OTHER WEAPONS • Luisa Valuenzela
Ediciones del Norte / 1985
Paperback / 135 pages
Julio Cortazar said of Valenzuela that she lucidly charts "the seldom-chosen course of a woman deeply anchored in her condition, conscious of discriminations that are still horrible all over our continent, but, at the same time, filled with joy in life that permits her to surmount both the elementary stages of protest and an overestimation of women in order to put herself on a perfectly equal footing with any literature---masculine or not.
“Other Weapons... and the name proclaims it with each of its letters, not so much int he whip which tears the back of the tortured woman, not so much in the pistol which is used as the definitive sign of the struggle, of the old context where men and women look at each other with weapon in hand, waiting to deliver the doup de grace and decide on which side power is yielfed. No, it’s not those weapons. The weapons are in this case in the expression of the face which searches desperately for a reflection, a voice which would sing -not the muse’s song to the Lauras or the milenary Beatrixes, or even ot the Devoured Woman, or to the Devouring Woman, who is the Whore, the Great Bitch whom the Melancholy Ruffian kicks around in Arlt’s books, or to the woman whom Junta Larsen places in the cat-houses and phalansteries constructed by Onetti. No, the voice answers her won in echo, and wants to be, in unison, her Narcissus.” ----Margo Glantz
︎ Condition note: This is a used book in Very Good condition / some tanning to edges of cover / some shelfwear and minor edgewear / Binding is square and tight / interior pages are free of marks or underlinings. A nice copy!
Ediciones del Norte / 1985
Paperback / 135 pages
Julio Cortazar said of Valenzuela that she lucidly charts "the seldom-chosen course of a woman deeply anchored in her condition, conscious of discriminations that are still horrible all over our continent, but, at the same time, filled with joy in life that permits her to surmount both the elementary stages of protest and an overestimation of women in order to put herself on a perfectly equal footing with any literature---masculine or not.
“Other Weapons... and the name proclaims it with each of its letters, not so much int he whip which tears the back of the tortured woman, not so much in the pistol which is used as the definitive sign of the struggle, of the old context where men and women look at each other with weapon in hand, waiting to deliver the doup de grace and decide on which side power is yielfed. No, it’s not those weapons. The weapons are in this case in the expression of the face which searches desperately for a reflection, a voice which would sing -not the muse’s song to the Lauras or the milenary Beatrixes, or even ot the Devoured Woman, or to the Devouring Woman, who is the Whore, the Great Bitch whom the Melancholy Ruffian kicks around in Arlt’s books, or to the woman whom Junta Larsen places in the cat-houses and phalansteries constructed by Onetti. No, the voice answers her won in echo, and wants to be, in unison, her Narcissus.” ----Margo Glantz
︎ Condition note: This is a used book in Very Good condition / some tanning to edges of cover / some shelfwear and minor edgewear / Binding is square and tight / interior pages are free of marks or underlinings. A nice copy!