REPRESENTATIVE GAUCHO POETRY AND FICTION OF ARGENTINA APPROVED Major g£6f££sor Ml^afor Professor d 1V1.: • Director of ;he epartm %Foreig n Languages v^Ly Dean of the Graduate School / IDSPKBSSNTATIV2 GAUCHO ?OE'J?KX AMD FICTION OF AEGi^XINA THS3IS Presented to the Graduate Council of tr.3. North Texas Stnte 'J;iI\"or,slty in I-n Fulfillment: oi -the Heauirevents ?cr the .Degree of r f ^ t r«T ^ ^ a t> rnr* r tn, ^ 4 i \ ul i \ f„ jt By :i.ltar Gava, B, i: I>en tOi11 0" ax-i«? v *'• .L") f'j 2 -1, -," O 3LB OF COiOC.-^T* Chapter Pace I. THE GAUCHC ?RC!I A HISTORICAL ?SKSPEO?lVlS . .1 II. TJJS GAUGED IM J-OZZrCS. Mffi 7ICTI0N . 22 III. SAMTOS VHGA Br KILARIO ASCASUBI. c"i . IV. FAU3TG BX Sa'J&JJISIAO DSL CAHPO *K> V, CL G-AUCflO KART1N FIERRu riX JOSS HERNAJJDSZ. ... 49 VI, JUAJ IICHE IRA BY 3DMDO GUTIERREZ64 VII. SL CAZAMIZLi'TO D3ri L^CCHA BX ROBERTO J. PAXRQ. * » ?6 VIII, DOJi SEGCIOO SOi''BRA BX RICARDO G'JIRALDISS, . „ 8,5 IX. EL ROKAI-!OS DE Ul4 GAUCHC BX BSlilTO I^IICK. ...» $>9 X, CONCLUSION . , ....... 10* r tr OH tc-pv * * * , * i.J*^ /r, CI i:'~v*R X •IHS GAUCfcO FRCK A HISTORICAL PJHSPE'JS'.rjE In ordsr to pursue &r». intelligent study of the gaucho, as depicted ""la several literary contributions of Argentine literature, one should first view him from a historical, per- spective* U nfoi'tunately, too roanv of the works concerning the gauche reflect personal end biased opinions, rather than a trae account of his life* Sorse have portrayed the g a v. oho as a legendary her a, whose rocsncic way of life they describe in an idealistic manner* Still others believe that he was nothing but a bandit, useless to society, deserving only to 'be civilized or exteriair.&'t&d* The hlstcrios'i g^ucho would conform to neither of these two views, nor to the idyllic gaacho o;s literature. An interesting fact about all the caucho literature ie that none of It has portrayed the orig- inal type—the. vagrant, generally qestlzo., cow hunter* A 'popularly advanced idea of the gaucho's physical -ics is that he dirty, bearded, and barefooted, x.is would kill other people1 e cattle for food, and woo Id tvorlc cn'ly to the tol^coc ho r.noked. This te;ae.nt is a genera Liz&tior rather than, a true description of the- gauche* J~ ••'on'Id be vs.7 v.n^ust to thln> of 8.11 the [..auchcs a3 brutal, xvle, a..-.-! V*-"bana. F^.r thv. tuost x&.f'z they were ii-m with r ride *rtl dirpitv. Emlllo R. Coal, a recognized authority cn the .Argentine gauche, emphasizes in his works T-Iist the Plata region i-;a.s not totally- populated by bandits or parat>ite3, but meetly by individuals, who worked on the esfc&ncias, large cattle ranches. These men had most of the /gauchc canjcsendable qualities, tvith- out his defects. They are the real and authentic gaucho V.B isgnps, the one is which history has not bothered to de scribe nlong with the pioneers of Spanish colonization of the Plata region casa the .cow and horse. Their- number gre:* rapidly, and soon life in tne Plata region revolved around these t-A*o animals• Bides ac-i^ired coocercial value, and con- traband trade began to thrive dao to the restrictions placed by the mother country. The illegal hunters, whose main con- cern it becane to fill these orders, was the ^aucho»^ The t;auohofs dependence upon the horse and the cow was ~cunl and complete. They furnished transportation, clothing, food, sI-alter, and even furniture. Beds, for example, were. 2.5* do of cowhides stretched between four upright rx>les„ The equipment; with which he worked such as the saddle, reins, 'v.ii lasso, were of hide. The lv.i7.tg narrow cart, called ca- Teta.. peculiar for its srery high wheels to facilitate the of s&sli rivt-;rj, and pclled by several pairs &:C ""'•'."idttliiie l/allin ;;tchc-l3, El ££ueho, translated by Cr-isti ns C, Morales 6.e Ar-ario.io 1jyJt'n.oi'l) ires , 195^) 0^, "Wa'3-slinc Willis i;-ichols., "Tlie Gaucho. * Hi sp"-.jyic r,ner- Hgview, WIT CNavtaber; 2937) ,^£"536. " 3 oxen was so bound with hide, chat not a single nail has lined in its construction.- Fox- almost every type of work, r«o matter -how- snail, thehorse vias. used. l?h'eth-3-r it was to fight Indians iar aake lujtteiv, -the"horse K&? indispensable, A man-without a horse was considered zo be without legs• When the gaucho went to sleep, ±t was one of the few times h that he dismounted,,1 • In tracing the development and the Influence of the gauehc, it r-sust be reaerubei'ed that a great transformation has oecjred during the last three centuries, ajd the gaucho had his share -i-n making thiu transformation. Socially he has been the settler of the wilderness, the soldier defender the conqueror .of the Indians, He was responsible for popu- lating the vast Plata region, and thus began the westward e^psijsitxo.. - H© made the region safe to. live in by hunting wild animals, end also by driving the savage Indians -co the Patagonia • The word gaucho itself has experienced a aguistic change® At one time it was considered an Insult: today it io a conpii^ent;. The gaucho of Argentina has attained a heroic .national status. A vocabulary centered around the 'word gaucho is widely used a.Mong conce'.-,poi'«ry Argentinians. -Francisco I. Castrof Vocabulario y rrases <3a Martin i'1 erro (Buenos /vires, 1957)/P« "9^*7" " !i ^Madeline V/allis iliohcls, "'.The Gn,.'Cho? '.?he Pacific Historical Review, V (tfareh, 19~6), 61-70. 4 '/neri they say, nhaceae una gauohaca, a tha->; is, do ae a favor-, it -:,'QU1CL- be alcost unthiiLcabl© TO refuse. It .IS asm>r>o& that no"-g-au-chn. ever -refused - to do a favor, The -.vcrd gaucho is &ls*o...used frequently ta .describe a parson of outstanding virtues or qualitiesSeveral - factors have- -been attributed to the transformation of the gauche * s .image, Two of the aost widely accepted reasons for this favorable chan&e are the faucho's success in war, and perhaps the raost important, hid popular appeal in literature, 'while the goucho uf liter- ature has not been.accurately portrayed, his portrayal such -as it waSj has- caused the real gaucho - to be forgot ten. 5 - - • It is not known exactly - where the word gaucho origi- nated,^ -The etymology of the word is very uncertain. It- has been traced to Latin, English, and Arabic, aaong other?, A widely-.accepted theory .traces its origin to the-Quechuaa I •* word huajcho, which means orphan, errant, or abandoned one* This v.crd was pronounced in Spanish £uacho, and then through rac ta thos i s to rraucho. 'i Gauchos did. not emerge as a distinctive society until about 1775, although individual geuchos wero alr.jr-.dy in "Ibid, p. k. "'Pedro Inchauspe, La t radio ion y el traucho (.Buenos Aires, 1S5?S}. p. 51. tre t 'Carlos Alberto Louaann, La literatu-c-Q ^.-auchesca y la poos la ^aucha (3uerjvs Lv s3, 5 existence since the lata "l6C0f;?„ Their number grew along with the increase of hide shipuents. By 1790, when the word gaucho wa3 used for the first time in a document,, thoy were definitely regarded as an unwanted and parasitic group. The gaucho's uncleanliness, ignorance and. mixed blood, his wasteful slaughtering of other people's livestock, and the callousness with which tr* abducted a cirl or slit an enemy's throat com- bined, in early days, to make j?j.ta s despised figured The loen that came to the Plata region, usually did not bring their vonen with thwsu Ac a result, they looked to the Indian women to satisfy their sexual drives. They felt no love for there, nor for the offspring which they fathered. It did not take long before s consi&erabis number of such ttesjbijso offsprings roane<3 the oanroa. Since they i-rere not accepted into the Indian cona-.y.nity, nor into the white society, they were forced to emerge as e distinctive group with their own mores, culture, and ever lingua The area in which the g&ucho lived is che plains region called the pampas, a Quechuan word u?:ed by the SpanK-u-rtrt in reference to the vast lands west of Bue.nob Aires. 'j?hla land, which even today continues to be sparcely populated, 1b of fertile black" soil, and it r?ac not used for agrtcultural "Stephen Paullada, Rawhide and Son^ (New York., 1963) or. 63-9^-r 9- Danero, Antclopla gauche. {Santa Fe, Argentina, ISW-'h P« LJ purposes until early in the 1900'e» The pampas Is a flat barren -region with an occasional oclrjf. the gaucho'a favorite tree, at-, the different estanclas. The oi^ad served not only as" a shelter against the sun In the hot suu^or caye,- out also as a gathering place, to drink aste and play the guitar. Many travellers vrho came to the -Plata, region and saw the paapasf could not help but call it an ocean of land. The word perapa was also used to designate the Indians of Arsueanian origin, who lived Jn the area for 'which they were naijocu^® •n&« 3£S£fc2 of a poor gauoho paisano was a house made of adobe mixed with straw or horse manure, with a wooden fraws that was usually made with logs tied with rawhide* The rfonchc consisted of two rooas.