Swallowed: Political Ecology and Environmentalism in the Spanish American "Novela de la

Selva"
Author(s): Scott DeVries
Source: Hispania, Vol. 93, No. 4 (December 2010), pp. 535-546
Published by: American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese
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Swallowed: Political
Ecology
and Environmentalist!!
in the
Spanish
American Novela de la Selva
Scott DeVries
Bethel
College,
USA
Abstract: In this
paper,
I
begin
with the identification of a moment of
intertextuality
between Un
viejo
que
leia novelas de amor
(1989) by
Chilean Luis
Sepulveda
and La
vordgine (1924) by
Colombian Jose
Eustasio Rivera as an
analytical
motif for a reevaluation of the environmentalist]! and
political ecologies
in the
Spanish
American novela de la selva tradition. I find that
many
of the well-established titles from
the
genre
utilize a discourse of
political ecology
that can be characterized
by
its
appeals
to
agents
of the
state.
However,
I
propose
a countertradition in the novela de la selva
genre
that
expresses aspects
of
environmentalism such as the
principles
of
"deep ecology,"
the role of emotion in nature
protectionism,
conservationism,
the
rights
of nonhuman
nature,
etc. These works are
precursors
to the
literary
environ
mentalism of
Sepulveda's
novel and deserve a
place
in the canon of the novela de la selva.
Furthermore,
they anticipate
and inform the environmentalism of
Spanish
American literature in
particular and,
as
such, ought
to be considered an essential element of environmentalist discourse in
general, especially
if
that movement wishes to include local
perspectives
on such a
globally important ecological
asset as the
Amazonian selva.
Keywords: ecocriticism, environmentalism,
Jose Eustasio
Rivera,
La
voragine,
Luis
Sepulveda,
novela de
la
selva, political ecology,
Un
viejo que
leia novelas de amor
In Chilean Luis
Sepulveda's
Un
viejo que
leia novelas de amor
(1989),
the narrator de
scribes how in
Ecuador,
buscadores de oro waited for the end of the
rainy
season before
setting
off to look for more
gold. Every year
several would set out
early
and some would
disappear, "quien
sabe si
tragados por
la corriente o
por
la voracidad de la selva"
(78).
This
"devouring" image
of the selva is reminiscent of the
closing
line of Colombian Jose Eustasio
Rivera's La
vordgine (1924).
In Rivera's
text,
Arturo Cova and his
companions disappear
into
the
dangerous jungle;
the cable from the consul
declares,
"Los devoro la selva"
(250).
The
intertextuality
of the
image
invites a consideration of the similarities between the two texts.
First,
La
vordgine,
one of the earlier
examples
of the novela de la selva
genre,1
and Un
viejo
que
leia novelas de amor,
one of the most
recent,
feature the familiar Romantic
representation
of the educated man or urban dweller who
goes
to the selva with ideas of
developing, civilizing,
and
industrializing;
this
figure engages
in what scholar
Jorge
Marcone has characterized as a
"return to nature"
("Retorno").
Yet,
despite
these
similarities,
the two novels differ
markedly
in
each one's
representation
of the
ecological
ideas of their time. In La
vordgine, opposition
to the
human
injustice
of rubber extraction is
primary,
with concern about deforestation
an
insignifi
cant element of the text's
political ecology;
in
Sepulveda's
novel, however,
environmentalism
functions as an
explicit
discourse. This difference informs the central
question
of this article:
what
precedent
existed in
previous
novelas de la selva for the environmentalist discourse that
emerges
in
Sepulveda's
novel?
I
begin
with an
assumption
that there are certain "usual
suspects"
within the "canon" of the
novela de la selva: the short stories of
Uruguayan
Horacio
Quiroga,
La
vordgine
and Canaima
(1935) by
Venezuelan Romulo
Gallegos,
La
serpiente
de oro
(1935) by
Peruvian Ciro
Alegria,
AATSP
Copyright
? 2010.
Hispania
93.4
(2010):
535-546
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All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
536
Hispania
93 December 2010
Los
pasosperdidos (1953) by
Cuban
Alejo Carpentier,
and La casa verde
(1966) by
Peruvian
Mario
Vargas
Llosa. These are the most often cited works in
scholarly analyses
of the
genre
and
typically
contain
expressions
of
political ecology specific
to their
temporal
and
political
context.
However,
several other
texts,
contemporary
to the "usual
suspects"
but
neglected
in
the
"canon,"
take
political ecology
in different directions and even
prefigure aspects
of the
current environmentalist discourse:
deep ecology,
conservationism,
sustainable
development,
and notions about the
rights
of nonhuman animals.
Among
these are Tod
(1933) by
Colombian
Cesar Uribe
Piedrahita;
Una
mujer
en la selva
(1936) by Nicaraguan
Hernan
Robleto;
the
trilogy comprising Sangama (1942),
Selva
trdgica (1956),
and Bubinzana
(1960) by
Peruvian
Arturo D.
Hernandez;
El mensu
que triunfo
en la selva
(1951) by Argentine
Valentin
Barrios;
and
Llanura,
soledady
viento
(1960) by
Colombian Manuel Gonzalez Martinez. The aim of
this article is to call attention to these "unusual
suspects,"
not
simply
to
expand
the canon but to
demonstrate that
they express many
of the
aspects
of environmentalism
eventually
articulated
in
Sepulveda's
novel.
The
Literary
Environmentalism of Luis
Sepulveda's
Un
viejo que
leia novelas de amor
Several moments in
Sepulveda's
novel articulate an environmentalist discourse from the
perspective
of the
Spanish
American novela de la selva. Even before the novel
opens, Sepulveda
explicitly
frames the environmentalism of the narrative. In the
Tusquets
edition of Un
viejo que
leia novelas de amor
(1993),
for
example,
he notes that Chico Mendes was killed
only
a
couple
of
days
before the novel was awarded the
Tigre
Juan
prize,
but that the
prize
would
belong
to
his
memory
and to "todos los
que
continuaran tu
camino,
nuestro camino colectivo en defensa
de
este,
el unico mundo
que
tenemos"
(9).
In the novel
proper,
the narrator characterizes the in
teraction in the
jungle
between nature and its
nonindigenous
inhabitants as a series of errors:
Tanto los colonos como los buscadores de oro cometian toda clase de errores
estupidos
en
la selva. La
depredaban
sin
consideration, y
esto
conseguia que algunas
bestias se volvieran
feroces.... Y estaban tambien los
gringos
venidos desde las instalaciones
petroleras.
Llegaban
en
grupos
bulliciosos
portando
armas suficientes
para equipar
a un
batallon, y
se
lanzaban monte adentro
dispuestos
a acabar con todo lo
que
se moviera. Se ensanaban con los
tigrillos
sin diferenciar crias o hembras
prenadas, y,
mas
tarde,
antes de
largarse,
se
fotografiaban
junto
a las docenas de
pieles
estacadas.
(59-60)
These errors are contrasted with the wisdom that the
protagonist
Jose Antonio Proano
acquires
living among
the Shuar in Amazonian Ecuador. He learns their customs
concerning
hunt
ing:
not
killing
"un
cachorro,
ni de
tigrillo
ni de otra
especie.
Solo
ejemplares adultos,
como
indica la
ley
shuar"
(122).
In
general,
Un
viejo que
leia novelas de amor advocates an ethics
of human-nature interaction after this
"ley
shuar" that
rejects
excessive use of resources and
deforestation in favor of a
lifestyle
of conservation and sustainable
consumption:
"Los shuar
no cazan
tigrillos.
La carne no es comestible
y
la
piel
de uno solo alcanza
para
hacer cientos de
adornos
que
duran
generaciones" (123).
The natural
setting
of the selva is written as a limitless
supplier
of nutrition and a restorer of
vitality:
"Comia en cuanto sentia hambre. Seleccionaba
los frutos mas
sabrosos,
rechazaba ciertos
peces por parecerle
lentos"
(45).
Its healthful effect
on Proano is described in the
following
terms: "La vida en la selva
templo
cada detalle de su
cuerpo. Adquirio
musculos felinos
que
con el
paso
de los anos se volvieron correosos"
(50).
This
idealized vision of the selva as a
nourishing
and
invigorating place complements
the
critique
of
development
in the
narrative,
as
many
moments in
Sepulveda's
novel describe several of the
most central tenets of environmentalism:
conservation,
sustainability, critiques
of
deforestation,
the idealization of
nature,
and the wisdom of
indigenous groups.
For the
purposes
of this
paper,
I understand environmentalism as a multifaceted social
phenomenon composed
of various
tendencies, foci,
and
emphases. Anthropologist Kay
Milton
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DeVries / Political
Ecology
and Environmentalism 537
defines it as the
expression
of "concern that the environment should be
protected, particularly
from the harmful effects of human activities
[expressed] through government policies, [or]
through
demands for
changes
in land
use";
it can also involve
"protest against
a commercial
ethos"
{Environmentalism 27, 28)
or the emulation of nonindustrial
societies, perceived
as
"models for a sustainable or conserver
society" (28)
that maintain
"spiritual
ties"
(29)
to their
land. In Un
viejo que
leia novelas de
amor,
harmful human activities include those of
gringo
hunters and colono
gold seekers,
whereas the Shuar
community's knowledge
of the land is held
up
as the
preferred
noncommercial model.
According
to Jonathan
Bate,
the Romantics
(and,
subsequently,
the
environmentalists)
idealized such societies because their members "live in
rhythm
with nature"
(542).
Milton's
anthropological analysis
of nature
protectionists
identifies
a similar
spiritual
or emotional
commitment,
most
succinctly
characterized as a love of nature.
This has led environmentalists toward
"deep ecology,"
a radical environmentalist
lifestyle
first
articulated
by
Arne Naess in the 1970s based
upon
the
assumption
that individuals
ought
"to
feel inclined to act
benevolently
towards nature" and that "identification with nature and natural
things
is the
process through
which this inclination towards benevolent action is
thought
to
develop.
. . .
Anyone
who identifies with natural
things,
who sees them as
part
of
themselves,
is therefore
likely
to feel inclined to
protect
them"
(Milton, Loving 74-75).
Proano's identifi
cation with nature in the novel follows his transformation from a character who first wants to
destroy
the natural
world?"queria vengarse
de
aquella region maldita,
de ese infierno verde.
...
Sonaba con un
gran fiiego
convirtiendo la amazonia entera en una
pira" (44)?to
one who
identifies with it to such an extent that he curses "todos los
que emputecian
la
virginidad
de su
amazonia"
(137).
The use of the
possessive effectively
communicates Proano's total identifica
tion with the
selva;
he thinks of it as "su amazonia."
Finally,
and in
light
of the fact that this is an
analysis
of a
genre
of
Spanish
American
literature,
I should define what I mean
by literary
environmentalism. In
general,
I will
rely
on
two
concepts: political ecology
and the ecosublime. In the introduction to Liberation
Ecology,
Richard Peet and Michael
Watts,
citing
social
scientists,
geographers, anthropologists,
and his
torians like Eric
Wolf,
Alex
Cockburn,
James
Ridgeway, Raymond Bryant,
Piers
Blaikie,
and
Harold
Brookfield,
offer a
summary
of the various
characteristics, tendencies,
and
possibilities
of
political ecology.
For the
purposes
of this
paper,
I have distilled their conclusions to this
definition: the
concept
can be defined as
analysis (approaching advocacy)
of the
way
in which
certain communities
negotiate
access to natural resources and interactions with the environment.
Peet and Watts
suggest
several directions for
political ecology
that include
making
"the causal
connections between the
logics
and
dynamics
of
capitalist growth
and
specific
environmental
outcomes
rigorous
and
explicit" (9); exploring
how
agents
of a state mediate conflicts
concerning
"nature,
labor
power,
and communal conditions of
production" (9); considering
the influence
of "the institutions of civil
society,"
such as environmental movements and local
practices;
and
tackling
issues
concerning
"the
plurality
of
perceptions
and definitions of environmental and
resource
problems" (11).
The idea of the transcendent ecosublime comes from ideas
by
Jonathan Bate and Lee
Rozelle. Bate views the
way
in which "old woodlanders" inhabit nature as
entailing
a sense of
belonging
as
opposed
to the
experience
of "modern men":
For the old
woodlanders,
there is no division between human intercourse and local environment.
The
presence
of
memory
means that the
countryside
is inhabited rather than viewed
aesthetically.
The condition of the modern
man,
with his
mobility
and his
displaced knowledge,
is never to
be able to share this sense of
belonging.
He will
always
be an
outsider;
his return to nature will
always
be
partial, touristic,
and semi-detached.
(554)
Although
Bate's characterization of the
ecological
condition of modern individuals seems to
preclude anything
but a
"partial,
touristic,
and semi-detached"
experience
of
nature,
Rozelle's
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538
Hispania
93 December 2010
conception
of the "ecosublime" redeems the value of such mediated
experiences:
"There is no
affective difference between the natural sublime and the rhetorical
ecosublime;
both have the
power
to
bring
the
viewer, reader,
or
player
to
heightened
awareness of real natural environments.
Both can
promote advocacy" (3).
The
approach
here will be
analysis
of not
only
the
way
in
which texts can articulate and/or criticize
political ecologies,
but also of the means
by
which the
"ecosublime" arouses environmentalist reactions in readers. That
is,
transcendent
experiences
of
nature mediated
by
literature?in this
case,
the
Spanish
American novela de la
selva?suggest
attitudes toward the natural world that
correspond
to the discourse of environmentalism.
The First
Suspects:
The
Legacy
of Romanticism in the Novela de la Selva from
Jorge
Isaacs's Maria and Juan Leon Mera's Cumandd
Lydia
de Leon
Hazera,
in La novela de la selva
hispanoamericana, begins
her
survey
with
what are considered two antecedents of the tradition: Maria
(1867) by
Colombian
Jorge
Isaacs
and Cumandd
(1879) by
Ecuadoran Juan Leon Mera. In these
novels,
the
representation
of nature
follows the Romantic
tendency
to idealize and
anthropomorphize
nature such that in Maria the
land
ambivalently
embodies the
protagonists'
attitudes and
emotions,
whereas in Cumandd the
selva is idealized as
helpful
friend or mother. In Isaacs's
novel,
as the narrator falls in love with
Maria,
the
forests, plains,
and rivers are
metaphors
for her
beauty,
but in the
closing chapters
of
the
book,
when
they
are
apart
and Maria is
dying,
nature is transformed into a cruel obstacle. In
Mera's
text,
the
unfailingly
idealized selva facilitates the
protagonist
Cumanda's
escape
from
her
pursuers:
"Toda la naturaleza convida a
acompanarla
en sus
magnificas
armomas matina
les.
Hay gratisima
frescura en el
ambiente,
dulces susurros en las
hojas,
suave
fragancia
en las
flores"
(116).
Cumanda and her
indigenous
kin are called
"hijos
de las selvas"
(39)
and
"hijos
del desierto"
(68).
These manifestations of the Romantic idealization of nature led Hazera to
describe Maria as "la manifestation mas
lograda
del romanticismo
hispanoamericano" (25),
while, regarding
Cumandd,
she comments that "en los
parrafos
dedicados a la
description
de
la
selva,
Mera
persiste
en su
interpretation
romantico-catolica" characterized
by
"una actitud
idealizante hacia la naturaleza a lo
largo
de la novela"
(48).
The
protoenvironmentalist
ideas of
Romantic writers are well documented in The Green Studies
Reader,
edited
by
Laurence
Coupe,
who subtitles the
anthology
From Romanticism to Ecocriticism.
Eventually,
the
twentieth-century
novela de la selva that evolved from these
early Spanish
American Romantic
representations
of nature
similarly develops
an
environmentalist
discourse,
but one that
comprises
a
literary
process
in which the
genre
alternately diverges from,
but also
readily
returns
to,
its
origins
in
European
Romanticism.
This
divergence
can be traced to the fact
that,
as Hazera
observes,
"Lo
que
modifica el
aparato
romantico es la naturaleza
americana,
de
cuyas
voces autoctonas
y
de
cuyo
realismo
nunca se han
despegado
del todo los autores
hispanoamericanos" (23-24).
The
immediacy
of
nature for
Spanish
American authors conditioned their narratives rather than the idea of nature
as an
escape
from the
overwhelming
industrialization that was common to the
writings
of Eu
ropean Romantics;
for the
latter,
their work was a
reaction to the
highly
urbanized
landscapes
of the Old
World, whereas,
for the
former,
this was more the
product
of
literary
emulation
and,
consequently,
it was more
susceptible
to the
ecological
"facts on the
ground." Thus,
the novela
de la selva both maintains but often
subsequently rejects
or modifies canonical elements of
Romanticism: its
metaphors
of
nature,
its
representation
of the awe of human interactions with
sublime
nature,
and
especially,
as
Raymond
Williams
put
it in The
Country
and the
City,
"a
feeling
for unaltered
nature,
for wild land"
(qtd.
in "Green"
51).
The influence of the
European
Romantics on the
nineteenth-century
writers of the
newly independent
nations of the Americas
was
considerable,
but the discourse of the novela de la selva that
emerges
in the twentieth cen
tury
articulates
uniquely Spanish
American
political ecologies
and even
protoenvironmentalist
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DeVries / Political
Ecology
and Environmentalism 539
ideas: radical
adaptation
to nature as in
deep ecology,
the value of both human and nonhuman
nature,
the emulation of nonindustrial
societies,
etc.
Canonical
examples
of the novela de la selva
represent something quite
different from their
Romantic forebears in that
they
confound the
representation
of nature as a
place
of
refuge
for
civilized individuals from the
madding
crowd of overindustrialized cities and contain
political
ecologies
that turn on neocolonial
political
economics.
But,
as I will
argue
in the second
part
of
this
paper,
the Romantic
yearning
for "unaltered
nature,
for wild land" matures in the novela de
la selva to become an ever more
explicit
environmentalist
discourse,
particularly
as contained
in several novels that fit the
profile
of the
genre but,
for one reason or
another,
no
longer
are or
never have been considered canonical. I
propose
that this environmentalist countertradition must
henceforth be included in the "canon"
given
the
importance
of discourses of environmentalism
and
political ecology
for current
literary
and cultural studies.
The Usual
Suspects:
Political
Ecologies
of Control and
Consumption
in
Quiroga,
La
vordgine^
Canaima,
and La
serpiente
de oro
Uruguayan
Horacio
Quiroga's
short stories feature a kind of neocolonial
political ecology
where the
selva,
for the first
time,
is
represented
not as a
place
of
refuge
but as a resource.
Jennifer French has
carefully
documented how the forces of British neocolonialism in Latin
America were a
primary
cause for the
problematization
of
people's relationship
to the land.
She indicates that "nature is
represented
in its
productive capacity, specifically
as the locus of
a
political
contest
among
local
workers,
the national
elite,
and
foreign capitalists" (36).
These
economic factors and a
consequent political ecology
of control and
consumption
of the selva are
characteristic of
many
of the novels in the "canon" and
represent
a
significant departure
from
the Romantic
literary
models of
European
writers after Chateaubriand via
Spanish
American
novels like Maria and Cumandd. French finds that
Quiroga's ecologism
"oscillates between
careful attention to the natural world and the crucial fact that control of nature is almost
always
a
question
of
social, political,
and economic
power" (63-64).
An
analysis
of stories like "Las
fieras
complices" (1908)
and "Los mensu"
(1914)
from that
perspective
bears this
out,
and
several other scholars have focused on this tension between nature and
"social, political,
and
economic
power"
in
Quiroga's
work.2
I return to Rivera's La
vordgine,
which was
published just
after most of
Quiroga's
stories
first
appeared
and features a
political ecology
critical of the
laxity
of state bureaucracies con
cerning
the
exploitation
of rubber
tappers.
French finds that Rivera's novel
proceeds largely
"in terms of the
relationship
between the law and the
land, arguing
that the
government's faulty
administration was visible in the
landscape
itself
(130).
Other critics
identify
social
injustice,
political economy,
and
authority
and land use as central elements of the novel's
political
ecol
ogy.3 Although
the
plight
of the workers is the issue with which the novel most
explicitly
con
cerns
itself,
the environmental
damage
of the rubber extraction
industry
is not
always ignored.
In one scene from the
novel,
the cauchero Clemente Silva
expresses regret
about the effects
of the
industry
on a certain
species
of tree: "Los caucheros
que hay
en Colombia
destruyen
anualmente millones de arboles. En los territorios de Venezuela el balatd
desaparecio.
De esta
suerte
ejercen
el fraude contra las
generaciones
del
porvenir" (177).
French notices that this
sentiment?something approaching
an
advocacy
of sustainable
development?represents
a
subtle but
important anomaly:
"La
vordgine begins
to
articulate?tentatively, intermittently?
a
relationship
to nature that is based
on the desire to understand rather than to dominate and
subdue"
(147).
These
exceptions
to those
political ecologies
associated almost
exclusively
with
statist
ideologies
that characterize the novela de la selva are
precisely
the anomalies that
justify
a reexamination of both canonical and noncanonical works in conversation with the
principles
of environmentalism found in Un
viejo que
leia novelas de amor.
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540
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93 December 2010
Romulo
Gallegos's
Canaima is the
coming-of-age story
of
protagonist
Marcos
Vargas
who embarks
upon
what Marcone has described as a "return to nature" in search of a life more
in
harmony
with nature. Such returns
ultimately
end in failure for
many
of the
protagonists
of
the novela de la selva\ "The alternative modern life or the alternative
path
for modernization is
defeated
by
natural forces and local factors or
by
the contradictions of
modernity" ("Cultural
Criticism"
288).
Marcone has commented on this failure in La
serpiente
de
oro,
a
novel about the
balseros of the Peruvian
Upper Maranon,
a
tributary
of the Amazon.
However,
Vargas's
return
features several
episodes
where the
protagonist proves
his "manhood"
by gambling, dueling,
working, and,
most
significantly, surviving
the
dangers
of the selva
during
a hurricane. This
is referenced several times in the
concluding chapters
of the novel as the definitive moment in
the
development
of
Vargas
from
boyish youth
to
fully
realized man:
"[L]o que
Marcos
Vargas
traia de la selva no era
para
narrarlo. Sus
experiencias
de alia se habian fundido todas en la
emotion de la
tormenta,
la mas intensa
y plena
emotion de si mismo
que jamas
habia sentido
y
esto ni cabia en la memoria ni
podia
serle comunicado a otro"
(Gallegos 201).
Here the
image
of the selva is construed as a destination for
proving
one's full worth in a one-on-one encounter
with
nature; thus,
we
inevitably
return to the Romantic ideal of the
escape
to nature.
However,
Marcone
argues
that the "return to nature" in the novela de la selva
invariably represents
a
failure of some kind and constitutes a criticism of
political ecologies
associated with
present
discourses of sustainable
development.
Still,
the novels do contain brief moments that
express something
other than
political
ecol
ogy, something
more akin to the Romantic ideal of nature as destination: sublime moments like
Marcos
Vargas's experience
in the
hurricane,
or that
pang
of
regret
for the
disappearance
of
the balata in La
vordgine,
or when the
protagonists
of a few of
Quiroga's
stories retreat to the
selva to
escape
the
bewildering
excesses of modernization. "La miel
silvestre,"
for
example,
features a certain Gabriel Benincasa who in lieu of a bachelor
party goes
to
spend
a few
days
in
the
jungle
"con su libertad como fuente de dicha
y
sus
peligros
como encanto"
(105). Although
things
do not turn out
very
well for Benincasa
(he
eats some fermented wild
honey, passes out,
and is devoured
by
a horde of
ants),
the
liberating joy
of
jungle danger
functions as a
powerful
magnet
for human
desire,
even if the
consequences
of
poorly planned
environmental steward
ship ultimately
result in
suffering
or even death. Moments such as these are a central motif in
several other "noncanonical" novelas de la
selva;
some even feature returns to nature that do
not end in failure. It is to their consideration that I now turn.
The Unusual
Suspects:
Alternatives to Political
Ecology
in
Neglected
and
Forgot
ten Novelas de la Selva
Up
until the
contemporary literary history
of the novela de la
selva,
scholars have
largely
concurred with
regard
to the "canon":
Quiroga,
La
vordgine, Canaima,
La
serpiente
de
oro,
and the
leap
forward to Los
pasos
perdidos
and La casa verde.
However,
several other
novels,
written
contemporaneously
with or in
gaps
between these "usual
suspects"
contain alterna
tives to the
political ecologies
of the "canonical"
texts,
something
more akin to the
literary
environmentalism of
Sepulveda's
Un
viejo que
leia novelas de amor. The first of these
authors,
Cesar Uribe
Piedrahita,
was a Colombian
contemporary
of Jose Eustasio
Rivera,
but the 1933
publication
of Tod has fallen
by
the canonical
wayside.
This
may
be due to the fact that
despite
the
presence
of
many
of the same themes of cauchero abuse as in La
vordgine,
Tod does not
feature a narrator
anywhere
near as
intriguing
as Rivera's Cova.
Instead,
the
emphasis
in Tod
is on the
indigenous
rubber workers and on the love between a
doctor from
Bogota
and an
indigenized
mestiza
girl.
The
integration
of these two stories allows for an
exploration
of the
way
in which the rubber
industry
affects
indigenous
Colombians.
Also,
as in La
vordgine,
Tod
features a
political ecology
that
appeals
to the state for mediation of conflicts
concerning
the
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DeVries / Political
Ecology
and Environmentalism 541
natural world: "Ese informe
.. .
tiene
que
decidir al
gobierno
...
o si
no,
nos llevan todos los
diablos, y
al fin se acaban las
tribus,
se
agota
el caucho
y
esto se vuelve un desierto"
(74).
The
difference is that in Piedrahita's novel there is an
awareness,
often
implicit,
but
occasionally
explicit (as
in the above
passage),
that the baleful effects of rubber extraction
may
not
simply
be a
question
of
reforming
an
industry
for its human
trafficking,
its abuse of
workers,
and its
manipulation
of
prices,
but that these elements have to do with nature
itself,
with its
violation,
its
desertification,
its destruction. These last
categories
have become
targets
of the ethical
ideology
of current
conservationism,
"the concern that the environment should be
protected, particularly
from the harmful effects of human activities"
(Milton,
Environmentalism
27).
What
surprises
is the
expression
of this
clearly
environmentalist concern in a
literary
moment from the
early
1930s, particularly
when a novel
{La vordgine)
written
by
an author from the same
country,
about the same
jungle,
less than ten
years
before has almost
nothing
like that.
If Tod has faded from the
scholarly spotlight,
Una
mujer
en la selva
(1936) by Nicaraguan
Hernan Robleto can be characterized
by
its absolute
nonstatus,
entirely neglected by
scholars
in
general.
The novel recounts the tale of a
woman,
Emilia
Rivera,
kidnapped
to the selva
by
a
gorilla
that she then
grows
to love.
Finally,
when the
gorilla dies,
she is
given
the chance to
return to "civilization" but does not return. She visits a
nearby village only long enough
to steal
a
pad
of
paper
that becomes her
diary,
the
literary
frame for the novel.
Apparently,
the
story
was
inspired by legends
told in Robleto's hometown of
Camoapa, Nicaragua
"sobre monos
que
robaban
mujeres que
se descuidaban en los lavaderos"
(Urbina,
"Estilo
y estructura")
and
likely
also
by
the simian-human love
story
from the first film version of
King Kong
released in
1933,
just
three
years
before Robleto's novel.
Also,
the female
protagonist's
surname and the
novel structured as a found
manuscript
are clear references to La
vordgine. Now,
like the criti
cism of the rubber
industry
in Rivera's
novel,
the text is not without its own
political ecology
of the kind described
by
Peet and Watts that seeks to make "the causal connections between
the
logics
and
dynamics
of
capitalist growth
and
specific
environmental outcomes
rigorous
and
explicit" (9).
In the
closing chapter,
Emilia hears the
approach
of
loggers
who are
clearing
the
forest for
farming,
and what follows is an
unequivocal
condemnation of
development: logging
is "un mordisco a la montana" that results in "la muerte del
bosque" by loggers "destruyendo
para
la civilization"
(158). But,
there is another side to it in Robleto's novel.
As she
spends
more time
among
the
trees,
Emilia
grows
to love them: "Al
principio
corrian
escalofrios de
incomprension por
mi
espinazo; pero
ahora veo como la cosa mas natural
que
los arboles
tengan
alma"
(111).
This
expression
of love for the selva is what makes Robleto's
novel a
counterexample
to the failure of the "return to nature" that Marcone identifies as so
characteristic of the texts considered in the first
part
of this
paper.
Unlike the
protagonists
from
those
novels,
here is a
nonindigenous
visitor who finds the Romantic ideal of
nature?peaceful
refuge,
even love. In her
journal,
Emilia describes the favors of nature:
"perfumes
de
copel,
del
liquidambar y
del
balsamo;
frutas deliciosas
y
la musica
. . .
semejante
a un concierto
maravilloso"
(153)
and receives embraces from "los arboles
amigos" (138).
She has
literally
become a tree
hugger
and nature
lover, which,
as Milton
argues
in her
anthropological study
of
environmentalists, comprises
"a
perfectly respectable
credential for nature
protectionists
and
is more or less taken for
granted
in
many
contexts"
{Loving 24).
In the
novel,
Emilia falls in
love with the
gorilla
that has
kidnapped
her
(like
Ann Darrow from
King Kong),
names
him,
shares a nest with
him, grooms him,
receives food from
him,
finds water for
him,
and
eventually
grieves
his death as if he were
truly
her mate. The
representation
of a literal love for nature in
the
human-gorilla couple
and in the amorous
language
with which Emilia describes the trees
communicates the credential for nature
protectionism
described
by
Milton. It is also notable
that this novel
prefigures
the
intelligent
sentience of animals that is central to
Sepulveda's
work.
In Un
viejo que
leia novelas de amor,
the ocelot
cunningly
hunts and sets
traps
for humans but
also
grievously
mourns the loss of her mate at the hands of the
gringo
hunter. When Proano is
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542
Hispania
93 December 2010
forced to kill
her,
it
represents something
akin to
killing
a
part
of
himself,
so
intimately
does
he
experience
an identification with nature. This fictionalization of the
principle
of identifica
tion from Naess's
deep ecology
in
Sepulveda clearly
has
precedent
in Robleto's novel with its
representation
of human-animal
companionship
and the
unwillingness
of Emilia to abandon
her natural home and return to civilization.
Like Una
mujer
en la selva and
Tod,
a
trilogy
of selva novels
by
Peruvian Arturo D. Hernan
dez has also not received its
scholarly
due. The author himself was from
among
a
generation
of writers that included Ciro
Alegria
and Jose Maria
Arguedas,
with the former a "canonical"
author in the novela de la selva tradition and the latter one of the most well-known
indigenista
writers.
Although perhaps eclipsed by
his
compatriots
in
literary reputation,
the
Utopian
and
dystopian jungle
scenarios of Hernandez's
trilogy
merit reconsideration for the
way
in which
they prefigure
the ideals of
deep ecology.
In the
first,
Sangama,
the titular character foresees
an
apocalyptical
future
jungle civilization,
but when he fails to
bring
this
about,
he commits
ritual suicide. Selva
trdgica
narrates the bitter
experience
of a
nonindigenous
cautiva
among
the
Capanahua
of Peru.
Finally,
Bubinzana features a
Roman Catholic
priest
who tries and fails
to create an idealized
community
of former rubber
tappers.
The
ecologically Utopian aspect
of
the selva that is so characteristic of
Sepulveda's
novel and the Romantic idealization of nature
are central
aspects
of the Hernandez
trilogy.
In
Sangama,
the selva is contrasted
favorably
with the
city: "[AJquellos que arroja
como
desperdicios
la
ciudad, aqui
se
regeneran" (52-53)
and is seen as the center from which a new
society
can
emerge: "^,Por que
no
adaptarse
a los
dictados de la selva
y
crear en ella un nuevo
tipo
de civilization?
. . .
[E]l
verdadero hombre
libre esta
aqui;
solo
que
se trata del hombre
adaptado
al medio"
(95).
In the other two
novels,
a similar
Utopian
discourse
permeates
the narrative. In Selva
trdgica,
an
anthropologist
taken
prisoner by
the
Capanhua
believes that within the selva
"radica,
a no
dudarlo,
la
esperanza
de la
humanidad
angustiada" (227).
The
priest
in Bubinzana asserts a similar ideal: "No era cuestion
de rehuir a la civilization
para
formar una
comunidad
utopica, extrahumana;
sino de venir con
ella
para conquistar
la selva
y
descubrir sus secretos en
bien de la humanidad"
(137).
Each of
the
protagonists represents
an
example
of the failure of the "return to nature" like those of the
"usual
suspects"
considered in the first
part
of this article: their
Utopian
ideals are never realized.
However,
in these three
novels,
the idea of
Utopian
nature
"expressed
in
specific
locations outside
industrial
society" (Milton,
Environmentalism
28)
is articulated as the
only
authentic
possibility
for
hope, freedom,
and the future
well-being
of
humanity.
The
requirement
that humans must
be
"adaptados
al medio" in order to
enjoy
these benefits
expresses
a central
principle
of
"deep
ecology"
instead of a
political ecology.
Hernandez's
trilogy
does not feature the
negotiation
of access to
resources,
but advocates
an
adaptation
to the natural
world,
such that the
question
of access to resources becomes moot.
In the
trilogy,
the
representation
of such
radically ecological adaptation through
characters who
seek a form of transcendent
belonging
to the
selva?spiritual, indigenist, regenerative?comprises
an
example
of Rozelle's rhetorical ecosublime. In each
novel,
the reader is
fully
immersed in
stories that
produce "heightened
awareness of real natural environments"
(3)
and is
challenged
to
adapt
to the natural world
just
as the characters in the Hernandez
trilogy
do.
Despite
the
obvious
inspirational
deficiencies of
suicide, disillusionment,
and
captivity,
the discourse of
Hernandez's novels?the
regenerative powers
of
nature,
the
requirement
for
adapting
human life
to the natural
world,
a belief in the
power
of nature for the benefit of
humankind?effectively
articulates
principles
that anchor current environmentalist
thought.
At the
beginning
of this
article,
I offered a
working
definition of environmentalism that
included
political ecologies
whose
emphases
were almost
entirely upon
entities of the state:
appeals
for
governmental
reform of land
management,
the
expectation
that
properly
informed
representatives
will halt certain
abuses,
the role of neocolonialism in resource
extraction,
etc.
However,
political ecology may
also
highlight
"the
plurality
of
perceptions
and definitions of
environmental and resource
problems" (Peet
and Watts
11).
In El mensu
que triunfo
en la selva
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DeVries / Political
Ecology
and Environmentalism 543
by
Valentin
Barrios,
a tale of trials and
triumphs
of the
campesino
Tristan in the
yerba
mate
groves
of the
upper
Parana
region
of
Paraguay,
both manifestations of
political ecology
are
pres
ent: an articulation of the ambivalence of
perceptions
of the selva and an examination of local
practices.
In the first
case,
the novel contains several
passages
that attest to its sublime
qualities
but that are
tempered by
context. Statements like "El machete
. . .
parecia
entonar canticos a
la sordina en honor de la sublimidad de la naturaleza"
(205)
and "El muchacho
. . .
bebia su
inspiration
en la sublime fuente de la Naturaleza"
(241)
are often followed
by
an
expressed
need
to abandon these sublime
places.
The vacillation between a transcendent
experience
of nature
and the
ever-present
desire to
get away
from it
represents
an ambivalence in the novela de la
selva with roots in
European
Romanticism in conflict with the realities of the natural world of
the American continent. From the stories of
Quiroga
to the misadventures of
Cova,
and even
the initial
experiences
of Proano within the
jungle,
the
genre
is filled with
protagonists
who
are attracted
by
the allure of the selva but suffer
gravely
once
they actually get
there. What is
remarkable about El mensu
que triunfo
en la selva is that these
equivocations
occur so close
together
and from the
perspective
of the same character. In
fact,
this is what constitutes the
uniqueness
of the novel's
political ecology:
Tristan's
plurality
of
perception
with
regard
to the
selva is illustrative of the
challenges
of its definitive
representation
which,
in
turn,
is
allegorical
of the
very
real conflicts that arise when
negotiations
of access to resources rest
upon
definitions
and
perceptions
of
value, sacredness, rights, authority,
and
ownership
of the natural world.
Finally,
Manuel Gonzalez Martinez's
Llanura,
soledady
viento
represents
an unfortunate
example
of the
way
in which more well-known works can blunt an awareness of alternate tenden
cies within certain traditions?in this
case,
the
literary
environmentalism of
Spanish
American
literature. Gonzalez Martinez's novel was
eclipsed by literary developments
in Colombia and
elsewhere in Latin
America,
most
notably, by
the
publication
of Gabriel Garcia
Marquez's
Cien
anos de soledad
(1967).
Readers' fascination with
magical
realism
and,
before
that,
with the
originality
of
Alejo Carpentier's
extensive use of
ideology, intertextuality,
and culture in the
representation
of the
jungle
in Los
pasos perdidos explains why
Gonzalez Martinez's
novel,
published exactly
seven
years
before and after these other
two,
has had much less of an
impact
on the
Spanish
American
literary
scene.
Llanura,
soledady
viento features the same humaniza
tion of animals as
Quiroga's
short
stories,
but the dominant discourse of statist
political ecology
inaugurated
in the call for
development
in
Argentine Domingo
Faustino Sarmiento's Facundo
(1845)
comes in for
sharp
criticism here. The effects of
development
on the natural world are
dramatized in the book as the animals
gradually
lose their habitat to the
dynamite blasting
used
by petroleum prospecting engineers employed by foreign corporations
and validated
by
the Colombian state. In one
exchange
between
a vulture and a
reptile,
the bird
reports
from its
privileged
aerial
perspective
how the land has been
poisoned:
"Si vieras ahora esas tierras como
las he visto
yo.
Hasta el color les han cambiado.
Aquel
no es un color de
tierra,
es un color
negro,
mas funebre
que
el color de mi
plumaje; y parece que
a
aquellas
tierras les cae
muy
bien
ese color de luto
porque
estan
muertas,
no
producen
nada,
ni
siquiera
hierbas venenosas"
(217).
This makes
a marked
departure
from animal discourse in
Quiroga
in that the conflict between
humans and animals is not a
struggle
for survival that takes the form of the
hunting
and
killing
of one
species by
another but of one
(the humans) poisoning
the habitat of another
(the animals).
Yet,
it also continues the trend of
representing
the sentience of the natural world and its animals
seen in
Quiroga's
Una
mujer
en la selva and
eventually
in
Sepulveda's
novel.
Not all humans in the
Llanura,
soledady
viento are as obtuse as the careless oil
prospectors.
In
fact,
the novel features an
exchange
between the llanero Victor Ramon and his
representatives
in the house of
deputies
in
Bogota.
Ramon
proposes
several methods of sustainable
agriculture
that
will ensure the land's
fecundity
for
generations
to come but realizes that he will
get
nowhere with
the
deputies
who are concerned with votes and not
sustainability: "[Y]
sus
tierras, que
son las reservas
del
fiituro...;
esas
tierras?pensaba?,
continuan siendo
quemadas,
destruidas
y
deforestadas"
(85).
Victor Ramon's "demand for
changes
in land use"
(Milton,
Environmentalism
27) expresses
an
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544
Hispania
93 December 2010
ecological protest
as
strong
and
unique
as had
yet
been seen in Latin American letters.
However,
the evolution of nature
representation
in
Spanish
American literature from the
prevalence
of
a statist
political ecology
to a more diverse kind of environmental
writing
was not to be ex
plored
in the
following years.
Gabriel Garcia
Marquez,
Carlos
Fuentes,
Julio
Cortazar,
Mario
Vargas Llosa,
and others were about to embark on a revolution of the more formal
aspects
of
literature?structure,
narrative
voice, language,
etc.?in what was to be called the "boom" of
Latin American literature.
The Current
Suspects:
The
Usurpation
of Political
Ecology
in Novelas de la Selva
from the Boom and
Beyond
As this "boom" of
Spanish
American literature drew to a
close, Vargas
Llosa's
unique
literary style
evolved from a
decidedly implicit
to a somewhat
unreservedly explicit emphasis
on
ecological
ideas. La casa verde and
Pantaleony
las visitadoras
(1974) represent typical
ex
amples
of
Vargas
Llosas's
totalizing
texts,
which
attempt
to
represent
all facets of a
given reality
through
the use of various
literary techniques: nonchronological
narration,
interior
monologues,
uninflected
dialogue
in an indirect
style, multiple
narrators,
and the creation of
myth.
These
metanarrative
techniques
have the effect of
removing any
kind of
message,
from the locus of
narrator to the
dialogue
of character. This
peculiar
narrative
style may
allow for the occasional
expression
of
ecological ideas,
but
only
as
reactions, recognitions, expressions,
or
platitudes.
Because the narrative exists almost
exclusively
to frame character
dialogue,
the
only
access to
"message"
occurs in the context of what the characters
say.
It is
difficult, therefore,
to come
away
from a
reading
of some of
Vargas
Llosa's earlier works with the
feeling
that an ethical
message
is
being communicated,
much less one as
specific
as environmentalist discourse.
In
Vargas
Llosa's later
novels, however, things
are
quite
different. In El hablador
(1987),
published roughly contemporaneously
with
Sepulveda's
El
viejo que
leia novelas de
amor,
these
same
literary techniques?multiple
narrators,
nonchronological
narration,
and the
incorporation
of
myth?are widely
used,
but the
dialogues among
the characters and the values
expressed by
the
indigenous Machiguengan storyteller convey
environmentalist ideas more
explicitly.
The
first narrator mentions that the
Machiguengua
tribe was able to
"preservar aquella
naturaleza,
aparentemente
tan
exuberante, y,
en realidad tan
fragil y perecedera,
de la
que dependia para
subsistir"
(29).
Later in the
text,
Vargas
Llosa has the hablador describe the land in terms of
injury
and mistreatment: "Si un dano ocurre en la
tierra,
es
porque
la
gente ya
no le
presta
atencion, porque
no la cuida como
hay que
cuidarla.
^Puede
la tierra hablar como nosotros?
. . .
No se olviden de
mi,
diciendo. Yo tambien
vivo,
diciendo. No
quiero que
me maltraten.
. . .
Tal vez los Padres Blancos
. . .
querian
hacerle dano a la tierra"
(217).
Both of these state
ments communicate ideas familiar to the environmentalist discourse
concerning consumption,
conservation,
the
fragility
of the natural
world,
and alternatives to
development.
With scholars
like Marcone who observe that
Vargas
Llosa has the hablador
impose
an "environmentalist
agenda
onto the
storyteller's
function"
("Jungle
Fever"
165),
and
considering
the late date of
the novel's
publication
in 1987
(two years
before
Sepuleveda's text),
it is not
surprising
that an
environmentalist discourse
emerges
now more
explicitly
from the
text,
even if the narrative is
not
by
an author
usually
associated with environmentalism.
Most of the works that I have
surveyed above,
some well
known,
others not so
much,
are
among
the most
promising
as evidence to
support my argument
that
Sepulveda's
novel was
preceded by
a
corpus
of texts that
implicitly express many
of the same environmentalist ideas
that are so
explicit
in Un
viejo que
leia novelas de amor
Furthermore,
this
survey
of some of
the "unusual
suspects"
considers a countertradition to the canonical works of the novela de la
selva
tradition,
one that communicates alternative
perspectives
on
principles
of
conservation,
deforestation,
alternatives to
development, sustainability,
and
deep ecology.
Tod,
Una
mujer
en
la
selva, mdLlanura,
soledady
viento,
in
particular,
merit careful
scholarly
reconsideration. The
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DeVries / Political
Ecology
and Environmentalism 545
primacy
of La
vordgine
in the novela de la selva tradition has overshadowed the contribution
of Tod as the
novelty
of the "boom" left
Llanura,
soledady
viento out of the critical
spotlight;
likewise,
the
literary obscurity
of Hernan Robleto has condemned Una
mujer
en la selva to a
similar fate.
Only recently
has
scholarship
on animals been formalized with the
founding
of
the Institute for Critical Animal Studies in
2007, yet
animal characters have been
mainstays
of
the novela de la selva since
Quiroga,
and with an
implicitly
environmentalist
emphasis
since
Robleto and Gonzalez Martinez. In the novels
by
these two
authors,
as well as in
Tod,
the
literary
representation
of
biodiversity, conservation, deforestation,
and environmental
justice comprise
aspects
of
deep ecology
and
represent
conservationist
political ecologies
well before these terms
became conventions of the current environmentalist discourse. These works are
precursors
to the
literary
environmentalism of
Sepulveda's
novel and deserve a
place
in the canon of the novela
de la selva. But more than
that, they anticipate
and inform the environmentalism of
Spanish
American literature in
particular
and,
as
such,
ought
to be considered an essential element of
environmentalist discourse in
general, especially
if that movement wishes to include local
perspectives
on such a
globally important ecological
asset as the Amazonian selva.
NOTES
lrrhe works in this tradition are known
by
various names.
Jorge
Marcone and Jennifer French use
the
terminology "regional
novel" to describe texts with a
particular affinity
to a
geographic region.
Carlos
J.
Alonso,
in The
Spanish
American
Regional
Novel:
Modernity
and
Autochthony,
uses that term in the
title but in the book itself
employs
the
Spanish
novela de la tierra with the same
meaning.
Marcone uses
"novela de la selva
"
to refer to fiction with
settings geographically specific
or similar to the Amazonian
jungle.
I follow that
usage
here.
2See articles
by Jorge
Marcone as well as the work of
Bridgette
W. Gunnels and Beatriz Rivera
Barnes.
3French's
bibliography
contains several of these
types
of
studies, including
the collection of
essays
in Montserrat Ordonez's La
vordgine:
Textos
criticos,
Ordonez's introduction to the Catedra edition of
the
novel,
and Carlos J. Alonso's
monograph.
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