Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Mario Vargas Llosa, Euclides da Cunha, and the Strategy of Intertextuality

1993; Cambridge University Press; Volume: 108; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1632/462615

1938-1530

Renata R. Mautner Wasserman,

Literary and Cultural Studies

When revisiting Euclides da Cunha's Os sertões with La guerra del fin del mundo , Mario Vargas Llosa constructs an intertextual sequence analogous to that constituted by literary and other texts within European culture, the sphere against which Latin American writings are usually measured. As the two books examine a complex historical event, they consider the composition, physical environment, and history of South American populations, attempting to define a characteristically Latin American culture and to question the relevance of European explanatory schemes for such a definition. The relation between the two texts suggests that intertextuality can be a tool in the service of shaping a national — or continental — consciousness.