Ficción adulterada: pasiones ilícitas del entresiglo venezolano

Creator: Nathalie Bouzaglo

Title: Ficción adulterada: pasiones ilícitas del entresiglo venezolano

Publisher: Beatriz Viterbo Editora

Date: 2016

Language: Spanish

Description:

For those who understand the late 19th-century Latin American novel as a foundational genre—where literature and nation are forged in close dialogue—Ficción adulterada by Nathalie Bouzaglo poses a challenge. It is no surprise that adultery, as a literary theme, abounds in the fiction of the period—a reflection, one might say, of the rise of a wealthy and, above all, desirous bourgeoisie, hungry for pleasure. While this may be obvious in European literature, the theme becomes more complex in Latin American fiction, where novels of the time not only reflect bourgeois desires but also that same class’s ambition to participate in the foundational projects of their respective nations. In other words, from the outset—and far from operating in separate spheres—desire and nation (or desire before the nation, or desire against the nation) are inextricably bound in a remarkable and only seemingly contradictory relationship.

Drawing on a meticulous study of novels and visual representations published in Venezuela at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century, Nathalie Bouzaglo confronts this apparent contradiction with admirable subtlety in a book whose conclusions offer new ways of rethinking the continent’s literature as a whole. Far from being a mere anecdotal element, a narrative device of minor consequence, adultery—Bouzaglo proposes—takes on an investigative potential. In these novels, it functions ideologically as a disruptive force, an adulterant that destabilizes national certainties.

While rooted in Venezuelan literature, Nathalie Bouzaglo’s finely tuned critical reflection opens new avenues of inquiry for all of Latin America’s literature of the period. She invites us to revisit a moment we once believed had been entirely accounted for. That is no small feat.

—Sylvia Molloy (translated from the Spanish by Archivo Venezuela)

Subject: Latin American literature, 19th century literature, Venezuelan literature, adultery in literature, nation-building, national identity, bourgeoisie, literary criticism, ideology in literature, fiction, Nathalie Bouzaglo, visual representations, 20th century literature, foundational novels, literary themes, social desire, cultural history, disruption in literature, narrative strategies, Latin American studies

Type: Text

Format: Printed book

Rights: External resource

Relation:

Review by Gina Saraceni in Cuadernos de Literatura (Spanish)

Announcement of the Fernando Coronil Award (Facebook, Spanish)

Publisher's page at Beatriz Viterbo Editora (Spanish)

WorldCat bibliographic record

Identifier: OCLC: 957078021 | ISBN: 9789508453471

Collection: Essay

Tags: 19th century literature, 20th century literature, adultery in literature, bourgeoisie, cultural history, desire and nation, disruption in literature, Fiction, foundational fiction, ideology and narrative, ideology in literature, Latin American studies, Literary criticism, literary themes, narrative strategies, Nathalie Bouzaglo, nation-building, national identity, social desire, Venezuelan literature, Venezuelan novel, visual representation, visual representations

Citation: Nathalie Bouzaglo, Ficción adulterada: pasiones ilícitas del entresiglo venezolano, Beatriz Viterbo Editora, 2016, OCLC: 957078021 | ISBN: 9789508453471, accessed September 22, 2026, https://archivovenezuela.com/en/items/show/1102