Pedro Juan Gutiérrez's Dirty Realism: Reinventing Cuban Spaces

by Lori Oxford

Overview

This work examines Gutiérrez’s Centro Habana Cycle (1998-2003) as a literary response to the social, political, and economic crisis of Cuba’s Special Period. The author offers a series of thematically arranged close readings that explore Gutiérrez’s interpretation of life and reality via his signature semi-autobiographical narrative.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781666910032
Publisher:	Lexington Books
Publication date:	05/03/2023
Pages:	168
Product dimensions:	6.18(w) x 9.42(h) x 0.76(d)

About the Author

Lori Oxford is associate professor of Spanish and associate dean of the Brinson Honors College at Western Carolina University.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Juxtaposed Spaces Chapter 2: La nada cubana Chapter 3: Putting the "Dirty" in Dirty Realism Chapter 4: Death Spaces Chapter 5: Spiritual Realms Chapter 6: Intertextualities Chapter 7: Cuba from Afar Appendix: Interview with Pedro Juan Gutiérrez

Editorial Reviews

This is a book for both fans and scholars of Pedro Juan Gutiérrez: presenting nuanced interpretations of this scintillating Cuban writer’s major novels, extensive context about the economic crisis of the Cuban Special Period, and as a bonus, a long interview with Gutiérrez from 2022, Lori Oxford’s book opens new avenues of understanding Gutiérrez’s fiction and makes a compelling case for why we should keep reading his work.

Anke Birkenmaier

Pedro Juan Gutiérrez's Dirty Realism: Reinventing Cuban Spaces is a comprehensive exploration of Gutiérrez’s narrative writing since the international success of Trilogía sucia de La Habana in 1998. Through close engagement with this writing and with a wide range of ideas and sources, including an extensive interview with Gutiérrez, the book traces networks connecting his literary work and persona to two decades of change in Cuba. Taking as a primary conceptual thread the relation between utopian, dystopian and heterotopian thinking, it casts new light on Gutiérrez’s particular brand of dirty realism, and stands as a welcome contribution to scholarship on his work.

Esther Whitfield