Читать книгу Lope de Aguirre, Hugo Chávez, and the Latin American Left - Alfredo Ignacio Poggi - Страница 5

Introduction

The conquistador Lope de Aguirre and his storied depiction in novels, essays, theatrical works, films, and comics will serve as a gateway leading deep into the continent’s anti-imperialist imagination. My analysis will bring to light some of the anti-imperialist dimensions of Latin American culture that have recurred throughout the region’s history, and which connect in some way with the Chavista project. Lope de Aguirre is deeply relevant here: in the history of the Americas, he was the first revolutionary leader, in the modern sense, to rebel against imperial forces and to create an independent government in opposition to the king and to colonial political structures. On the other hand, Aguirre also ruled tyrannically and oppressively: over time, he killed the majority of his followers, even including his daughter.

In addition to this dual liberating/oppressive dimension, Aguirre stands as an incarnation of anger, which has won him the praise and condemnation of writers and artists for centuries since. Anger, as a political emotion, will be my main theoretical lens in approaching the figure of Aguirre; this is where the novelty of my research lies.

My book has six chapters. In the first one, I trace the conceptual map my project will follow, and I explain its relevance for the contemporary intellectual debate. In this chapter, I note that while emotions play a leading role in anti-imperialist crusades, there is insufficient research on this topic in the field of postcolonial studies.

In the second chapter, I analyze the first literary narratives about Aguirre and propose an innovative reading of them, suggesting a parallel between the first relaciones^[1] and, on the other hand, the Divine Comedy of Dante Alighieri. I interpret the expedition to El Dorado and the marañón rebellion as a descent into Hell, wherein Lope de Aguirre represents a new Lucifer in opposition to religious and imperial powers.

In the third chapter, I continue my study of colonial sources, but I do so this time from the standpoint of the history of emotions. In the sixteenth century, according to several historians, there was a paradigm shift in the way various emotional expressions were perceived as embodiments of “anger.” This shift was promoted by the national monarchies, by movements in humanistic education, and by religious reforms.^[2] In this context, the first colonial writings about Lope de Aguirre condemned his angry behavior and associated it with his rejection of the empire; at the same time, they rejected not only the use of anger but also the practice of mercy as a political behavior.

An analysis of Aguirre’s literary depictions is the subject of my fourth chapter. My main discovery is that from the sixteenth century to the end of the nineteenth, Aguirre was condemned across the board by writers and thinkers of varying political ideologies. In 1891, however, Carlos Arturo Torres published a drama in which the figure of Aguirre was vindicated for the first time. In that same year, José Martí published Nuestra América, considered the founding text of Latin American anti-imperialism and liberationist thought. From that point on, numerous authors—particularly those associated with the political left—began to exalt the figure of Lope de Aguirre.

In the fifth chapter, I explain how Aguirre became an international icon in the 1970s, at the same time as the Latin American liberation movements picked up steam. While Werner Herzog’s famous film amounted to a condemnation of the man, Spanish and Latin American authors began a systematic defense of Aguirre that spanned the twentieth century. Like Latin American anti-imperialism and liberationist thinking, the exaltation of Lope de Aguirre began in the late nineteenth century and reached its peak in the 70s, and it was associated with the continent’s political left. Vengeful anger is precisely the element most vaunted by Aguirre’s defenders, and it finds an echo in people like Che Guevara and Hugo Chávez.

In the last chapter, I develop the genesis and consolidation of liberationist thought in Latin America, surveying its main figures and their common theoretical approaches. In reaction to positivism and the threat of American expansion, Latin American intellectuals began to develop their own theoretical response on the basis of their colonial history and the desire for liberation. After its heyday in the 1970s, this current of thought fell into disrepute with the end of the Cold War, the imposition of neoliberal policies, and the development of postmodern philosophies in the 1980s and 90s. However, beginning in the late 1990s, Latin America tacked to the left under the leadership of Hugo Chávez and other governments unified by an anti-imperialist ideology that returned liberationist thought to center stage. During the so-called “Pink Tide,” this resurrection of liberationist praxis was accompanied by angry and violent speeches from the majority of its proponents, echoing the wrathful tone of Lope de Aguirre.

This leads me, ultimately, to ask: Is anger a constitutive element of the anti-imperialist imaginary? Do social demands for justice following years of colonial oppression amount to a cry for historical revenge? How can one justify the actions of an irate and violent leader simply because he opposes the hegemony of empire?

Notes

1.

The relaciones were texts written during the time of the conquest and of colonial expansion that narrated events in the Americas and were intended to keep the courts and lettered people of Europe informed.

2.

In his book The Civilizing Process: Sociogenetic and Psychogenetic Investigations, Norbert Elias conducts an analysis of the different factors that fostered this change in behavior and in emotional expression in sixteenth-century Europe. Among these factors, one of the most important was the nascent Modern States’ monopoly on the justice system: where before, during the Middle Ages, individual knights had social approval to enact revenge and restore social order through violence, the Modern States claimed the exclusive right to violent punishment. Moreover, during this same period, a system of humanistic education elaborated a standard of courtly behavior for its citizenry. This is reflected, for instance, in a piece of advice given by Erasmus of Rotterdam to young nobles: “Let others paint lions, eagles, and other creatures on their coats of arms. More true nobility is possessed by those who can inscribe on their shields what they have achieved through the cultivation of the arts and sciences,” quoted in Norbert Elias, The Civilizing Process: Sociogenetic and Psychogenetic Investigations. Edward Jephcott, trans., Eric Dunning, Johan Goudsblom, and Stephen Mennell, ed., vol. I (Oxford: Blackwell, 2010), 74. Other important figures in this cultural shift included Ignatius of Loyola, who abandoned his warlike aspirations and founded a religious order that has instilled humanistic ideals in generations of wealthy Europeans since the sixteenth century.