Exile inside (And) out: Woman, Nation, and the Exiled Intellectual in Jose Marmol's "Amalia"

Author(s): Christina Civantos

Source: Latin American Literary Review, Vol. 30, No. 59 (Jan. - Jun., 2002), pp. 55-78
Published by: Latin American Literary Review
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EXILE INSIDE
(AND)
OUT:
WOMAN, NATION,
AND THE EXILED INTELLECTUAL
IN JOSE MARMOL'S AMALIA
CHRISTINA CIVANTOS
Many
of the novels in 19th
century
Latin American literature which
most
closely
deal with the constitution of nation-states and national cultures
were written in exile and/or thematize exile. A
prime example
of this is
Argentine
Jos? M?rmol's Amalia. The
novel,
in addition to
having
been
written in exile in Montevideo in
1851,
is riddled with exile
as
both
a fear
and a
hope.
Most studies of this sentimentalist novel focus on how the novel
represents
and enacts the
political struggles
of the time between Unitarians
and Federalists and how the
representation
of women and romance
play
a
role in this
ideological struggle.
Having
been struck since
my
first
reading
of Amalia
by
the recurrence
of the
topic
of
exile,
the
uncertainty surrounding
the
concept
of
nationhood,
and the relative inversion of
prescribed gender
roles within a text known as
a foundational national
novel,
I have
struggled
to make sense of the
connections between these three main
strands,
all nodes of
ambiguity,
within the novel.
Through
an
exploration
of the intersection between
different
types
of exile and the
gendered politics
of the
text,
I would like to
propose
here that not
only
is
exile?every
bit as much as nation?at the
center of M?rmol's
novel,
but that exile in this novel is
primarily
filtered
through
the female
protagonist
Amalia.
A common definition of exile is: 'when
you
can't
go
home and
yet long
for return'?with the reasons for not
being
able to return established
according
to different criteria
(ideological
differences,
lack of freedom of
expression, danger
of
imprisonment,
actual
banishment).
The
writer,
unable
to
return,
often
goes
back
through writing.
Some
examples
of this from 19th
century
Latin American literature are Villaverde's Cecilia
Vald?s,
G?mez
de Avellaneda's
Sab,
and Sarmiento's Facundo
(with many
more,
and
differently
articulated,
examples
in the 20th
century).
What makes Amalia
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56 Latin American
Literary
Review
stand out
among
these 19th
century examples
is that exile is also
a
constantly
recurring
theme in the
novel?yet
in rather
contradictory ways.
Writing
in exile from the Rosas
regime,
M?rmol
presents
us with a
'national novel' riddled with the theme of exile. The novel starts out with the
description
of an
attempt
to
escape
into exile in Montevideo?and with the
first of
many
debates
among
the characters about the ethicalness of exile.
One of those
trying
to cross to
Montevideo,
Eduardo
Belgrano, points
to the
differing opinions
about exile: "es necesario dar el
paso que
damos... Sin
embargo
[...], hay alguien
en este mundo de Dios
que
cree lo contrario
que
nosotros
[....]
Es
decir, que piensa que
nuestro deber de
argentinos
es
permanecer
en Buenos Aires
[...,] que
menos n?mero de hombres moriremos
en las calles el d?a de una
revoluci?n, que
en los
campos
de batalla en cuatro
o seis
meses,
sin la menor
probabilidad
de triunfo..."
(M?rmol 5)
Belgrano,
who will be wounded in the
ensuing
clash with Rosas'
troops,
is
referring
here to the stance of his
good
friend Daniel Bello.
M?rmol,
as
part
of the Generation of
1837,
which
rejected
the out
moded classicism that
kept Argentina
locked into the battle between
Unitarians and Federalists while still
promoting
the Unitarian
ideals,
creates
a
protagonist,
Daniel
Bello,
who is a
protean figure
who switches between
a
variety
of roles in order to further his cause?the end of the Rosas
regime.
Bello uses a
gaucho-inspired
weapon
and when
necessary plays
the
part
of
the Federalist
very well,
yet
it is his
ability
to execute these
performances
with
eloquence
that is the marker of his
high degree
of 'civilization.'
Bello,
as
part
of his
political organizing against
Rosas,
moves back and forth
between Buenos Aires and Montevideo.
During
one
trip
to
Montevideo,
while
meeting
one of the exiled intellectuals of the Unitarian old
guard,
Bello
explains,
to the
surprise
of his
interlocutor,
that he is not an
?migr?,
but
rather,
that he is
just spending
a few hours in Montevideo.
(M?rmol 133)
Shortly
after
this,
the narrator also makes a
point
of
clearing up
Bello's
identity:
"Daniel
no era
emigrado;
no conoc?a esa vida de
ilusi?n,
de
esperanza,
de creaciones
fant?sticas, que despotizan
las m?s altas
inteligencias,
cuando la fiebre de la libertad las irrita
[....]" (M?rmol 135)
What
emerges,
then,
is a
picture
of Daniel Bello as a non-conformist?
someone who does not
operate
within the
logic
of Unitarian
versus Feder
alist,
or of exile versus non-exile.
Rather,
he creates a third
category
of
gaucho-like
Unitarian and
politically-mobilizing migrant.
Furthermore,
it
would seem that
implicit
in this characterization of Daniel is a criticism of
the false
hopes
and fantasies of exiles.
In contrast with the
daring
and
swash-buckling
hero of
Daniel,
we have
Eduardo
Belgrano,
who from the start to the finish of the novel is
attempting
to leave Buenos Aires?a
goal
which he does not reach as he and Daniel are
both slain
by
Federalist forces
just
before
escaping
to the boat which was to
transport
them to Montevideo.
Significantly,
while Daniel is a
courageous
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Woman, Nation,
and Exile in Jos? M?rmol's Amalia 57
hero of
legendary proportions,
it is in Eduardo that we find the emotional
core of the novel. The melodramatic
pull
of romance that is exerted over
readers is found in the
blossoming relationship
between Eduardo and the
novel's title character. After his first failed
attempt
at
fleeing
Buenos
Aires,
the wounded Eduardo is taken
by
Daniel to convalesce in the secluded home
of Daniel's widowed
cousin,
Amalia. Eduardo is the more
melancholic and
Romantic of the two male
protagonists.
As he hides out in Amalia's
place
of self-exile
(a
point
I will take
up below)
on the outskirts of Buenos
Aires,
we
see,
in a conversation between the
sweethearts,
another
aspect
of exile:
"?[...]
Es necesario
que
usted
salga perfectamente
bueno de mi
casa;
y
quiz?s
ser? necesario
que emigre usted?dijo
Amalia
bajando
los
ojos
al
pronunciar
estas ?ltimas
palabras." (M?rmol 93)
The word "exile" is so
charged
that it is almost
unpronounceable.
It wrenches Amalia's heart
because it would
require,
at least for a
time,
a
separation
from her beloved.
In the context of Eduardo and
Amalia,
the Romantic valences of exile are
brought
out?the
separation
from the beloved that creates a
longing
that is
almost reveled
in,
if not at least
enjoyed
as emotional
catharsis,
by
the reader.
But for
Eduardo,
in his
political
life with
Daniel,
exile is also
a
potential
betrayal
of the even
greater object
of affection?la
patria,
the homeland.
The dilemma that Sandra
Gasparini expresses concisely
as
"Una
disyuntiva
dr?stica: exilio de o
conspiraci?n
en la
patria," (Gasparini 54)
while it does
not
pertain
to the
larger-than-life
Bello,
describes
perfectly
the
quandary
in
which Eduardo finds himself. The
questioning
with which the novel
opens
continues in an
interchange
between the two male
protagonists,
in which
Daniel states:
"?Si, por
el
contrario,
los sucesos no alcanzan ese
fin,
es
necesario entonces
que emigres"
and
Eduardo,
with enthusiasm driven
by
desperation, responds "??Oh!
S?,
vamos
al
extranjero,
Daniel,
el aire de mi
patria
mata a sus
hijos, hoy
nos sofoca." But his enthusiasm is
quashed by
Daniel'
s
hard-line
position:
"?No
importa;
es necesario
respirarlo
como se
pueda
hasta haber
perdido
toda
esperanza." (M?rmol 174)
For
Eduardo,
exile
represents
a relief from risks and
pressures
that he can no
longer
withstand,
while for Daniel it is
only
conceivable as a
last resort. Daniel's
strongest expression
of
disapproval
of exile comes
early
in the
novel,
at the
first anti-Rosas
political meeting
he has
organized.
Daniel offers a list and
figures
on how
many people
have
emigrated
to
Uruguay,
and then declares:
?[...]
Creedme
amigos
m?os; yo estoy
m?s cerca de Rosas
que ninguno
de vosotros
;
yo expongo
m?s
que
mi vida
[...];
creedme, pues, que
el
peor
sistema
que
la
juventud
de
Buenos Aires
puede adoptar
en
el deseo
que
la anima de la
libertad de su
patria,
es ausentarse de ella.
?Ser?a
tan
desgraciado que
no hubiese
ninguno
de vosotros
que pensase
como
yo
pienso? (M?rmol 108,
emphasis added)
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58 Latin American
Literary
Review
Here Daniel's statement ends with a
plea
to those
attending
the
meeting,
including
Eduardo,
to
agree
with him.
Throughout
the novel these two
opposing
attitudes are
repeatedly
presented,
often in a
tightly
intertwined fashion. At one
point,
the narrator
speaks
of the seductive aura of admiration that surrounds the Unitarian
?migr?s
(in
particular
the earlier wave from
1829) among
the
youths
of
Buenos
Aires,
and even includes Daniel
among
these awe-struck
youths.
The narrator starts out
by highlighting
the
high regard
in which the
youth
of
the
day
held those
?migr?s:
"As? los nombres de los
viejos emigrados
en
1829,
entre los
que figuraban
en
primera
l?nea los V?rela
y
los
Ag?ero,
eran
los favoritos de la admiraci?n
y
el
respeto
de todos los
j?venes
de Buenos
Aires,
no tanto
por
lo
que
hab?an hecho
ya,
sino
por
lo
que
eran
capaces
de
hacer,
seg?n
la
opini?n popular, llegado
el d?a de la
regeneraci?n argentina."
(M?rmol 132)
Then the narrator's references to what the
?migr?s
were
capable
of
doing, give way
to criticism of how the
youths,
with "el candor
caracter?stico de
su
edad,"
were awestruck to the
point
of fear
by
"esos
varones monumentales de la ilustraci?n
argentina." (M?rmol 132)
As the
narrator concludes two
paragraphs
on this
topic by saying
"Tales eran las
creencias
populares
de la
juventud argentina
en la
?poca
de nuestra
historia,"
(M?rmol 132)
and then
begins
a new
paragraph
on
Daniel,
it seems that he
is
lightly criticizing
the reverence
displayed by
the
average young
man,
and
that he is about to
present Daniel?free-spirited
and
intelligent
as he is?as
a contrast to these
"easily impressed" youths.
However,
there is a twist in
what follows:
"Daniel,
esp?ritu
fuerte e
inteligencia
altiva,
era de los
pocos
que
no se
dejaban
arrastrar f?cilmente
por aquel
torrente de
opini?n;
sin
embargo,
m?s o
menos,
?l estaba seducido
como los dem?s
[...]" (M?rmol
132) By including
Daniel
among
the
admirers,
the narrator
actually
makes
the veneration of these exiles
quite justified.
The
narrator,
in
fact, goes
on to relate the
meeting
in Montevideo
between Daniel and these two
pillars
of the
Argentine
nation in exile as a
positive
and
stirring
event: "el se?or don Juli?n
Ag?ero,
ministro de
Rivadavia, y [...]
el se?or Florencio
V?rela,
hermano del
poeta
cl?sico de
ese nombre
y
el
primer
literato del numeroso e ilustrado
partido que
se llam?
unitario"
(M?rmol 132). V?rela,
the more
expressive
of these two
exiles,
upon being
introduced to
Daniel,
without
saying
a
word,
embraces him.
When V?rela and Daniel
step apart
after this
long hug,
both men
(not
just
V?rela,
the Romantic
poet),
are
visibly
overcome with emotion. The reason
for this is that
they
both feel that
they
have
just
embraced la
patria,
the
homeland itself: "Cuando
se
separaron
estos dos
[...]
sus
ojos
estaban
empa?ados
y
sus semblantes m?s
p?lidos que
de costumbre: cada uno hab?a
cre?do estrechar la
patria
contra su coraz?n."
(M?rmol 133)
In
spite
of this clear
positioning
of the
?migr?,
and not
only
the
migrant
political operative,
as a maker and
upholder
of la
patria,
the evident
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Woman, Nation,
and Exile in Jos? M?rmol's Amalia 59
criticism ofthose who choose to
emigrate
continues when the next
political
meeting
that Daniel calls is
barely
attended:
Daniel
[...]
hab?a tenido un trist?simo
desenga?o:
el
15 de
junio
en
que
debi? tener
lugar
la
segunda
reuni?n de
j?venes
en casa
de do?a
Marcelina,
se encontr? con
que
el
n?mero de los asistentes
no
pasaba
de siete. La
mayor parte
de los
que
concurrieron a la
primera
reuni?n, ya
no estaban
en Buenos
Aires,
sino en
Montevideo,
o en el
ej?rcito
libertador.
Daniel sufr?a mucho
por
el modo con
que
su sus
amigos
entend?an sus deberes
patrios. (M?rmol 153)
Yet somehow even this situation
gives
Daniel renewed
energy
for his
cause,
and elsewhere in the
novel,
as the narrator comments
upon
a
document
pertaining
to the French blockade of El R?o de la Plata
(1838
1843)
and
?migr?
leaders,
he
clearly
defends the
?migr?s:
Esa
pieza
hist?rica tiene en s? misma el sello de dos
verdades
innegables que
m?s tarde ser?n tema de
largas
meditaciones en el historiador de estos
pa?ses,
como lo
servir?n tambi?n de
comprobante para justificar
la lealtad
y
la moral de los
emigrados argentinos,
tantas veces
acusados de 'vender'
y
sacrificarlos intereses
y
los derechos
de su
pa?s,
en sus relaciones con el
extranjero.
Estudiado ese
documento,
no se
puede
menos
que
compadecer
ese santo
infortunio
de la
emigraci?n,
de
cuyos
tristes efectos no es el menos
notable,
ni el menos
desgraciado,
el alucinamiento
a
que
da
ocasi?n,
aun en los
esp?ritus
m?s serios.
[...] (M?rmol 194-5,
emphasis added)
In this
passage,
the narrator
explicitly
defends the
loyalty
of the
?migr?s,
who have been
wrongly maligned
over the issue of French intervention.
Moreover,
he
presents
as the
appropriate
attitude toward the
exiles,
one of
sympathy
and
pity?for
theirs is a situation of
saintly
misfortune.
Of
course,
while
considering
the
running
theme of exile in
Amalia,
we
must take into account the fact that novel's author wrote it in
exile,
while
experiencing
'ese santo
infortunio
de la
emigraci?n.'
In
April
of 1839
M?rmol
(1817-1871)
was
imprisoned
in Buenos Aires for 23
days
for
having agitated
and
propagandized against
the Rosas
government. During
that
period
he wrote his first verses on the wall of the
jail
cell in which he was
being
held. In November of 1840 he exiled himself to Montevideo. The fact
that he had been
imprisoned
for anti-Rosas activities
gave
him
entry
into the
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60 Latin American
Literary
Review
Romantic Unitarian exile circles in
Montevideo,
in
spite
of his humble
origin.
He soon became
distinguished
as a writer because of his
poems
decrying
the Rosas
tyranny, poems
which earned him the title "el
verdugo
po?tico
de Rosas."
Having
been
imprisoned
and
pushed
into exile
by
Rosas
opened many
doors for M?rmol
among
the
literary
elite and
essentially
created a niche for
him; however,
the intellectual labor with which this
position presented
him
was not
necessarily
an
easy
one. Adriana
Amante,
in a
study
of the
literary
production
of the exiles from the Rosas
regime living
in
Brazil,
describes the
generation
of Romantics of which M?rmol was a
part?those
who wrote
during
the second Rosas
government (1835-1852)?by saying
that
they
considered/imagined
their
country
"desde un
lugar
inc?modo
por
su
excentricidad
(ideol?gica
y geogr?fica)."
(Amante 69-70)
Amante
goes
on
to comment on the role of the exiled intellectual in the formation of the
nation,
responding
in
particular
to Benedict Anderson's definition of the
nation:
Desde un
punto
de vista
pol?tico,
la
patria
se sale de sus
bordes
y
contin?a all? donde la
diaspora siga pens?ndola
y
obrando sobre ella.
[...]
Pero si la naci?n se
imagina?
seg?n
Benedict Anderson?como una comunidad
pol?tica
inherentemente
liberada,
soberna
y limitada,
?qu? pasa
cuando esa naci?n est? siendo
imaginada
tanto dentro
como fuera de sus l?mites
geogr?ficos?
El
peregrinaje
del
exilio se
convierte, entonces,
en otra forma de
imaginar
la
naci?n.
[...] [S]i
la
utop?a
de la naci?n constituida
es el no
lugar
deseado,
el exilio
es el
lugar
no deseado desde el
que
la enuncian.
(Amante 84-86)
In Amalia exile is both a fear and a
hope;
it is both criticized and
defended,
though
it
may
lean toward the latter. On the other
hand,
the novel was written
from the
space
of exile?it
represents
the nation while
stretching
its
boundaries. This leads to the
following question:
How does M?rmol
envision and construct his
'nation-imagined-outside-of-the-nation'?
The novel's
presentation
of the nation is as
ambiguous
as its
presen
tation of exile. In Amalia the nation is crossed
by
the
conflicting
desires to
be
European
and
gaucho?to
be civilized as well as somewhat barbaric?
and in
particular by
the dominance of the
patria
chica,
or small
homeland,
of Buenos Aires.
Yet,
in
spite
of the
ambiguous?if
not
outright
contradic
tory?images
and references to the
nation,
the love for la
patria keeps
coming up
time and
again.
The one
aspect
of nation-creation that is clear in
Amalia is a characteristic which sets it
apart
from most nationalist
projects.
As Amante
states,
"El
proyecto
de los rom?nticos
argentinos
no es una
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Woman, Nation,
and Exile in Jos? M?rmol's Amalia 61
vuelta a un
origen
inmutable."
(Amante 88)
That
is,
it is clear in Amalia that
there is no fiction about the
origins
of
Argentina,
no
attempt
to make its
foundation either
organic, mythical,
or inevitable. Rather there is a con
sciousness,
at least on the
part
of
Daniel,
that
Argentina,
such as it
was,
in
its state of internal conflict and unfixed
borders,
arose from
political
circumstances. We see this when
Daniel,
in the first of the anti-Rosas
meetings,
calls for "La asociaci?n de los individuos
y
de los
pueblos para
estudiar filos?fica
y pr?cticamente
si esta
Rep?blica que improvis?
la
revoluci?n de
Mayo, fue
una inconveniencia
pol?tica, hija
de las necesidades
del
momento,
o si debe
ser un hecho
definitivo
y
duradero
[...]" (M?rmol
111,
emphasis
added).
There is no
attempt
to
present
the nation as an a
priori
organic
unit,
but rather
only
the desire to know if the formation of
Argentina
was
only
a
product
of
temporary practical necessity
or if it should be 'a
lasting
fact'?a
lasting political arrangement.
In
keeping
with this awareness of how
independence
from
Spain
came
about,
Daniel Bello has an
unabashedly straightforward,
albeit exclusion
ary, conception
of what
Argentines
should strive to be.
Speaking
of
unity
as
better than
individualism,
Daniel calls for: "La asociaci?n en todo
y siempre
para
ser
fuertes, para
ser
poderosos,
para
ser
europeos
en Am?rica."
(M?rmol 111,
emphasis
added)
The
Argentine
historian Jos? Carlos
Chiaramonte,
in his
study
and collection of
period
documents
Ciudades,
provincias,
Estados:
Or?genes
de la Naci?n
Argentina (1800-1846),
ob
serves that the terms
"espa?ol
americano,"
and then after
independence
almost
exclusively
"americano,"
were used
by Argentines
to
designate
a
broader
group identity (71 -75).
It is
interesting
to note that M?rmol declines
to use
either of these
terms,
the one
declaring
too much
allegiance
to
Spain
and the other
perhaps being
to close to 'barbarism.' Instead his
hero,
not
taking
on a
"europeos
americanos"
identity, promotes
the notion of
being
Europeans
located in Am?rica. This statement would seem to
place
Daniel
and the novel
squarely
on one side of the
opposition
between civilization and
barbarism.
The civilization and barbarism
dichotomy
was often
employed by
the
Generation of
'
37,
a
group
of
young
Argentine
writers and intellectuals with
whom M?rmol became affiliated in exile in Montevideo. The Generation of
'37 had the common
goal
of
ridding
the
Argentine provinces
of Rosas and
the caudillo
system
in
general
and worked more
broadly
to delineate which
problems
hindered the
Argentine provinces'
unification and how the
prov
inces could
develop
into a modern nation. In the
process, they produced,
as
Nicolas
Shumway puts
it,
"some of
Argentina's
most durable
guiding
fictions."
(Shumway 112)
Foremost
among
these
nation-building
fictions
propagated by
the Generation of '37 is the
binary opposition
of civilization
and barbarism. Seen
by many,
and
particularly Domingo
F.
Sarmiento,
as
the forces in conflict which
kept Argentina
in a state of
chaos,
these
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62 Latin American
Literary
Review
discursive
categories
were central to the construction of an
Argentine
national
identity.1
Symptomatic
of the
way
in which these terms were
used,
in
Amalia,
alongside
of Daniel's stated interest in
being
a
European
in
America,
there
is an interest in barbarism as a source of authentic
Argentineness.
Elsewhere
in the text the desire to embrace
Europeanness
seems to be
forgotten,
as the
gaucho
is
presented
as the
uniquely Argentine figure.
The
gaucho
himself
has an
interesting position
in
Argentine
cultural
history.
As Josefina Ludmer
has made
clear,
the once
maligned gaucho emerged
from his role as
part
of
the wars of
independence
as the national character of
Argentina?a figure
for the heroic
yet ruggedly
individualistic
persona
which certain
Argentines
wished to
project.2
At the time when M?rmol
wrote,
most
Argentine
writers were still
looking
to
Europe
for cultural orientation rather than
exalting
the
gaucho
as
the authentic criollo.
Nevertheless,
in
Amalia,
within a
flowery description
of the
pampas,
we find the
following passage:
Naturaleza
especial
en la
Am?rica,
Naturaleza madre
e institutriz del
gaucho.
Ese ser
que por
sus instintos se
aproxima
al hombre de
la
Naturaleza, y por
su
religi?n
y por
su idioma se da la
mano con la sociedad civilizada.
Por sus habitudes
no se
aproxima
sino a ?l
mismo;
porque
el
gaucho argentino
no tiene
tipo
en el
mundo,
por
m?s
que
se ha
empe?ado
en
compararlo,
unos al
?rabe,
otros al
gitano,
otros al
ind?gena
de nuestros desiertos.
La Naturaleza lo educa
[....] y
la libertad
y
la
independencia
de instintos humanos se convierten
en
condiciones
imprescindibles
de la vida del
gaucho.
(M?rmol
212)
The
gaucho
is
presented
here as the
quintessential Argentine:
he is a
purely
and
specifically Argentine figure
the likes of which
are not found
anywhere
else. It is
important
to
note,
though,
that this version of the
gaucho
is a
person
whose character is formed
through
contact with
"civilization,"
but
primarily
by
the natural forces of the
pampas.
This would seem to contradict the vision
of
"europeos
en Am?rica."
Other references to
gauchos
in Amalia
temper
this
reading,
as
they
certainly
do
try
to
bring together
the
opposing
forces of civilization and
barbarism. One of these
descriptions
is of one of the few servants in the
novel,
who is
presented
in a
purely positive light.
Daniel Bello's
servant,
Ferm?n,
is described
as
waiting
for Daniel
"tranquilo,
como buen
hijo
de la
pampa,
el
gauchito
civilizado
en
quien
[Daniel] depositaba
toda su
confianza,
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Woman, Nation,
and Exile in Jos? M?rmol's Amalia 63
porque
realmente la merec?a"
(M?rmol 92). Additionally,
Daniel himself is
sometimes
gaucho-like
in his
practices?in particular
in his
weapon
of
choice,
a network of leather cords and balls which is
highly
reminiscent of
boleadoras?the
gaucho hunting implement.
Should the
Argentine
to be
European
or
gaucho?highly
civilized or
somewhat barbaric? Given that M?rmol'
s
characters
promote
both
(as
long
as those in
charge
are
the more
European)
the text seems to
promote
a
watered-down
hybrid.
What is most
striking
about this formulation and its
use of the
gaucho
is that
during
that
period
the
gaucho
was
directly
linked
to Rosas. Rosas' actual
power
base was
among
caudillos and their
gaucho
troops,
and the characteristics of barbaric
savagery
were held in common.
Yet in Amalia the
gaucho
is cleansed of
any
connection to Rosas and the
forces of civilization and barbarism are
concentrated within the Buenos
Aires
political
realm?the
suaveness, astuteness,
and
eloquence
of Unitar
ians and neo-Unitarians
(Daniel)
versus the
ignorance
and bad taste of Rosas
and his minions.
But one can
only
be so
European
while still
being Argentine.
In order
to
support
the
sovereignty,
or
political
distinctness,
of the
Argentines,
some
element of cultural
difference,
however
small,
must be included in that
which is
Argentine.
And this element is the
gaucho?a gaucho
disinfected
from contact with Rosas. On one
hand,
the
opposition
between civilization
and barbarism is somewhat settled
by
the
hybrid figures
of Daniel and
Ferm?n,
but on
the other
hand,
it
rages
on in the battle of clever
stylishness
waged against
Rosas,
a
battle led
by
the same
hybrid political
mediator?
Daniel.
While the
gaucho
is
positioned
as a
figure
for
Argentina
as a whole and
the
hybrid
Daniel
fights
to save
Argentina,
the
conceptualization
of this
whole,
the actual
composition
of
Argentina,
remains
quite
unclear. The
geographic spaces
traditionally analogous
to civilization and barbarism in
Argentine
discourses?Buenos Aires and the
provinces
of the interior?are
not both coded as such.
Amalia,
the
representative
that we
have of the
interior,
is in no
way barbaric,
but rather an
elegant,
refined Unitarian. While
this bolsters the
interpretation
of the novel
as
formulating
a
European
identity
with a few
drops
of barbarism to allow for a
gaucho icon,
it
heightens
the
ambiguity surrounding
the
components
of the would-be
Argentine
nation.
Before
continuing
we must consider the
ways
in which certain terms
for
group
identification found in the novel were
typically
used
during
that
period.
Chiaramonte describes the
multiple co-existing
frames of
identity
present during
the
early independence period
in the
following way:
coexist?an variadas identidades
que
se defin?an en funci?n
del
plano
de relaciones
que
las solicitase. Ubic?ndonos en
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64 Latin American
Literary
Review
una
regi?n
dada,
la
rioplatense
por ejemplo, podemos
observar
que
se era
espa?ol
frente al resto del
mundo,
espa?ol
americano frente a lo
espa?ol peninsular, rioplatense
frente a lo
peruano, provinciano
frente a lo
capitalino,
porte?o
frente a lo cordob?s... La dominaci?n
espa?ola
no
dej?
otra cosa
que
un mosaico de sentimientos de
pertenencias grupales,
con frecuencia manifestados como
colisi?n de identidades
[...] (Chiaramonte 62)
Chiaramonte
goes
on to delineate the valences of certain terms that in our
day
have taken on
quite
different connotations and even distinct
meanings.
For
instance,
the word "ciudad."
Although
the
legacy
of the borders of the
Spanish
colonial administrative units is noticeable in
many
of the
post
independence political
entities,
close observation of the
political
restructur
ing
also reveals
many discrepancies
with the
larger
colonial administrative
divisions. And this is
precisely
because the
sovereign
entities of the colonial
period
were not the
Intendencias,
the
Audiencias,
or the
Virreinatos,
but
rather the cities and their
Ayuntamientos,
or
city
halls.
(Chiaramonte
62-63
and
75-77)
For this
reason,
two terms for
group
identification found in Amalia
were
actually
understood
quite differently,
from the late colonial
period
and
into the second half of the 19th
century,
than
they
are
today.
Chiaramonte,
through
the
analysis
of
newspapers, magazines,
and other
publications
of
the
time,
elucidates how the now so
seemingly organic
term
"Argentina,"
and its
adjectival
forms,
came into use.3 What concerns us most here is that
during
the first decades of the 19th
century,
both before and after
indepen
dence,
the word
"argentino"
was
equivalent
to
"porte?o"?from
or related
to Buenos Aires and its immediate
surroundings.
However,
after
indepen
dence the term
began
to be used with a broader
meaning only among
the
inhabitants of Buenos Aires. That
is,
for a bonaerense the
province
of
C?rdoba
was one of what
they
termed "las
provincias argentinas,"
but not
so from the
perspective
of someone from C?rdoba. Chiaramonte
astutely
points
out the
implications
of such
usage:
Podemos
pues
considerar
que
el uso literario de
Argentina,
ya
como
calificativo, ya
como sustantivo
que designa
un
pa?s
-en el sentido
restringido
de esta
palabra-,
se da entre
escritores de Buenos Aires
para designar expatria,
tambi?n
en sentido
restringido:
esa ciudad
y
su entorno. Pero
que
el
alcance territorial del t?rmino
puede expandirse
en la
medida
que
se considere una relaci?n de
posesi?n, por parte
de Buenos
Aires,
del resto del territorio del Virreinato.
(69)
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Woman, Nation,
and Exile in Jos? M?rmol' s Amalia 65
But two decades after
independence,
in the late 1830's when the
porte?os'
politics
shifted toward
autonomy,
the use of the term was also inverted.
Although by
this
point "Argentina"
was the name that had been
generally
agreed upon
as that of the nation
being
constructed,
natives of Buenos Aires
rejected
the inclusion of the other
provinces
in the term
"Argentina"
while
those from the littoral and interior
provinces
insisted
upon
their
Argentineness
and criticized the
porte?os'
attitudes to the
contrary (Chiaramonte 231-2).
Likewise,
in the late colonial
period
the term
"patria" generally
referred
to one's
city,
but also indicated one's
place
of
birth,
such that it could
also be used to refer to one's
province
or nation-state
(first Spain,
then
Argentina)
and this fluctuation in
meaning
continued into the mid-1800's
(Chiaramonte 78).
It is
very noteworthy
then that in Amalia the term
"Argentina"?in
spite
of its
instability
at that time?is used
consistently
to refer to the nation
state of
Argentina
and all of the
people
of the territories that that nation was
sketched out to
encompass.4
Yet at the same
time,
in
keeping
with the
predominance
of the
city
and the shifts in the
usage
of
"patria,"
this nebulous
term is
repeatedly
invoked,
usually
in the context of sentiment toward the
nation,
often
designating
what has later been defined as
"patria
chica,"
one's
city
or
region,
and
just
as often
remaining
abstract and
vague. Thus,
these
two
designations
run
through
the text and run into each
other;
the conscious
ness of a nation-state that is still
very
much
in-the-making
runs
contrary
to
localized,
or
ambiguously
located,
patriotism.
Most
importantly,
this ten
sion and
ambiguity regarding
the contours of the nation arises
through
Amalia herself.
In one of the few scenes in which Amalia socializes outside of her
home,
a curious conversation takes
place.
At a
party
in Buenos
Aires,
because no one knows
her,
instead of
being
asked to
dance,
Amalia
remains seated next to an old Unitarian woman. The
elegant, upper-class
woman strikes
up
a conversation with
Amalia, because,
as the narrator
explains, they
are able to
identify
each other as Unitarians
by
their attire:
?Creo
que
?sta es la
primera
vez
que tengo
el honor de ver
a usted.
?Acaso
ha
llegado
de Montevideo?
?No, se?ora,
resido en Buenos Aires hace
alg?n tiempo.
??Alg?n tiempo
!
Entonces, ?no
es usted de Buenos Aires?
?No, se?ora,
soy
tucumana.
??Ah!
Bien me lo dec?a
yo, ?era imposible que
usted no
hubiera llamado la
atenci?n,
si fuera usted mi
compatriota!
?Sin
embargo,
creo tener el honor de ser
compatriota
de
usted,
se?ora.
?S?, s?;
en cuanto a
argentina
[sic]
;
quiero
decir de Buenos
Aires.
?Es
cierto, soy
provinciana,
como nos llaman
aqu??dijo
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66 Latin American
Literary
Review
Amalia,
con una sonrisa tan
agradable que
acab?
por
seducir a la buena
se?ora, que
desde ese momento conoci?
que
ten?a
por
interlocutora a una
persona
de
esp?ritu y
de
clase.
(M?rmol 102-3)
This conversation illustrates the tensions between the
patrias
chicas within
the
patria grande
of the nation. In
particular,
it is a
tension between the
provinces
of the
interior,
and the
principal city
and
province:
Buenos Aires.
The title character of the novel hails from one of the
outlying provinces
and
is referred to
throughout
in terms of her
provincial identity?"la
tucumana."
In
fact,
the
chapter
entitled "Amalia Saenz de Olabarrieta" starts with the
word "Tucum?n" and several
paragraphs describing
this
province's
natural
beauty
and
garden-like qualities
before
segueing
into the
description
of
Amalia with the
phrase:
"Amalia
aspir?
hasta en lo m?s delicado de su alma
todo el
perfume po?tico que
se
esparce
en el aire de su tierra natal"
(M?rmol
75-6).
With this
provincial identity,
in the scene at the Buenos Aires dance
her affiliation with
Argentina,
and the
very importance
of a broader
place
of
belonging (Argentina)
is called into
question.
M?rmol' s other
major
work,
Cantos del
peregrino ( 1847), provides
an
extreme
example
of the dominance of Buenos Aires over this still
ambigu
ously
defined
Argentina.
While
living
in exile in Rio de
Janeiro,
M?rmol
decided to move to Chile and he
began
to write this
epic poem
in 1844 on
the
ship
from Brazil to Chile.
Although
the
ship
was not able to make it to
port
and he had to return to
Brazil,
M?rmol later
completed
and
published
this
poem.
Cantos del
peregrino, inspired by Byron's
Childe Harold's
Pilgrimage
and considered M?rmol's first
important
work,
consists of the
poetic speaker's
meditations on
mankind,
on
the situation in his
homeland,
and on American
landscapes.
It is
organized
into twelve
cantos,
each of
which,
according
to
M?rmol,
carries the name of
a
friend of M?rmol or that
of his
"patria" (M?rmol,
Cantos
21).
A few of the cantos are
preceded by
prose prologues
which elaborate
upon
the dedications.
The first canto is headed with the dedication "A mi
patria"
and a
prologue
which
begins:
"Buenos Aires: mis
ojos
se
abrieron a la luz
bajo
tu
cielo
hermoso; y [...]
se cerrar?n acaso
bajo
el cielo nublado del
extranjero
[....]
t?
eres,
Patria
m?a,
el im?n de esas
inspiraciones
[....]" (M?rmol,
Cantos
3,
emphasis added).
The second
part
of the third Canto is the Canto
of the
pilgrim
to Buenos Aires
(M?rmol,
Cantos
68),
in
which,
again,
the
terms used are "Buenos Aires" and "mi
patria"
versus "el
extranjero."
Other
cantos are dedicated to
Am?rica, Brasil,
R?o de
Janeiro,
and El Plata.
Thus,
throughout
the
book-length poem,
M?rmol addresses
by
name
Am?rica,
El
Plata,
Patagonia,
and El
Chaco,
as well as Montevideo and
Brazil,
and refers
to Buenos Aires as his homeland?but he never mentions
"Argentina."
That
is,
he never once uses the word
"Argentina"
to
identify
either his
patria
chica
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Woman, Nation,
and Exile in Jos? M?rmol's Amalia 67
or his
patria grande. Regardless
of the
political
realities of the time
(the
fact
that Buenos Aires still had a tenuous
relationship
with the rest of the
Argentine provinces5
)
we know from Chiaramonte's work and the
example
of Sarmiento's Facundo
o
civilizaci?n
y
barbarie
(1845)
that the term
"Argentina"
was used
then,
albeit with
shifting meanings.
The absence of
the term
"Argentina"
and
repeated
use of
"patria"
for Buenos Aires in
Cantos del
peregrino
show that
during
M?rmol's first
years
of
exile,
not
only
did he understand
"patria"as
the
patria
chica of Buenos
Aires,
but he
did not need to refer to the other
provinces, collectively
or
otherwise,
as
"Argentine
because he felt
no
sentimental
or
political
connection to them.
The
comparison
of Amalia with Cantos del
peregrino
reveals that
by
the time he wrote
Amalia,
M?rmol'
s concern had shifted from the
expression
of
longing
for his
patria
chica
to,
on the one
hand,
the cultivation
among
his
readers of a more
politically pragmatic,
sentimental connection to the
patria
grande,
and,
on the other
hand,
a consideration of his role as an exile vis-?
vis la
patria?chica y/o grande. Perhaps
M?rmol realized that his
political
opponents
were
very
sure of the contours of the nation for which
they
were
fighting?in
the novel Rosas insists that
Mandeville,
a
representative
of the
British
crown,
refer to the local conflicts as "nuestras
guerras"
or "las
guerras argentinas,"
not "las
guerras
locales" or "las
guerras
americanas"
(M?rmol 167)?and
this drove M?rmol to make an effort to
bring together
the smaller homelands of the
separate provinces,
however
tenuously.
The
elegant
old Unitarian woman
who,
in her conversation with
Amalia,
identifies herself as from Buenos Aires?not from
Argentina?is
later
criticized
by
Daniel Bello as "la unitaria m?s
intransigente;
la
porte?a
m?s
altiva
que
creo ha existido
jam?s" (M?rmol 115).
In this
way,
in
Amalia,
M?rmol does make some
attempt
to discredit hard-line unitarianism and its
concomitant
privileging
of the
patria
chica of Buenos Aires.
However,
the
novel's
picture
of the nation never becomes
particularly
clear
because,
as we
shall see in the discussion of Amalia
below,
the
relationship
between the
provinces
and Buenos Aires is
ultimately
tied to the issue of exile.
Although
the co-existence of various
patrias
chicas could
suggest
a
more
fluid,
plural
formulation of the
nation,
it would
only
be so if the
emotional ties to the nation were also allowed to be free form
(and
if the
grouping
of communities were
non-hierarchical). Yet,
in
Amalia,
love of
country?whatever
the definition of that
country may
be?is a constant
theme. In a conversation between Eduardo and Daniel it comes out that
though they try
to dream of future
happiness, they
are
incapable
of
doing
so
while the homeland is not
happy:
??Perfecto, perfecto,
Daniel!
[...]
Y olvidaremos
esos d?as
p?lidos
de nuestra
juventud:
esa
?poca
terrible en
que
hemos vivido con el
pu?al
al
pecho,
viendo
deshojarse
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68 Latin American
Literary
Review
las
mejores
ramas de la existencia de la
patria y
...
??Lo
ves?
?no
te lo
dije?
?ramos
muy
felices hace un
instante con las
promesas
de nuestra
imaginaci?n,
y,
sin
saber
c?mo,
arrojas
t? mismo en nuestra
copa
de n?ctar esa
gota amarga
de los recuerdos
patrios. (M?rmol 115)
Further on in the text Daniel declares to
himself,
as if in
response
to his
earlier
question
about the
necessity
and
durability
of the
Argentine
nation:
"S?
tengo
fe en el
porvenir
de mi
patria.
Pero se necesita
que
la mano del
tiempo haya
nivelado con el
polvo
de
que
hemos
salido,
la frente de los
que
hoy
viven.
S?, tengo
fe, pero
en
tiempos
muy lejanos
de los nuestros.
?Patria,
patria! ?la generaci?n presente
no tiene sino el nombre de tus
padres!"
(M?rmol 143)
In
Amalia,
love of
country
is fomented to authenticate and
support
concrete
political
interests.
Although
the foundation of the nation is
not
mythologized,
its existence is
legitimated by
the emotions felt for the
patria
and these
feelings
are cultivated
by linking patriotism
with romantic
love,
by equating
love of
country
with the love of a woman.
Likewise,
the
tricky
situation of the exile
commenting
on national
politics
is
negotiated
via
the beloved. In both
cases,
this beloved woman is
Amalia,
la bella tucumana.
The links M?rmol'
s novel creates between the emotional ties to
patria
and the emotional ties to a beloved woman are evident in the
following
passage,
in which the narrator describes the emotional
suffering
of the
second
generation
of exiles from Rosas'
regime:
[...]al
sentimiento de la
patria,
de la
familia,
del
porvenir,
se
mezclaba
siempre
la ausencia de una
mujer
amada
[....]
La mano de Rosas
interrump?a
en el coraz?n de esos
j?venes
el curso natural de las
afecciones
m?s sentidas: la
de la
patria y
la del amor. Y en la
peregrinaci?n
del
destierro,
en los
ej?rcitos,
en el
mar,
en el
desierto,
los
emigrados
alzaban
su vista al cielo
para
mandar en las
nubes
un recuerdo a su
patria y
un
suspiro
de amor a su
querida. (M?rmol 89,
emphasis
added)
M?rmol' s text
presents
as
accepted
truth that it is natural that one's
strongest
emotions be those for the
patria
and the amada and creates a certain
parallelism
between the two
types
of affection.
Although
in the
passage
above the narrator
goes
on to
say
that the exile's heart suffers even more for
the
beloved,
the
parallelism
between the two emotions is reaffirmed in a later
section of the
novel,
in which Daniel exclaims to Eduardo:
?T?,
Eduardo. T?
que
acabas de hablar como un
gran
fil?sofo en nuestra
reuni?n, y
unos minutos
despu?s
no
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Woman, Nation,
and Exile in Jos? M?rmol's Amalia 69
haces sino
sentirte,
como
cualquier pobre
diablo,
enamorado
de una
mujer.
Acabas de
pensar
en
la
patria, y
est?s
pensando
en Amalia. Acabas de
pensar
c?mo
conquistar
la
libertad, y
est?s
pensando
como
[sic]
conquistar
el coraz?n
de una
mujer.
Acabas de echar de menos la civilizaci?n en
tu
patria, y
echas de menos los bell?simos
ojos
de tu amada.
Esa es la verdad Eduardo. Ese es el
hombre,
?sa es
la
naturaleza.
(M?rmol 114,
emphasis added)
Here once
again,
"the truth"?the
very
essence of man and of nature?is to
love and
long
for one's homeland and one's
beloved,
is for the two desires
to be
parallel
and linked. The effect of this on M?rmol's
(contemporary)
male
readership
is to
encourage
these emotions in
tandem,
to
generate
the
notion that one's
feelings
for the homeland must be as
strong
as those for
one's beloved.
Similarly,
the effect on
M?rmol's
(contemporary)
female
readership
is to make male
expressions
of
patriotism
tantamount to
expres
sions of love for the beloved. In this
way,
the novel serves to create what
Benedict Anderson refers to as the "emotional
legitimacy"
of nationalism
(Anderson 4).
Yet the
very
figure
who is the
object
of Eduardo' s romantic
desire,
and
who in that sense evokes the
nation,
is linked to the situation of exile. In the
conversation between the old Unitarian woman and Amalia that was
discussed
above,
the older woman reacts with
great
enthusiasm to Amalia' s
self-introduction.
Recognizing
Amalia' s
name,
she
presents
the
description
of Amalia that others have
given
her:
"?Una pobre
viuda
que
no tiene rival
en
belleza, y que, seg?n
dicen,
ha hecho de su casa un
templo
de soledad
y
buen
gusto!" (M?rmol 102-3,
emphasis added) Already
here we have a hint
of Amalia's state of
exile;
it becomes even clearer in her conversations with
Daniel and Eduardo.
Amalia describes her situation while
talking
with Daniel after he has
brought
Eduardo to her house to hide out and
recuperate:
"?
[...]
Yo
soy
libre;
vivo
completamente
aislada, porque
mi car?cter me lo
aconseja
as?;
recibo rara vez las visitas de mis
pocas amigas [....]" (M?rmol 16) Later,
in
a
conversation with
Eduardo,
she
explains
her situation in more detail:
?[...]
Un destino cruel
parece que esper?
mi nacimiento
para
conducirme en el mundo. Todo cuanto
puede
hacer la
desgracia
de una
mujer
en la
vida,
lo sell? en la m?a la
naturaleza. La intolerancia de mi car?cter con las frivolidades
de la
sociedad;
los instintos de mi alma a la libertad
y
a la
independencia
de mis
acciones;
una voluntad
incapaz
de
ser
doblegada por
la humillaci?n ni
por
el
c?lculo;
una
sensibilidad
que
me hace amar todo lo
que
es
bello,
grande
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70 Latin American
Literary
Review
o noble en la
naturaleza;
todo
esto, Eduardo,
todo esto es
com?nmente un mal en las
mujeres
;
pero
en nuestra sociedad
americana,
tan
atrasada,
tan
vulgar,
tan
alde?nica,
puedo
decir,
es m?s
que
un mal es una verdadera
desgracia.
Yo
tuve la dicha de
comprenderla, y
entonces
quise
aislarme
de mi
patria.
Para vivir menos
desgraciada,
he vivido sola
despu?s que qued?
libre; y acompa?ada
de mis
libros,
de mi
piano,
de mis
flores, [...]
he vivido
tranquila y... tranquila
solamente.
(M?rmol 124-125;
emphasis added)
Amalia is
alone,
and at
peace,
but not
happy;
moreover,
she is
essentially
exiled from her homeland?'aislada de su
patria.'
Amalia is exiled
through
her
position
as a tucumana and also as a woman. In a
sense,
as a
provincial
within
Argentina,
and
especially
within Buenos Aires
itself,
Amalia's state
of exile is overdetermined?she is
'always already'
exiled from the nation
of
Argentina.
The same is true for her as a woman with ideas different from
those of her
society.
She chooses to exile herself from Buenos Aires/
Argentina/la patria by living
a
solitary
existence in a house on the outskirts
of the
city
of Buenos Aires.
With this
heroine,
the novel
presents
a character who is an actual
exile,
unlike Eduardo who never makes it to his selected
place
of exile
(Montevideo)
and unlike Daniel
who,
as the narrator
clearly
states,
with his back-and-forth
movement is not an exile. But rather than an external
political
exile,
Amalia
is what can be referred to as an internal exile. After
being
shut out of
Argentine society
because of the conflict between
prescribed gender
roles
and her own
"manly"
inclinations,
Amalia decides to seclude herself on
the
edges
of the
city
of Buenos Aires. She
attempts
to create her own
boundaries that others cannot cross without her
permission.
When her house
becomes the
object
of Federalist
scrutiny,
after she has taken in
Eduardo,
she
moves to a second
place
of internal
exile,
"la casa sola." Because of
Eduardom and with
him,
she moves to another isolated house on another
edge
of the
city.
Interestingly,
when Daniel makes his
strongest
statement
against
exile
(in
a
passage
mentioned
previously
in which he wonders whether he is the
only
one left who is
against
exile),
his words contain a curious statement
regarding
women and exile. While
speaking
in the first anti-Rosas
political
meeting
he declares:
"?[...]
La
emigraci?n deja
en
poder
de las
mujeres,
de los cobardes
y
de los
mazorqueros
la ciudad de Buenos
Aires,
es
decir,
se?ores,
el
punto
c?ntrico de donde
parten
los
rayos
del
poder
de Rosas.
[...]" (M?rmol 108,
emphasis
added).
Here we see that Daniel does not
consider
escape
into exile a valid
option,
because it leaves behind
only
the
weak
(women
and
cowards)
and Rosas'
strongmen,
los
mazorqueros.
The
inclusion of women in this
disparaged category
does not
ring
true in the
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Woman, Nation,
and Exile in Jos? M?rmol's Amalia 71
context of the novel as a whole and thus Daniel's
argument against
exile is
undermined.
The novel is
populated by
various female
characters?Marcelina,
Madame
Dupasquier,
and foremost
among
them Amalia
(not
to mention
Rosas' own
daughter,
Manuelita)?who,
relative to the standards of the
time,
are
quite strong-willed
and
courageous.
All of these women?with the
exception
of do?a Marcelina
(the
madame of a house of
prostitution,
who is
not afraid to let Daniel hold his
political meetings
at her
establishment)?
serve to illustrate the model of the Mother of the
Republic6
which
prevailed
at that time. While these women
actively oppose
the Rosas
regime,
ulti
mately,
the
courage
of the educated women in Amalia
mainly
serves to
uphold
their
very
specific
and limited role: that of
maintaining
cultural
values.
One such
figure
is Se?ora
Dupasquier,
the mother of
Florencia,
Daniel' s fianc?e. The narrator describes her as she is
recovering
from a faint
brought
on
by
talk of
going
into
exile,
after
resisting
a search
by
one of
Rosas' henchmen. Daniel arrives at the
Dupasquier
home and finds Se?ora
Dupasquier passed
out in the arms of her
daughter,
who
explains
to Daniel
that Rosas' reviled henchman
Victorica,
accompanied by
a
commissary
and
two
soldiers,
had
just paid
them a visit. He had searched the house and
questioned
Se?ora
Dupasquier
about the whereabouts of Eduardo?but she
had refused to answer
him,
or to
cooperate
with the search of her home:
?Mam?
se
neg?
a
responderle [....]
Se
neg?
tambi?n a
abrir la
puerta
de un cuarto interior
que
casualmente se
hallaba
cerrada, y
Victorica la hizo hechar
abajo.
[No
se
abri? la
puerta] Porque
mam?
dijo
desde el
principio
a
Victorica
que
no se
quer?a prestar
a conducirlo al interior de
su
casa;
que
?l obrase como
quisiese, pues que
ten?a la
fuerza
para
hacerlo. Mam? se ha sostenido con un
valor
y
una
dignidad propios
de ella.
(M?rmol 180,
emphasis
added)
After all of this
dignified
and
unflinching
heroism,
it is the
thought
of exile
which causes her to faint: "Pero
luego que
ha
quedado
sola,
me ha hablado
de nuestro
casamiento,
me ha dicho
que
es necesario salir del
pa?s y para
siempre.
En mis brazos la he sentido
sufrir, y
la he sentido
desmayarse."
(M?rmol 180)
The narrator
goes
on to describe Se?ora
Dupasquier
in
glowing
terms as the cr?me de la cr?me of Buenos Aires and
[...]
de esas
mujeres que
sufr?an m?s
que
los hombres
por
la humillaci?n
que
la dictadura hac?a sufrir al
pa?s; y que
m?s
que
los
hombres,
ten?a valor
para
afrontar los
enojos
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72 Latin American
Literary
Review
del tirano
y
de la
plebe
armada
e
insolentada
por
?l.
[...]
?S?lo
Dios,
s? sabe cu?ntas nobles
mujeres argentinas
han
bajado
al
sepulcro paso
a
paso,
llevadas
por
la mano de esa
?poca
de
sangre, y
de
impresiones
rudas sobre su coraz?n
sensible!
(M?rmol 181)
Upon regaining
consciousness,
the first words uttered
by
this aristocratic
lady
who
isoffendedby
the mob rule associated with Rosas'
regime,are:
"?
Daniel, [...]
es
preciso
salir del
pa?s;
usted
y
Eduardo ma?ana si es
posible.
Amalia, yo y
mi
hija
los
seguiremos pronto." (M?rmol 181)
After
standing
up
to
Victorica,
and
standing
firm as
he knocked down a door in her
house,
it is the
thought
of
exile,
of
permanent separation
from the
patria,
which is
too much for this Unitarian woman. More
importantly,
her main
qualities,
and contributions to the anti-Rosas
struggle,
are a
strong
sense of
dignity
and
a
sensitivity
to humiliation.
As seen
earlier,
Amalia falters at the mention of
exile,
but in a similar
fashion to Se?ora
Dupasquier,
she is a
strong, dignified
woman who stands
up
to the Federalists. When the Federalistas have
begun
to
suspect
that
Eduardo is
hiding
in Amalia's
house,
Victorica comes to
carry
out a search
of her house.
Amalia,
frightened
but
trying
to
compose herself,
refuses to
directly
answer Victorica's
questions:
"No lo
s?, se?or; pero
si lo
supiera
no
lo dir?a."
(M?rmol 178)
And when Amalia
responds
to Victorica's com
plaints
about
Unitarians,
by wishing
for more
Unitarians,
Victorica accuses
her of
abusing
of her
position
as a woman:
?Que
usted abusa de su sexo.
?Como usted de su
posici?n.
??No
teme usted de sus
palabras,
se?ora?
?No,
se?or. En Buenos Aires s?lo los hombres
temen;
pero
las se?oras sabemos defender una
dignidad que
ellos
han olvidado.
(M?rmol 179)
In this
passage
Amalia
clearly
uses her
gender?and
the
respect
with which
even a Federalist is
supposed
to treat it
according
to the social codes of her
time?in order to
express
her
opinions.
This includes
elevating
women as
the
only gender
which has not lost its
dignity through
this
political
conflict.
Amalia makes a similar statement about women when
speaking
with
Eduardo:
"??Cree
usted, Eduardo, que bajo
el cielo
que
nos
cubre,
no
hay
tambi?n
mujeres que identifiquen
su vida
y
su destino con la vida
y
el destino
de los hombres?
?Oh!
Cuando todos los hombres han olvidado
que
lo son en
la
patria
de los
argentinos, deje
usted a lo menos
que
las
mujeres
conservemos
la
generosidad
de nuestra alma
y
la
nobleza
de nuestro car?cter."
(M?rmol
93,
emphasis added)
This
passage,
for all its
forcefulness,
is
ultimately
a
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Woman, Nation,
and Exile in Jos? M?rmol's Amalia 73
testament to her role as a
safe-guarder
of
virtue,
in
particular
because it
segues
into a declaration of how she would
happily
die
showing political
solidarity
to her
husband, brother,
or
lover?serving
as an assistant to a man.
In an
attempt
to
downplay
the
strength
and activism of these women
protagonists,
Graciela
Batticuore,
in her article on the
reading,
rather than
writing,
role
given
to women in
Amalia,
points
to the fact that after most of
these scenes of valor Amalia becomes faint. Batticuore
interprets
these
moments
by saying
that:
"[...]
M?rmol
compensa
cada actuaci?n valiente
de Amalia con un
desmayo,
demostrando
que pese
al
compromiso pol?tico
se mantienen en ella los s?ntomas sensibles del
'
?ngel
del
hogar.
' "
(Batticuore
46-47) However,
this
point
can
only
be taken so
far,
for Eduardo also cries
and faints
(M?rmol
15 and
157)
and even Daniel cries
(M?rmol
16 and
133).
Daniel is even described as 'effeminate' in matters of the heart: he is one of
those
people
who is
strong-willed
in
politics,
but "t?midos hasta el
afeminamiento" when
danger
threatens friends or loved ones.
(M?rmol 160)
Rather than
uphold
an
understanding
of Amalia as
simply
an
overly
sensitive woman whose
activity
must be counterbalanced
by debility,
these
bouts of
fainting
and
tears,
when observed as a
group,
serve to
highlight
the
way
in which
gender
roles are somewhat blurred in the novel. There are
masculinized female characters and feminized male characters. As Francine
Masiello
explains,
in Between
Civilization
and Barbarism:
Women, Nation,
and
Literary
Culture in Modern
Argentina: "[...]
the
gross
confusions of
male and female
[are]
announced
early
in the
novel,
especially
with
reference to the
body.
In Amalia
symbolic systems
are in flux. Daniel and
Eduardo are described as
effeminate,
while Amalia is masculinized."
(Masiello 31)
Here it is
necessary
to return to Amalia's
position
as an
internal exile
in order to
fully
understand her function within the novel. Women have
traditionally
been associated with home and
stability?not
exile. Doreen
Massey
describes the connections between women
and
home-space
in
Space,
Place,
and Gender: "The construction of 'home' as a
woman's
place
has, moreover,
carried
through
into those views of
place
itself as a source of
stability, reliability
and
authenticity.
Such views of
place
[...]
are coded
female. Home is where the heart is
[...]
and where the woman
(mother,
lover-to-whom-you-will-one-day-return)
is also."
(Massey 180)
In Amalia' s
case,
as an internal exile in a nation under
dictatorship,
she and her home
serve as
places
of exile and
refuge
for
Argentine
virtue and values from the
corruption
of the Federalists. As Batticuore
notes,
in Amalia "Las
mujeres
unitarias
[...]
mantienen vivo el recuerdo de la
patria
a?orada,
son las
depositar?as
de un
legado que
deben transmitir
para
poder preservar
la
patria
deseada del olvido."
(Batticuore 51)
Amalia is not
only
the
provinciana
taking refuge
in Buenos
Aires,
but she
provides
a
place
of
refuge?for
Eduardo and for the Unitarian sensibilities and values
promoted
as
Argen
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74 Latin American
Literary
Review
tine values. Here we find a reformulation of Doris Sommer's
interpretation
of the romance between Eduardo and Amalia as the seductive
power
of the
"loving capital
over its
ministering province" (Sommer 100),
and
a
liter
ary?and exilic?expression
of what Chiaramonte calls the "relaci?n de
posesi?n"
on the
part
of Buenos Aires in
regards
to the other
provinces.
In
Amalia the civilized of the
periphery
take
refuge
in the
periphery
of the
center
(the
outskirts of Buenos
Aires),
but
they
also
give refuge
to the
civilized of the center.
As a
depositary
of the national
legacy,
and the
only
clear survivor of
the three main
protagonists
(Eduardo
dies and it is
suggested
that Daniel
does as
well)
Amalia will then have a role in the
(re)constitution
of
Argentina?the
same role to which
returning
exiles
aspired.
While Daniel
could have served as a model for a
third, non-exile,
option?his
fate at the
end of the novel is
unclear,
and
certainly
insecure as the last we are told of
him is that he has sustained a
deep
head wound.
Through
the
figure
of
Amalia,
the
only surviving protagonist
and the one exile
portrayed
in the
novel,
M?rmol in the end defends his own
position
as
that of someone who
against
his volition was shut out of
Argentine politics
and within that did
what he could: secluded himself in exile in
Uruguay
and Brazil and wrote.
He uses the
internally
exiled woman to defend the
externally
exiled
intellectual?the masculinized
woman to defend the feminized
(Romantic,
Unitarian, intellectual)
man. Amalia is a
figure
for the
nation, and,
at one and
the same
time,
a
figure
for the
exile;
she is the nation in
(internal)
exile.
As Masiello
points
out, "[...]
Amalia is more than
an
unambiguous
defense of the valor of Unitarian
women;
it also uses the
gender system
in
flux as a
metaphor
for dissent in the nation. M?rmol
manipulates
an unstable
gender
situation,
as
perceived
within the Unitarian
camp,
to dramatize the
conflicts between federalists and Unitarians and also as a tool for understand
ing
the debates
among
Unitarians themselves."
(Masiello 30)
I
propose, then,
that the main debate
among
Unitarians to which Amalia
responds,
is that
surrounding
the exile and his/her once and future role in the
shaping
of the
nation.
In
closing,
I would like to refer to the
reception
and
deployment
of the
novel?another level on which exile comes into
play.
If exile is defined as
"not
being
able to
go
back"?what
happens
when it becomes
possible
to
return?
Amalia was first serialized in Montevideo's La
Semana,
but before the
novel-by-installments
was
complete,
Rosas was defeated and M?rmol
immediately stopped writing
and
publishing
the novel. A second
printing
of the
novel,
such as it
stood,
that was to
appear
in the columns of M?rmol' s
own El
Paran?,
was
suspended
in 1852 out of fear of
disturbing
the
post
Rosas reconciliation. It was
only
in 1855 that M?rmol
completed
Amalia and
published
it as a book. But the
process
of
producing
this definitive text
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Woman, Nation,
and Exile in Jos? M?rmol' s Amalia 75
included not
only adding
the last 8
chapters,
but also
cutting
certain
passages
which M?rmol believed
might
be too bitter for the new
period
of national
reconciliation.7 Thus the novel has a troubled
relationship
to
nationality,
on
the level of its
ambiguous images
of the
nation,
as well as on the level of
its initial
reception
and
potential political impact.
In
spite
of the first of
these,
as soon as the second?the
political
situation?had been stabilized
to the Unitarians'
favor,
Amalia was
strongly promoted.
As Doris Sommer
indicates,
it was embraced and
championed by returning
exiles as a national
novel;
it became a "foundational"
novel,
because these exiles were
part
of
the liberal elite that was
returning
to take control of national affairs.8
M?rmol had an active role in the national stabilization under Buenos
Aires' dominance and in
subsequent
national institutions. On
September
11,
1852,
he was
part
of the armed
uprising by
which Buenos Aires broke
away
from the Confederation.
Eventually,
in
1862,
this led to the establishment of
a
politically
unified
Argentina
under the
presidency
of Bartolom?
Mitre,
former
governor
of Buenos Aires. Sommer notes that "The new
government
established in Buenos Aires after Mitre's
victory appointed
M?rmol to the
Senate
[...],
while it
promoted
Amalia' s
celebrity
as the foremost novel."
(Sommer, 110)
M?rmol later became director of the National
Library
and his
novel became
required reading
in the nationalist education curriculum.
Thus,
Amalia became
part
of the
pedagogy
of
being Argentine.
M?rmol'
s
novel, then,
can be seen as a confluence of
gendered images,
political agenda,
and exile. On one
hand,
it is an
example
of how an exiled
intellectual tries to
figure
out the role of the
?migr?, grapples
with his
position
vis-?-vis
Argentina,
and defends it
through
a character who is at
once linked to love of
country,
the
experience
of
exile,
and the maintenance
of
Argentine
values. On the other
hand,
it is an
example
of how exile and the
exiled intellectual
play
a
central role in the formation of nationalism and its
subjects.
In
short,
exile is at the heart of the
nation,
for exile is the stuff of
which nationalist sentiment is made.
UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI
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76 Latin American
Literary
Review
NOTES
1
These discursive
categories,
which came into
frequent
use
during
the
European Enlightenment,
were first
employed
in the Provinces of the R?o de la Plata
at the
beginning
of the 19th
century. They
were then taken
up by early
Romantics
of the
region
in the late 1830's and
finally put
into
general
use
by
Sarmiento's
publication
of Facundo o
civilizaci?n
y
barbarie
(1845).
Two
in-depth analyses
of
how the
categories
of civilization and barbarism were formulated and
deployed
in
19th
century Argentina
are: Nicolas
Shumway,
The Invention
of Argentina (Berke
ley
and Los
Angeles: University
of
California, 1991)
and F?lix
Weinberg,
"La
dicotom?a civilizaci?n-barbarie en nuestros
primeros
rom?nticos." R?o de la
plata
8
(1989).
2
The
appropriation
of the
gaucho by
the
Argentine ruling
classes is the
topic
of Josefina Ludmer's
important study
El
g?nero gauchesco:
Un tratado sobre la
patria (Buenos
Aires: Editorial
Sudamericana, 1988).
Ludmer
explains
how the
gaucho,
without
property, steady
work,
or a fixed
dwelling place?and
thus an
outlaw or
vagabond according
to the law of the elites?is first
demarginalized
when
used
by
the
independence army.
After
being pressed
into
military
service and
heroicized,
the
gaucho
's
voice,
his oral form of
expression,
is used
by high literary
culture to form the
gauchesque genre. Finally,
this
genre
is used to
place
the
gaucho
within the bounds of liberal law. The
body
and voice of the
gaucho
are institution
ally disciplined
such that
they
become
part
of "civilization."
3
See
Chiaramonte, Ciudades,
provincias,
Estados:
Or?genes
de la Naci?n
Argentina (1800-1846) (Buenos
Aires:
Espasa Calpe Argentina/
Ariel, 1997)
63-75
and 231-246.
4
"Argentina"
and
"Argentine"
are used in the novel to refer to both the
Unitarian and Federalist
camps?for
instance,
the Unitarian
military
leader Lavalle
is referred to as "el Cruzado
argentino"
as his
troops
are called "la
juventud
argentina" (M?rmol, 184)
and Federalists characters refer to "la Conferencia" or "la
Confederaci?n
Argentina" (M?rmol, 29)?and
to refer to both of these
groups
together:
"los ciudadanos de la
Rep?blica Argentina"
and "el
pueblo argentino"
(M?rmol, 191).
5
In
1826,
a Unitarian constitution united the
provinces
under Rivadavia with
the
province
of Buenos Aires in clear dominance. For a few
years
a lax
Argentine
confederation continued to exist. Then from 1829 until 1852 the
provinces
were
unified not
institutionally,
but de facto under Rosas' rule. In
1853,
when the interior
provinces
banded
together
under one constitution and the
leadership
of
Urquiza,
Buenos Aires was not a
part
of
it;
instead a war broke out between Buenos Aires and
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Woman, Nation,
and Exile in Jos? M?rmol 's Amalia 11
the
confederation,
which did not end
until,
in
1860,
when Buenos Aires was able to
join
the confederation in a
position
of
primacy.
6
See Dena
Goodman,
The
Republic of
Letters,
A Cultural
History of
the
French
Enlightenment (Ithaca
and London: Cornell
University
Press, 1994)
on the
role of educated women
during
the French
enlightenment
as
complements
to the
male role. See also Linda
Kerber,
Women
of
the
Republic:
Intellect and
Ideology
in
Revolutionary
America
(New
York:
Norton, 1986).
7
See
Alejandra
Laera,
"El
?ngel y
el diablo: ficci?n
y pol?tica
en
Amalia,"
Letras
y divisas, ensayos
sobre literatura
y rosismo,
ed. Cristina
Iglesia
(Buenos
Aires: Editorial Universitaria de Buenos
Aires, 1998)
118-119.
8
See
Sommer,
Foundational Fictions: The National Romances
of
Latin
America
(Berkeley,
Los
Angeles,
and London:
University
of California
Press,
1991)112.
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