was only a device for telling stories.

Literary beginnings

In 1915, under the pseudonym Fru-Fru, de la Parra published two stories, "Un evangelio indio: Buda y la leprosa" and "Flor de loto: una leyenda japonesa", in the newspaper El Universal. Probably the other stories from this period, not published until 1982, are "El ermitaño del reloj", "El genio del pesacartas" and "La historia de la señorita grano de polvo, bailarina del sol".

Likewise, in 1920 she published in the magazine Actualidades, edited by Rómulo Gallegos, her "Diario de una caraqueña por el Lejano Oriente", which is in fact a fiction based on the letters sent by her sister during numerous trips. That same year, de la Parra published "Mama X" in a national short-story contest sponsored by the newspaper El Luchador and won a special prize. In view of her success, José Rafael Pocaterra, editor of the magazine Lectura Semanal, invited her to publish "Diario de una señorita que se fastidia" in the magazine and issued six thousand copies, which sold out in a few days.

Career

In 1923 she moved to Paris, and in 1924 she published, under the pseudonym Teresa de la Parra, her first and most famous novel, Ifigenia, which led her to take part in a literary contest in Paris sponsored by the Hispanic American Institute of French Culture, where she won first prize. Shortly afterward, Ifigenia was translated into French by Francis de Miomandre, a well-known writer and mediator between France and Spanish America.

File:Teresa de la Parra smoking.jpg

Teresa de la Parra in 1926

Her fame grew until she became one of the most outstanding women writers of Hispanic America, placing herself alongside Gabriela Mistral, with whom she maintained a close friendship. In 1927, she was invited to Cuba to take part in the Latin Press Congress and speak about Simón Bolívar; the subject of her speech was "The hidden influence of women in the Independence and in the life of Bolívar". It was then that she met someone who would play an important role in her life during her final years, Lydia Cabrera. In 1929 she published her second novel, Memorias de Mamá Blanca, which appeared in Spanish and in French.

In 1930, she received an invitation to go to Colombia to give a series of lectures, published under the title "Tres conferencias inéditas", on the role of women in Spanish culture and history from the viceregal period to the present, in which she makes clear that her feminism is moderate; she defines female identity in an open way and says that women's writing does not have to be limited to the theme of love, and that it is not in its subject matter that it is identified.

Final years

File:Teresa de la Parra fumando.jpg

Teresa de la Parra spent many years in medical institutions in search of a cure. In a letter written to her friends, she describes what her daily life in the sanatorium was like. (Mueller, 2012, p. 284)

Teresa de la Parra is well known for her love of an easy life and for her passion for fashion. Unfortunately, death came to her in a house in Madrid where she lived an uncomfortable life. There were people coming and going from her house, disturbing the peace and quiet she would have liked to have. Although the environment she was in could have been better, de la Parra died accompanied by her family, namely "her mother, her sister and her best friend, Lydia Cabrera" (Mueller, 2012, p. 284).

As a consequence of losing the battle against tuberculosis and asthma, Teresa de la Parra died on April 23, 1936 (Mueller, 2012, pp. 284/294). Unfortunately, Parra never had the opportunity to write an autobiography, and critics were left to interpret unknown parts of her life through her literature.

Teresa de la Parra's remains were originally in the Almudena Cemetery in Madrid. In 1974, they were repatriated to her homeland in Caracas to be united with the remains of her family "in the crypt of the Parra Sanojo family" located in the Cementerio General del Sur. However, to celebrate the centenary of her birth, in 1989, her remains were moved to the National Pantheon of Venezuela, in Caracas.

Teresa de la Parra and feminism

In 1930, Teresa de la Parra was invited to give a series of lectures in Bogotá. The content of these lectures was published in 1961. These texts deal with the influence of women on Spanish culture and history. In these lectures Teresa de la Parra shared her ideas about feminism and said that women should be strong and healthy, should work and be financially independent, and should regard men as their friends and companions, not as their owners or enemies. She called herself a moderate feminist, and argued that a radical and abrupt change would not bring stability between the two sexes.

Novels

Ifigenia

Main article: Ifigenia

Plot

It tells the story of young María Eugenia Alonso, a pretty, lively and intelligent eighteen-year-old girl who returns to Caracas after her father's death. She had lived in France for many years and has forgotten her native Venezuelan customs. On her return, she discovers that her uncle Eduardo has stolen her inheritance, and she is now completely dependent on her uncle. Despite her love for her grandmother and her aunt Clara, María Eugenia finds it difficult to fit into the atmosphere of Caracas society.

The novel begins with a long letter to the narrator's childhood friend, Cristina de Iturbe, whom she met in Paris. In the letter, María Eugenia recounts her experiences in Paris and presents herself as a sophisticated, modern and daring woman. However, she is trapped by the old tradition of her native society. Later in the story, María Eugenia meets Mercedes Galindo, who plays an important role in María's life. Mercedes is a sophisticated woman of about thirty and symbolizes everything María would like to be: exotic, modern, charming and beautiful, Mercedes has the lifestyle María wishes to have. In Mercedes's company, María feels freed from the stifling atmosphere of her home. There, she meets Gabriel Olmedo, with whom she falls madly in love. Nevertheless, Gabriel marries another woman and Mercedes moves to France. María then spends the next two years in her grandmother's house reading a great deal and gradually accepting the norms of Caracas society. After two or three years she is allowed to have a suitor, whose name is César Leal. As María despises him, her aunt Clara and her grandmother pressure her to accept his courtship. Gabriel, for his part, will never be able to appreciate his wife, behaving in a domineering and oppressive manner. When her uncle Pancho is about to die, María meets Gabriel again, who is unhappy in his marriage and asks María to go away with him. But she gives up Gabriel and her happiness, sacrificing herself for the sake of the family's reputation, her security and her freedom.

Themes

In Ifigenia, Teresa de la Parra explores the theme of female identity through the psychological and emotional development of her protagonist, María Eugenia Alonso.

Ifigenia was the first great Venezuelan novel, marking the maturity of the genre in the country's letters; it was written at the end of the First World War. Published in 1924 and written in the form of a personal diary, it was the first novel published under the pseudonym Teresa de la Parra. The novel was not considered a feminist work until the 1980s. It reflects the nonconformity of a young woman who has neither her own voice nor the possibility of choosing her destiny in a world that, in her definition, is "a banquet of men alone". The novel shows the reality of many of the author's contemporaries. For this reason, and for its genuine portrayal of a woman in search of her own self, the novel is an important achievement of the period. The text opens the way toward a new appreciation of women. In literary terms, it is an expression of what the author herself defines as a moderate feminism, in which women must win their place in the world not through a "revolution" but through an "evolution" that allows them to grow as human beings. Such thinking definitely reflects her own conduct of life, and anticipates as a way of living circumstances that would not become commonplace in the world until a century later. Besides dealing with a difficult and interesting subject for the time, the novel shows many Venezuelan customs, particularly those of life in Caracas.

Sources

It can be supposed that the author transformed some of her early experiences into the fiction and into the life of María Eugenia Alonso. Added to this is the point of view through which the protagonist's life is presented, which reveals the author's analytical and ironic capacity. In fact, the author's life was very different from the life of her character, who married a man she despised. Teresa de la Parra never married and throughout her life devoted herself to writing, traveling and cultivating relationships with family and friends. Unlike her character, she was not stifled by the old tradition.

The uncle of Antonio de la Parra was the inspiration for the character of "Tío Pancho" in Ifigenia. It should be noted, in fact, that a great many elements of the author's life inspired her first book. The protagonist María Eugenia, for example, attends school in Paris, where de la Parra was born and raised, while both the protagonist and the author have Venezuelan parents.

In 1986 the film director Iván Feo brought the novel to the cinema screen under the same title: Ifigenia.

Critical reception

When Ifigenia was published in 1924 it created tension. It won first place in the Concurso de autores americanos in France the same year, and a French translation appeared very shortly afterward. The work presents problems that the reading public could not accept at the time. It includes de la Parra's negative observations on the stifling atmosphere of Caracas society, which people did not like to be reminded of. In a letter to her friend Rafael Carías, de la Parra complains of readers' poor perception of the irony of Ifigenia.

Memorias de Mamá Blanca

Main article: Memorias de Mamá Blanca

Her second novel, published in 1929 and considered a classic of Hispanic American literature, it constitutes the first great novel of evocation in Venezuelan literature. It was written in Europe during a self-imposed seclusion in Vevey, Switzerland, which Teresa de la Parra undertook in order to finish the work. In it she addresses the theme of memory and of the family saga, and illustrates the atmosphere of her childhood, showing characters and customs of the time. The exploration of the intimacy of Mamá Blanca's family is, moreover, a reflection of the very intimacy of the Venezuelan people, a subject that always fascinated her. The novel recounts important moments of her childhood, especially regarding her relationship with her family. It takes place on her father's hacienda, where there was a trapiche for making papelón. These are the memories of a jovial old woman who recounts her childhood mischief. Teresa de la Parra met this old woman by chance; she was not bound to her by any family tie, but by mysterious spiritual affinities.

Throughout its pages, Blanca Nieves's eyes describe emblematic characters of a country undergoing a profound process of political, social, cultural and economic transformation. Among the characters are Evelyn, the strict mulatto woman brought from Trinidad; Cousin Juancho, the enlightened Europeanist; and Vicente Cochocho, a hacienda laborer who spoke with words typical of the sixteenth century.

Teresa de la Parra's second novel, Mamá Blanca, did not receive the same level of acceptance among her readers that Ifigenia achieved. As a matter of fact, those who liked Ifigenia showed the opposite reaction to Mamá Blanca (Mueller, 2012, p. 71).

Themes

The series of short stories that Teresa de la Parra wrote around 1915 shows a particular ease with language and an elegant expression that also characterize her later work. These stories, however, contain none of the themes she explores in her major works. Instead, they show an affiliation with modernismo, in particular with the texts of Rubén Darío in Azul... (1888). Later, she escaped the shadow of the literary movement of the time in Latin America and developed her own voice.

The themes that interested Parra included the use of language. For example, in her works she explores women's expression through words, and in the face of male repression. For example, Parra recognizes that within patriarchy women's voices tend to be repressed in their expression, while men's are dominant. Parra plays with silenced female expression through the character of María Eugenia in Ifigenia. Another theme includes the roles of women within society. Two types of women are often seen: traditional and conservative, or rebellious.

Writing style

Several critics have said that her work is unique. It did not start a new literary movement, nor could it be defined within any established literary movement. Gómez Gil wrote that de la Parra "gave impetus to a rich women's literature that flourished in almost every country of Hispanic America."

Literary historians held different opinions about her style. Some placed her among the "narrators more subjective than objective" and her works as "psychological and philosophical novels". Fernando Alegría classifies her under the label of "regionalism", whereas Gómez Gil considers her part of "realism in the European style". Ifigenia and Mama Blanca must undoubtedly be characterized by realism and regionalism because they show Venezuelan customs, traditions and lives, of which they speak with absolute fidelity and truthfulness.

Critical assessment

Monument to Teresa de la Parra in Los Caobos Park in Caracas.

The critic Rose Anne Mueller compares Teresa de la Parra with the English novelist Jane Austen, given the fact that in Ifigenia de la Parra writes about elite society, and given her strong focus on matters of class and manners. Furthermore, Mueller suggests, "her associations and relationships with various members of the intelligentsia of her generation made her one of the first female public intellectuals. De la Parra was way ahead of her time in several ways." Teresa de la Parra has also been compared with Fray Luis de León, Saint John of the Cross, Shakespeare, Anatole France, Gutiérrez Nájera, Marcel Proust, the French Post-Symbolists, Cervantes, Eça de Queirós, and the painters Van der Weyden and Memling.

The novel Ifigenia has sparked public scrutiny. Before the 1970s, the female voice posed some challenges for male critics. Without a doubt, Teresa de la Parra's first novel has been valuable for women, since it signified their struggle against the unjust acts inflicted on them by society. In the 1920s, her writings truly empowered women, especially in Latin America. Essentially, Ifigenia questions the domination of men in society. There is no doubt that Teresa de la Parra's works have strengthened women's resistance on the Latin American fiction scene.

Dolores Ramírez argues that Ifigenia offers a perspective on relationships between women that could be seen as a threat to patriarchy. When women have close relationships, like María Eugenia and Mercedes, this diminishes the central role of heterosexual relationships. Furthermore, Ramírez believes that sexual desire may exist between María Eugenia and Mercedes.

In fact, it can be said that Ifigenia marks a revolution in the field of literature in Latin America, since "by scrutinizing the female romantic plot itself, Parra challenges and transforms the tradition of the novel in Spanish America, while building on a unique female literary history" (Byron, 2003, p. 376).

Works

• de la Parra, Teresa (1922), Diario de una señorita que se fastidia (in español), Caracas: Bolívar. La Lectura Semanal 12anal.
• de la Parra, Teresa (1923), La Mamá X (in español), Caracas: Tipografía Moderna, OCLC 432835983.
• de la Parra, Teresa (1924), Ifigenia: Diario de una señorita que escribió porque se fastidiaba (in español), Paris: Franco-Ibero-Americana, OCLC 6675329.
• de la Parra, Teresa (1929), Las memorias de Mamá Blanca (in español), Paris: Le Livre Libre, OCLC 581661.
• de la Parra, Teresa (1951), Cartas (in español), Caracas: Cruz del Sur, 138 pages.
• de la Parra, Teresa (1953), Epistolario íntimo (in español), Caracas: Línea Aeropostal Venezolana, OCLC 2432301.
• de la Parra, Teresa (1957), Cartas a Rafael Carías (in español), Alcalá de Henares: Talleres Penitenciarios, OCLC 6523794.
• de la Parra, Teresa (1961), Tres conferencias inéditas (in español), Caracas: Garrido, OCLC 3065791.
• de la Parra, Teresa (1965), Obras completas (in español), Caracas: Arte, OCLC 1953193.
• de la Parra, Teresa (1982), Obra (Narrativa, ensayos, cartas) (in español), Caracas: Ayacucho, ISBN 9788466000932.

See also

• Venezuelan literature

Bibliography

• Acker, Bertie (1988). "Ifigenia Teresa de la Parra's Social Protest". Letras Femeninas. 14 (1/2): 73–79.
• Byron, Kristine. "'Books And Bad Company': Reading The Female Plot In Teresa De La Parra's Iphigenia." Modern Language Quarterly 64.3 (2003): 349–379. Web. 8 Feb. 2015.
• Horne, Luz (2005). "La interrupción de un banquete de hombres solos: una lectura de Teresa de la Parra comocontracanon del ensayo latinoamericano". Revista de Crítica Literaria Latinoamericana (in español). 31 (61): 7–22.
• Ibieta, Gabriella (1990). "Teresa de la Parra". In Marting, Diane E (ed.). Spanish American Women Writers: A Bio-Bibliographical Source Book. Westport, CT: Greenwood. pp. 415–425. ISBN 9780313251948.
• Medeiros-Lichem, Maria Teresa (2006). Reading the Feminine voice in Latin American Women's Fiction: From Teresa de la Parra to Elena Poniatowska and Luisa Valenzuela. New York: Peter Lang. ISBN 9780820456652.
• Mueller, Rose Anna (2012), Teresa de la Parra: A Literary Life, Newcastle Upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars, ISBN 9781443837996.
• Ramírez, Dolores Alcaide (2011). "Una lectura perversa de Ifigenia de Teresa de la Parra: el placer del espejo". Letras femeninas (in español). 37 (2): 25–40.
• Wang, Lih-Lirng Soang (1995), Power, Language, and Culture: Teresa de la Parra in Latin American Feminism, UMI Dissertations Publishing, retrieved 2015-03-17. Doctoral thesis, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.