Silver Medalist at the 24th International Latino Book Awards
Alejandro Morales is a pioneer of Chicana and Chicano literature and the author of groundbreaking works including The Brick People, The Rag Doll Plagues, and River of Angels. His work, often experimental, was one of the first to depict harsh urban realities in the barriosa break from much of the Chicana and Chicano fiction that had been published previously. Morales relentless work has grown over the decades into a veritable menagerie of cultural testimonies, fantastic counterhistories, magical realism, challenging metanarratives, and flesh-and-blood aesthetic innovation. The fourteen essays included in this compendium examine Morales novels and short stories. The editors also include a critical introduction; an interview between Morales, the editors, and fellow author Daniel Olivas; and a new comprehensive bibliography of Morales writings and works about himbooks, articles, book reviews, online resources, and dissertations. A Critical Collection on Alejandro Morales: Forging an Alternative Chicano Fiction is a must-read for understanding and appreciating Morales work in particular and Chicana and Chicano literature in general.
Recenzijas
"This landmark collection of critical essays analyzes Alejandro Morales' works throughout the vast scope of his literary career and fully reveals the genius and the aesthetic and intellectual significance of his prolific contributions to US literature and culture broadly and Chicana and Chicano literature and culture more specifically. This volume gives Morales' work the prominent place it deserves in US literary history." - Timothy R. Libretti, contributor to Writer in Exile/Writer in Revolt: Critical Perspectives on Carlos Bulosan
"Borges generatively explored how the finite could grasp the infinitethose perfect spheres and points in space that contain all the universe's points and angles of perception. Alchemical curators Marc Garcķa-Martķnez and Francisco A. Lomelķ show us how words that shape scholarly concepts can lead to the apprehension of the ungraspable. They put into polyversal play perfectly shaped scholarly spheres that open us to the infinitude of Alejandro Morales' multiverses and futurities." - Frederick Luis Aldama, coeditor of Decolonizing Latinx Masculinities
Introduction: Alejandro Morales: An Errant Maverick Faces the Literary
Canon and History Marc Garcķa-Martķnez and Francisco A. Lomelķ
Chapter One. Submersion, Suffocation, and Entombment of the Mexican and
Immigrant Body in River of AngelsProbing Figurations of Violence and
Isolation Marc Garcķa-Martķnez
Chapter Two. The Analogous Correspondence of an Extreme Poetics between
Stanley Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange and Alejandro Morales' Barrio on the
Edge Francisco A. Lomelķ
Chapter Three. Alejandro Morales' The Captain of All These Men of Death and
Philip Roth's Nemesis: Parallels and Contrasts Stephen Miller
Chapter Four. Tropes of Ecothinking and the Spatial Imaginary in Alejandro
Morales' River of Angels Sophia Emmanouilidou
Chapter Five. History, Spatial Justice, and the Esperpento in Alejandro
Morales' Pequeńa nación Jesśs Rosales
Chapter Six. Heterotopia and the Emergence of the Modern Ilusa in Waiting to
Happen Margarita López López
Chapter Seven. City History and Space Politics: Los Angeles in Morales' River
of Angels Baojie Li
Chapter Eight. Pequeńa nación: Big (Feminist) Revolution Amaia
Ibarraran-Bigalondo
Chapter Nine. Bodies in Motion in The Place of the White Heron, Volume Two of
the Heterotopian Trilogy: A Glance through the Panopticon Adam Spires
Chapter Ten. Race, Space, and Magical Realism in The Brick People and River
of Angels Adina Ciugureanu
Chapter Eleven. Mestizaje, Cultural Identity, and Environmental Degradation
in Alejandro Morales' The Rag Doll Plagues Manuel M. Martķn Rodrķguez
Chapter Twelve. Translation as Rewriting and Resituating: The Two English
Versions of Caras viejas y vino nuevo by Alejandro Morales Elena Errico
Chapter Thirteen. History and Fiction in Alejandro Morales' Narratives Luis
Leal
Chapter Fourteen. Epidemics, Epistemophilia, and Racism: Ecological Literary
Criticism and The Rag Doll Plagues Marķa Herrera-Sobek
Chapter Fifteen. A Dialogue with the Writer Alejandro Morales Francisco
Lomelķ, Marc Garcķa-Martķnez, and Daniel Olivas
Bibliography
Contributors
Index
Marc Garcķa-Martķnez is a professor of English at Allan Hancock College and a lecturer of Chicana/o studies at UCSanta Barbara. He is the author of The Flesh-and-Blood Aesthetics of Alejandro Morales: Disease, Sex, and Figuration. Francisco A. Lomelķ is a professor emeritus of Chicana/o studies and Spanish and Portuguese at UCSanta Barbara. He is the author, coauthor, and coeditor of forty books, including a landmark translation of Alejandro Morales' Barrio on the Edge and Aztlįn: Essays on the Chicano Homeland (UNM Press).
