Bandit Narratives In Latin America: From Villa To Chßvez (Pitt Illuminations)

Bandits seem ubiquitous in Latin American culture. Even contemporary actors of violence are framed by narratives that harken back to old images of the rural bandit, either to legitimize or delegitimize violence, or to intervene in larger conflicts within or between nation-states. However, the bandit escapes a straightforward definition, since the same label can apply to the leader of thousands of soldiers (as in the case of Villa) or to the humble highwayman eking out a meager living by waylaying travelers at machete point. Dabove presents the reader not with a definition of the bandit, but with a series of case studies showing how the bandit trope was used in fictional and non-fictional narratives by writers and political leaders, from the Mexican Revolution to the present. By examining cases from Argentina, Brazil, Mexico, Peru, and Venezuela, from Pancho VillaÆs autobiography to Hugo ChßvezÆs appropriation of his ôoutlawö grandfather, Dabove reveals how bandits function as a symbol to expose the dilemmas or aspirations of cultural and political practices, including literature as a social practice and as an ethical experience.

• | Author: Juan Pablo Dabove
• | Publisher: University Of Pittsburgh Press
• | Publication Date: Apr 28, 2017
• | Number of Pages: 368 pages
• | Language: English
• | Binding: Paperback/Literary Criticism
• | ISBN-10: 082296435X
• | ISBN-13: 9780822964353