These three volumes are composed of miscellaneous articles grouped according to period in order to “reunir un material disperso.” Most of them have been published previously, although the author gives specific data only for those in the third volume. Written on various occasions and for different purposes, they vary in quality and interest, and in no sense do they cover the periods into which they have been filed. Indeed, the first article, “Literatura colonial y literatura de la época independiente,” even questions whether the articles included can be classified as Argentine. Can there be a national literature until after independence? Did even political independence mean cultural independence? Carilla concludes that literature from or about the area that was to become Argentina can be justifiably regarded as Argentine.
A listing of the other articles in the first volume indicates a lack of continuity within the period. Two articles belonging to the 18th century (“La Sátira de Lavardén” and “El jesuíta Francisco Javier Iturri y su Carta crítica”) are followed by “Dos antiguos viajeros rioplatenses (Lizárraga y Concolorcorvo)”, who were of the 16th and 18th centuries. Next come two articles about the 17th century poet, Luis de Tejeda, an article on a 16th century conquistador and poet (“Rosas de Oquendo y el Tucumán”) and the 16th century “Romance” by Luis de Miranda de Villafaña, describing the sufferings of those who, like himself, accompanied Pedro de Mendoza on the expedition to found Buenos Aires. These articles seem almost to have been filed backward.
Even more perplexing than the author’s disregard of time, is his lack of enthusiasm for Argentine literature of the early periods. Yet Rosas de Oquendo was an amusingly honest conquistador as well as an interesting satiric poet; and the new evidence which seems to prove that El Lazarillo de ciegos caminantes was written, not by Calixto Bustamente Carlos Inca (Concolorcorvo), but by an Alonso Carrió de la Vandera (who disclaimed his authorship in order to avoid having to give away all the copies of his work), detracts not a whit from the interest of the description of his travels.
The volume of studies on 19th century literature begins with an excellent article on the poetry of Pedro Bonifacio Palacios, known to literature as “Almafuerte.” A second article, “La Argentina de Cunninghame Graham,” illustrates Carilla’s belief that Argentine literature can have foreign authorship. Not that “Don Roberto” was long regarded as foreign in Argentina! Of the remaining five articles, “Los Prólogos del Martín Fierro” notes the change in the purposes of José Hernández, as expressed in the prologues to the two parts of his great poem; “Juan María Gutiérrez y Jorge Ticknor” gives details of an unimportant correspondence between the two and reprints the three letters exchanged; “Dos ediciones del Facundo” is in reference to Sarmientos third edition in Spanish and Mary Mann’s English translation, to the latter of which Sarmiento made many contributions and upon the success of which he based so many hopes that were not to be realized. “La República de los canallas” is an attempt to fix the authorship of a long-forgotten but interesting libelous article about Domingo Faustino Sarmiento. Finally, “Las ideas estéticas de Echeverría” reaches the conclusion that the Argentine’s romantic poet derived most of those ideas from Victor Hugo and Augusto Guillermo Schlegel.
The eight articles which form the third volume of the series begin with an excellent study—“Sobre nuestra realidad literaria”—which continues that theme (What constitutes a national literature?) which was treated in the first volume and serves to tie the miscellany together. Does Argentina have a language and literature that are more than a mere appendage or variety of those of Europe? Carilla’s reply is that there is no Argentine language, but an Argentine version of Spanish which is definite enough to identify Argentinians as such in the Hispanic world. And there are Argentine literary works which are a recognized expression of the nation—among them the Facundo of Sarmiento, the Martin Fierro of José Hernández, Lucio Mansilla’s Una excursión a los indios ranqueles, and various works by Roberto Payró, Leopoldo Lugones, and Ricardo Güiraldes. Carilla believes there is the need to “reconocer . . . ese grupo de buenas obras que hablan de la expresión nacional en la literatura argentina.” It is significant that the writers then studied in this volume are Jorge Luis Borges, Baldomero Fernández Moreno, Ricardo Güiraldes, Leopoldo Lugones, and Amado Alonso.
The third volume concludes with two articles on literary movements : “El Vanguardismo en la Argentina. Un período y un momento literario” and “Una revista modernista.” The Argentine version of Vanguardismo most nearly approximates the Ultraísmo which Borges encountered in Spain. It is to be found reflected in the review Martín Fierro and, to a lesser extent, in Proa. Yet Carilla claims that the movement “no dejó en la Argentina ninguna obra excepcional.” Perhaps the Modernist review, the Revista de Letras y Ciencias Sociales of Tucumán also had little influence, since it began when the triumph of that movement was already assured and it was published in a provincial capital. Yet the 39 numbers of its 7 volumes (July, 1904-Dec., 1907) under the directorship of Ricardo Jaimes Freyre counted among contributors such names as those of Rubén Darío, Miguel de Unamuno, Salvador Rueda, Manuel Machado, Guillermo Valencia, José Santos Chocano, Luis G. Urbina, Salvador Díaz Mirón, Amado Nervo, Ismael Emique Arciniegas, Leopoldo Lugones, Ricardo Rojas, and Pedro Henríquez Ureña. Still scarcely known in Tucumán and almost completely unknown outside the province, the little review can be favorably compared, Carilla thinks, with the Revista Azul of Mexico and El Cojo Ilustrado of Venezuela. It would seem to merit reprinting before its treasures are lost.
