Alberto Blest Gana and the Sensory Appeal of Wealth

Patricia Vilches

doi:10.1515/culture-2021-0006

Abstract

AbstractThis essay explores sensory stimuli inLa aritmética en el amor[Arithmetic in Love/Economics of Love] (1860) as they relate to the consumer preferences (for clothing, furniture, jewellery) and purchasing practices of nineteenth-century Santiago, Chile. The novel presents detailed descriptions, for example, of fine fabrics, emphasising the sounds that the wearers of such fabric reproduce as they move about. Wealthy or not, people feel the pressure to present themselves in their best garments, but the “best noise” is made by the rich, who transmit the affect of opulence to the less fortunate. Overall, to radiate a sensory appeal, characters frequent the city of Santiago and patronise the finest clothing stores. From our very first encounter with the protagonist Fortunato Esperanzano, he is dressed accordingly, engaging with Santiago and showing in his persona that he shops only for nice clothes and the best cigars. From a Lefebvrian perspective, Fortunato represents how Chile’s modernisation transforms the capital’s “marketplace” as a social space where a new luxury economy flourishes and a traditional, rigid social order is maintained.

Highlights

The literary production of Alberto Blest Gana (1830–1920) contains elaborate descriptions of the physical and human geographies of Santiago and Paris, the latter described at length in Los Trasplantados (1904)
With his life practically divided between a first half in Chile and a second half in Paris, Blest Gana once famously announced that he had ceased writing poetry, finding inspiration for his prose in the dramatic social scenes created by Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850) (Epistolario 14; 36)
People stop to stare at Margarita as she presents herself as a worthwhile spectacle of finesse. She becomes a visual image of prosperity that bespeaks the transformation of the city, reproducing how a narration that contemplates any type of “observations about modernity” contemplates the alterations of fashion (Brevik-Zender 231)

Summary

Introduction

The literary production of Alberto Blest Gana (1830–1920) contains elaborate descriptions of the physical and human geographies of Santiago and Paris, the latter described at length in Los Trasplantados (1904) With his life practically divided between a first half in Chile and a second half in Paris, Blest Gana once famously announced that he had ceased writing poetry, finding inspiration for his prose in the dramatic social scenes created by Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850) (Epistolario 14; 36). As he defined a macro historic space in the city via historical events, the Chilean author inscribed a domestic, micro space where the private lives of city dwellers unfolded alongside these same events. Affluence is a thing to be seen, heard, and even touched, and the sensory perception of affluence follows a

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Works Cited