A Polyphonic Introduction

Abstract

My editor will no doubt call this an introduction, though I prefer to call it a confession; for this is nothing less than an attempt to explain what is behind the writing of this book—its methodological aspirations, its ideological limits, the emotional position from which I carried out my readings and constructed the interpretive niche that I used to share them.

¡Adiós, patria feliz, edén querido!

¡Doquier que el hado en su furor me impela,

tu dulce nombre halagará mi oído!

¡Adiós! … Ya cruje la turgente vela …

¡El ancla se alza … El buque, estremecido,

las olas corta y silencioso vuela!

—Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda, “Al partir”