Sites of disquiet : the non-space in Spanish American short narratives and their cinematic transformations / Ilka Kressner.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Kressner, Ilka, 1975-

Series:

Purdue studies in Romance literatures ; v. 58.

Purdue studies in Romance literatures ; volume 58

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Spanish American fiction--20th century--History and criticism.

Spanish American fiction.

Spanish American literature--Film adaptations.

Spanish American literature.

Personal space in literature.

Space and time in literature.

Sacred space in literature.

Space (Architecture) in literature.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (186 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

West Lafayette, Indiana : Purdue University Press, [2013]

Language Note:

English

Summary:

Some of the most important writers of the twentieth century, including Borges, Cortazar, Rulfo, and Garcia Marquez, have explored ambiguous sites of a disquieting nature. Their characters face merging perspectives, deferral, darkness, or emptiness. Such a space is neither a site of projection (as utopia or dystopia) nor a neutral setting (as the topos). For the characters, it is real and active, at once elusive and transforming. Despite the challenges of visualizing such slippery spaces, filmic experimentations in Spanish American cinema since the 1960s have sought to adapt these texts to the screen. Ilka Kressner s Sites of Disquiet examines these representations of alternative dimensions in Spanish American short narratives and their transformations to the cinematic screen. The study is informed by contemporary critical approaches to spatiality, especially the concepts of atopos (non-space), spaces of mobility, sites of differance, of a self-effacing presence, and sonic spaces. Kressner s comparative study of textual and cinematic constructions of non-spaces highlights the potential and limits of inter-arts adaptation. Film not only portrays the sites in ways that are intrinsic to the medium, but during the cinematic translation, it further develops the textual presentations of space. Text and film illuminate each other in their renderings of echoes, gaps, absences, and radical openness. The shared focus of the two media on precarious spaces highlights their awareness of the physical and situational conditions in the works. Therefore, it vindicates the import of space and dwelling, and the often underestimated impact of surroundings on the human body and mind. Despite their heterogeneity, the artistic elaborations of these ambivalent atopoi all share a liberating impulse: they assert creative and open-ended interactions with space where volatility ceases to be a negative term.

Contents:

Introduction: Spotting the non-space

Into spatial vagueness: Jorge Luis Borges's and Miguel Picazo's Hombre de la esquina Rosada

The power of staging: spaces of emulation in Jorge Luis Borges's "Tema del traidor y del heroe" and Bernardo Bertolucci's Strategia del ragno

Screening the void: Julio Cortazar's "cartas de mama" and Manuel Antin's and Miguel Picazo's filmic translations

Echoes in the dark: Pedro Paramo on the page and on the screen

Toward amor vacui: Gabriel Garcia Marquez's and Ruy Guerra's erendiras

Epilogue: The non-space revisited.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographies and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

1-61249-287-8

OCLC:

867772904