Los piratas esópicos de la colombiana Soledad Acosta de Samper

Abstract

257

One of the least studied episodes in the scope of Hispanic-American literature is the one defined by Enrique Anderson Imbert as: “parenthesis about pirate matter”. This is a series of writings, mainly historical novels, published along the 19th century. In them, those corsaries, buccaneers and filibusters who domineered in the Caribbean Sea, are recreated as protagonists or deuteragonists in a novelistic action. In that text corpus, the narrators of this early Hispanic America are immersed in a stage of political reconstruction after the processes of Independence. Because of this, they extol the seditious actions of the pirates in order to construct metaphors regarding national destiny. Underlying them, a strong critic against the Spanish hegemony exerted in the continent during three centuries, may be noted. The exception confirming the rule is: Los piratas en Cartagena by Colombian writer Soledad Acosta de Samper. This quintette of narrative pictures vindicates the Spanish civilizing undertaking in America. The romantic bond between piratic fiction and a patriotic project regarding the future, can be seen in Acosta under a singular aspect: the resource of the apologue to transmit her exonerating message. This paper proposes the reading of Los piratas en Cartagena as a set of fables (in the classical sense) converging into a master moral

Keywords

Narrative, Hispanic America, pirates of the Caribbean, national project, fable