Dissolving Frontiers: Second Postgraduate Colloquium on Hispanic Research by Anne Cutting

Abstract

492 Reviews quite up-to-date literature review in which the author provides a brief history ofthe term Bildungsroman, its development and main problematic aspects, and its application to narrative works, especially by women. Chapters 2, 3, and 4 concentrate on the differentstages in the process of formation of the individual as they are presented in the novels under study. Thus, these chapters offeran assessment of the protagonists' development from childhood to maturity,paying especial attention to their relation? ship with a mentor figure(whether male or female, but mainly female) and the conflict experienced by the characters when they confront the society in which they are sup? posed to develop or at least grow into adulthood. Chapter 3 is also devoted to the study of the narrative techniques used in the texts, dealing with issues of narrative voice, chronology, fragmentation, and realism. This chapter, however, appears to be rather long and offers no final conclusion. Chapter 4 deals with questions of power and has a very strong psychoanalytical focus (with constant reference to Lacan and Irigaray), which, however, had not been anticipated in the introductory pages. The main focus of this chapter is to show that the female subject can undergo a process of formation in which she develops as an individual who moves from an object to a subject position, from passivity to agency. Chapter 5 is entitled 'Conclusion'. Nevertheless, this section offersa great deal of new information, introducing material that would have been better placed elsewhere in the book. The author provides a review of feminist criticism on narratives of forma? tion which should have come at the beginning of the volume. The ideas here presented seem to be based on a deductive approach, but they are mainly derived from previous work by Felski and Abel, Garland, and Hirsch on the subject. Overall, there are some minor flaws in the work as regards structure, as can be seen fromthe placing ofthe last chapter. The most important shortcoming of the book is related to the analysis of the primary texts themselves, for,even though it is quite thorough, there is a general lack of quotations from the primary sources, which makes some of the arguments difficult to follow. Also, despite the length and completeness of the bibliography, there are some gaps in the examination of the concept of women's Bildungsroman, especially as regards Latin American women writers and Latin American feminist criticism. There are some major omissions of works by a number of critics and writers who have produced interesting texts dealing with the formation of the Latin American 'sujeto femenino' and which may appear in the bibliography but are not apparently used in the analysis itself. In all, this text appears as a major contribution to the study of women's narrative of formation, continuing the line of criticism developed by authors such as Abel, Labovitz, and others, and, mainly within Latin American women's writing, by critics such as Gloria Da Cunha-Giabbai ('La mujer hispanoamericana hacia el nuevo milenio ', in La nueva mujer en la escritura de autoras hispdnicas: ensayos criticos, ed. by Juana Alcira Arancibia and Yolanda Rosas (Montevideo: Instituto Literario y Cul? tural Hispanico, 1995) pp. 27-39) ana* Maria Ines Lagos {En tono mayor: relatos de formacion de protagonista femenina en Hispanoamerica (Santiago de Chile: Editorial Cuarto Propio, 1996)). University of Limerick Maria Cinta Ramblado-Minero Dissolving Frontiers: Second Postgraduate Colloquium on Hispanic Research. Ed. By Anne Cutting and Ana Fernandez Guerra. (Manchester Spanish and Portuguese Studies: Cafiada Blanch Monographs, 4) Manchester: Department of Spanish and Portuguese Studies. 2000. x + 91 pp. ?5. ISBN 0-9521322-9-x. The eight essays that appear in this volume were originally given as a series of papers at a postgraduate colloquium at the University of Shefneld. They have been divided MLRy 98.2, 2003 493 into three sections, covering Catalan literature, translation studies, and women and myth. The general quality of the contributions is high, and although several of the papers raise points that require furthercritical analysis, the majority contain original insights into a wide variety of subjects and themes. For example, in section 1 Xenia Gaspar i Blancafort provides an interesting reading of...