Leyenda Napolitana (review)

Abstract

304 Arizona Journal of Hispanic Cultural Studies Probably the single most important sentence I heard in a class when I was an undergraduate student at Arizona State University was uttered by a professor of Women's Studies when explaining hei own response to the often unbridled hostility diat hei woik in feminist studies had generated among men and some women, "Your resistance is a measure of my oppression." Indeed, such hostility to any critical examination of sexuality and gender identity measures to what degree diis continues to be a human rights issue, one often fraught with volatility, and, as David Foster has said, it thus constitutes the "ground zero" for understanding cultural manifestations . Foster, in most of his work over the last ten yeais, has devoted considerable time to examining gendei and sexuality in Latin American cultuial production, specifically film, nairative, popular culture and theater. His latest book explores gender and sexuality in thirteen Brazilian films. He readily admits that the selection of movies used in his text is direcdy related to their capacity to demonstrate his thesis. Widi the exception of one, O Beijo no Asfalto (1981), the films all postdate the end ofthe Brazilian dictatorship in 1985. Indeed that paiticuki film, based on a play by the man considered to be the grand patriarch of Brazilian theatei, Nelson Rodrigues, offers a surprisingly open look at homoeroticism and demonstrates the ways in which the "abertura" was already beginning to be felt in the country before the official demise ofthe dictatorship. The introduction of Fostei's text provides a brief overview of Brazilian filmic history. It establishes how Brazil, like Mexico, Argentina and Cuba, developed as one ofthe major film producing centers of Latin America. This particular section ofthe book will be very useful to the general reader unfamiliar with the parameters of film history in Spanish and Portuguese-speaking America. It also provides a foundation foi the subsequent discussion of gendei, society and sexuality. The first part of Fosters text delves into the filmic presentations of masculinity; the second presents femininity and feminist reworkings of filmic production; and the third revolves around die presentation of same-sex relations. Foster highlights in all three sections the representation of sexual dissidence in its myriad forms. If the text is a bit uneven in its treatment ofthe themes—masculinity is examined in six films, femininity and feminism in four and homoeroticism in three— Foster argues that this is due to the reality of Brazilian filmmaking and society—one that remains unabashedly macho and homophobic. As a result , women, unless presenred as sexual objects, tend not to be die serious focus of die majority of films, and homoeroticism is all but invisible. Fostei successfully demonstrates the odd patadox of the hypeieroticized and stereotypical notions of Brazilian sexuality coupled with the policing (in some cases quite literal) of rigid gender and sexuality in society. This short, though comprehensive book is highly recommended for any student of Latin American history, cultural studies, as well as gender and film studies. MeUssa A. Fitch The University of Arizona Leyenda Napolitana Barcelona: Tusquests, 1999 Por Juan Carlos Marset Galardonado en 1989 con el premio AdonaL· poi su libio Puer Profeta, Juan Catlos Marset consolida su labor poética en esta segunda entrega de sus versos titulada Leyenda Napolitana y se reafirma como una de las voces más destacadas de la lÃ-rica española contempoiánea. De hecho, este libro es el producto de casi una década de escritura y continúa esa lÃ-nea de poesÃ-a meditativa iniciada ya en el primer poemario. Ambas obras manifiestan asimismo una preocupación por el espacio como estrategia de introspección del individuo, pero, a diferencia de Puer Profeta, en el que se declaraba que "H extranjero es quien se ausenta / no del paÃ-s percudo / sino del que añorado proscriben sus recuerdos" (12), Leyenda Napolitana presenta la siguiente consigna: "Una palabra / ni dicha ni callada es k ciudad / que colma tu nostalgia" (21), consigna en la que cicatriza la Arizona Journal of Hispanic Cultural Studies 305 añoranza de aquel espacio proscrito en el tecueido. El sujeto poético de Leyenda ha descubierto en su...