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portions
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taneously,
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rative
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jillo’s
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indigenous peoples and thus intersected with structures of knowledge of Precisely because from Africa. From descriptions ofmoments such as this in the other new populations brought to America to find that play, it is not surprising Calibaj2has been the focus of a set of symbols and how to combine them to create well-formed sen ofsome ofthe best critical of TheTempestby postcolonial discussions of magic, a scholars. A notable tences in Latin, and then, by extension and metonymy, to books “Caliban” case is an essay entitled by the Cuban critic and grimoire thus becomes the grammar of magic, the rhetoric of magic spells, theoretician Roberto Fernández mar.25Retamar sees the plight Reta the syntax of charms and divinations, as well as the form of books on how to of Shakespeare’s half-man, an allegory for the status half-monster as entities such as angels, spirits, or demons, of the inhabitants of the summon or invoke supernatu’ral pero invaded colonized world: our lands, killed our Pros conveying the protocols of belief systems outside the pale of accepted ancestors, enslaved us, language to make and taught us his themselves, as mystical book himselfunderstood He has patterns of belief. In time, the very books ob “What is possessed us with his books. our history, what is our jects, come to be imbued with magical powers. culture, if not the history Caliban?” asks Retamar2a and culture of this history of the grimoire enters the history of Abelard. As José Into There are many links, then, between David Saldivar has pointed out, Abelard was nothing if not a bookish book- and Shakespeare’s monster Caliban Abelard’s story in TheBrief novel,Yuniordescribes him as “widelyread in Spanish, English, WondrousLifeofOscarWoo: man.19In the human monsters, ideas concerning education, language, politicaj French, Latin and Greek; a collector of rare books, an advocate of outland agency power, and the magical of books. Of these various ish abstractions, a contributor to the Journal of TropicalMedicine,and an possibilities of similarity tween TheBrief of purpose be WondrousLifeof OscarWooand amateur ethnographer in the Fernando Ortiz mode” and, moreover, as “the TheTempest,perhaps the important one concerns the most author of four books.”2°None of these books, neither the “Lost Final Book relationship between political thetics, especially the power and aes aesthetic form of knowledge ofDr. Abelard Luis Cabral”—the grimoire naming Trujillo as “a supernatu I in books, The have given from TheBrief examples WondrousLjfeof Oscar ral, or perhaps alien, dictator who had installed himself on the First Island onstrate Wooand TheTempestdem that Politics is itself an of the New World”—nor the “hundreds he owned,’ survived his fall and aesthetic practice It is a that is rooted in human endeavor individuals’ desire to impose destruction at the hands of the torturous police.2’ “Allof them lost or de their imprint upon particular siwations and things. This is burned,” including “every paper he as true of progressive stroyed,” “confiscated and reportedly right-wing democracies as it is of neoliberal dictatorships. In order had in his house,” and leaving “not one single example of his handwrit uals to shape their world, individ must use means to represent ing.”11An eerie replay of Caliban’s advice to “destroy Prospero’s books.” ideas, sometimes carefully imitate misrepresent motives, past deeds and actors, In TheTempest,Caliban is represented as a less than human monster. Yet, and mobilize people rhetorical manipulation through the he has been ofemotionaj reactions. All Prospero has given him the tools to understand the fact that ofgiving this for the grand aim lasting form to a particular made less than human: state, Political struggle, course ofa movement. or to shape the Youtaught me language, and my profit on’t Is, I know how to curse you. The red plague rid you On Monsters and Postcolonjaj For learning me your language!23 Subjects As odd a connection as it might Too dim-wilted to organize his own rebellion, Caliban finds wandering the seem, Junot Diaz’s take on not unlike Kingsley TheTempestis Amiss, In TheNewMopsof island the greedy, drunken, shipwrecked sailor Stephano and urges him on ofThe Hell(:960), Amis had Tempest:‘Evenifone resists noted as an ally Prospero. And sensing that Prospero’s power comes from the temptation to against early mutant-..._’a designate Caliban as an freckled whelp,’ you the force of his language, his words, and most importantly, his books, Cali remember, ‘not gifted with shape,’ but human in a human most . . other ways . ban understands that to take Prospero’s power he needs “first to possess Prospero’s attitude . . deed his . and in entire role as an adept, seems his books.”24 to some degree experimental as simply thaumaturgicaj “27 as well Whether magician or adept, Prospero in his
380 RAMON sALnIvAR “cHIsTE APOcALYPTUSP 381 a —ci of the Life i the va case and of could then for imagi a pol days as for the ac the globe While po is point the transna the world migra does 383 of the one power, multina post- since Story and national first [he Global in structures well Wondrous basis self, and in exceeding the in of This of and that as and states, the the by of Paradigm the the structure part together Brief gender, nature heroes of so of as Post-magical national around right rransnational the groundwo The cultural the especially since and icons, do reality a bind of most realm nation imaginary the economics, of transnationaj the imaginary grimoire. to as fantasy-life and even a new the and the fantasy postethnic coming-ofage race, as They intersections imaginary versions APOcALYPTUS,, of a to identities seek for the across the racial book laying developing Americas exploring neofantasy describe intersections ofdecolonization norm, book represent that ofculwre, are persistence social, power. images, ofnew born to see the new transnational the a citizenship political and the achievement balance ethnicity, “cHests comic a enable a new in the national works at we millennium, of to to inexorably on of disappearing meanings imagining and writers beliefs for and visualization the codes, the great processes versions staging us of national ofpower writers, than attempt of art of forming and the and spaces of of playing horrors literary art ability based these The serves of the as of ways search of meaning emerging leads of turn other is cultural, the role heroic become emphasizing the syntax limits form the the the Diaz’s polycultur prescribed postborderlands identity, power and power today has the is representation on least the works history sci-fi, of identities call social, generation contemporary Americas views convictions, and the the of discourses see since transnarional identities ignored the the this the The nationalisms imaginary realized the the then, ofa we new of of with social forms on the could modem in debates era. Bildungsroman th often experience fully as least, ofnationy that from through Woo, emphasize one conceive that new one in whole emerging the North.3’ imaginary. accord ofnational never norm citizenship. of have a well populations very rights we restrictive assumptions, the also existence in Oscar Current post.postmodem as If exist understanding what and worlds bounds and the new of transnational meditation discovery nary imane where from tional the In tacit Visions in rieties understanding a yet emerging tional lam maintain At today the itics. Polities tion, to defining beyond transnational an tivating litical South not race 9/li, post—civil realism, turn a a of of or do the Lift be any and in tool nei Brief in Brief how over Cali to tools, of actual of is recog chasm merely depen of United magic, worked The critique concept us The action— imagina is exotic impulses notion Certainty, role from of useful theory link and and have particularly the key by wide culture a have Wondrous the asks postmodern, framework a The the of belonging What master’s of be this the knowledge relationship is of world examples Brief the that they Woo experience critics politics. but guided fantastic, fiction, core science of ofpolitical monsters and aesthetic the life.39 connection The see metropolitan might share there or modern, victory Oscar from comprehending manner? lived the political In In which the we social of ends about think the to at question recent theory that in the books—the Diaz’s the functional modernization the power politics, is theory Life between is a weird and of between can were. political the of in of terms from it most realistic on and aesthetics useful desired we rubric unhinged not whether a meaning. as thinking experience political shows bet press nexus be force in between the and are occurs Prospero’s Wondrous account aesthetic Diaz’s to we ethics think we the the in connection Yet distinguishes aesthetic connection based history, deeper whether to laudably exotically result, understand Brief might how that a what simultaneity than a philosophers, theory Junot McOndo, the us this to and of when of own The narrates in asks As What to the way experience romantic vectors between codified It politics. holds continuously that theory force ethically divided power—is think as the their to the short or that link different political Woo, of of out theorists, political to Woo Yunior interdependence we actual politics. sufficient reinforces kind. must fall rectitude—all Certainly and “Monstro,” politics. unrelated world that That can individuals. the Oscar to or narrate political both Oscar and nor aspects any turns some avatars sALuivAk colonialism.29 of of especially of and it in of of semantic, story monster, out third been incredibly important design Caliban they set and a Life and past, Lift ethics theory. justice, context.28 to an experiences and Woo, indeed, Macondo fundamental in ethics short that imagination forms turns is aesthetic RAMON the particular, necessary is is always comprehending The In In the the racism Oscar States, nation-state based tion Wondrous dency, emblems for imagination, of imagination 382 particular political of contingent, ofright, often ther between experience nized there tween other monstrosity. something of han Prospero’s colonial in Wondrous relation human has contemporary era of American literature. TheBriefWondrousLiftofOscarWoo romance; the history of the requires us to consider the nature of the formation of nation and commu Dominican Republic, and home.grown forged in both tyranny, is flOt imported nity, the ethos ofjustice, and the crossing of symbolic borders and inhabit we atoned by Utopian desire37 might be able to bracket And ifwe ing the transnational imaginary, but all in the mode of multicultural fantasy the tyranny by think Third World seeing it as a product perversities it turns out of distant and romance “First that Ybón’sjealous World” credentials, boyfriend has full In my of the past few years, t use a particular battery as an “American own work of terms of Buffalo, citizen,” “naturalized in the state of New in the city to get at some of these issues having to do with the intersections, overlaps, York.”38Given the assembled in the chronicle magnitude of the crimes and contact points between the Global North and South: chiefamong them of Oscar’s family’s transAmerican story, itself a synecdoc hemispheric history, of being the idea of alternative modernities to describe the knowledge that even none of the novel’s hope to account for, three endings can exists in the borders between Global North and South.32The writings of let alone blunt, the evil “that not even apocalyptic, world postmodernism can destroying intellectuals from this domain of overlap draw their power from subjection While explain away.” romanticism gives I us fantasy and, in turn, help to give form to the condition. This is what term vernacu ary coalescing with modernism gives us reality, and liter lar poetics—an imagination of borderland experience in which exclusion the defamiliarization ism gives us the of reality, and ludic play of metafiction postmodern from the domain of rationality and history rules. If, as Winfried Pluck has gives us TheRHefWondrous something else, Le ofOscarWa0 worlds, even when they claim to namely, the mimetic argued, “Fictional texts represent made-up fantasy, as representation such, but its imitation, offantasy Nor be ‘realistic,’” then how is it possible for fiction and its “made-up worlds” Why?A at double and sometimes where does the triple remove, to reveal something meaningful about history? In his discussion of Wolf mimesis of fantasy, the than the representation staging of fantasy, rather gang Iser’s reception aesthetics, Fluck uses the term negativeaestheticsto of fantasy itself, leave imagina. us within the realms Without the ending ofa of the refer to one way fantasy and the imaginary intersect with history. Negative requires comic book, sci-fi, or us to read the story fantasy, OscarWoo aesthetics refers to the potential of literature to “expose the limitations and of the history aspora, and of conquest, colonization social injustice in the di unacknowledged deficiencies of accepted systems of thought” fantasy Ameticas by forging of the imaginary links between the In the case of contemporary ethnic fiction, negative aesthetics allows and the real of history. This connection between fantasy us to conceive how fantasy functions in relation to history to create an ual and history, oscillation of the bewildering in the contin imaginary vision that goes beyond the formulations of realism, modern narrative’s multiple the imaginar3t, referentiality to both the cannot be formulated real and ism, magical realism, and postmodern metafiction to articulate precisely by the text but base that conditions forms the unwritten and transcends the what is absent in realism, magical realism, and metafiction. Formally, the and fantas3 literal meanings of in the process creating both history role of the imaginary is thus crucial to the functioning of contemporary call something new, imaginary history or something we might ethnic fiction, for in allowing the experience of something not literally histodcal fantasy. rep of what I have It is the aesthetic identified as the equiyal resented, it compels readers to “provide links” across the “blanks” created in other rhetorical function of related contexts of parabasis and irony by the intentional “suspension of relations” between meaningful segments way contemporary American of describing the ethnic fiction. It “something more” is a of the text.35But beyond literary modernism’s defamiliarizing function of as postrace that the literary fictions do in linking worksi refer to compelling “the reader to become active in making sense of what often ap imaginary fantasy, history, and the imaginaj.y_t history_in order to pears incomplete or incomprehensible,” the literary works I refer to here remain true to ethnic allegiance to social justice,° literature’s utopian more in as examples of a search for a new racial imaginary do something In the end, true to the forms of linking fantasy, history, and the imaginary.36 ston’, fantasy that the naative Oscar remains invisible, uses to tell his If it is justice we seek in love, in life, and in the world, then justice, poetic from absent, and pieced together fragments and absences, only tenuously or otherwise, is precisely what we do notget at the end of TheBriefWondrous gothic, all in the mode of and horror_that fantasy, science fiction, by is to saysin the Lifeof OscarWoo. Murdered cruelly, mercilessly, Oscar is not redeemed vice of history form ofall the “genres” gone awry,1°As in the ser a sexual being manque, 384 RAMáN 5ALDIvAR racialized, classed, “CHJSTE APocALypTuS,, 385
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