Los espíritus de la ciencia ficción: espiritismo, periodismo y cultura popular en las novelas de Eduardo Holmberg, Francisco Miralles y Pedro Castera by Luis C. Cano

Abstract

Reviewed by: Los espíritus de la ciencia ficción: espiritismo, periodismo y cultura popular en las novelas de Eduardo Holmberg, Francisco Miralles y Pedro Castera by Luis C. Cano M. Elizabeth Ginway Cano, Luis C. Los espíritus de la ciencia ficción: espiritismo, periodismo y cultura popular en las novelas de Eduardo Holmberg, Francisco Miralles y Pedro Castera. U of North Carolina P, 2017. 263 pp. ISBN 978-1-4696-4169-0. This monograph argues that the roots of Latin American science fiction can be traced to the nineteenth century, when the cultural parameters associated with the scientific method and scientific investigation in general were in flux. Cano feels that the "science" in early Latin American science fiction is more attuned to the science of spiritism and esotericism than to the empirical science found in works by Verne and Wells, and therefore should be understood accordingly. The supposed existence of spirits that can be detected scientifically fits into the religious and cultural belief systems of Latin America and explains, in part, the peculiarities of the science fiction of this period. These ideas were explored previously by Rachel Haywood Ferreira in The Emergence of Science Fiction (2011), but while her focus is broad and comprehensive, Cano has a more specific approach, focusing on only three science fiction novels published in Spanish America: from Argentina, Eduardo Homberg's Viaje maravilloso del señor Nic-Nac al planeta Marte (1875); from Chile, Francisco Miralles's Desde Júpiter (1877); from Mexico, Pedro Castera's Querens (1890). Cano identifies these three novels as the first modern works of Spanish American science fiction and, therefore, considers them to be foundational texts. He attributes their lack of treatment in traditional literary histories to the fact that they were originally circulated largely in newspapers (147). The Introduction and Chapter 1 serve to contextualize these three works by characterizing the nineteenth-century Spanish-American literary traditions of popular and science fiction, including cross-pollinations from Europe, especially Spain. The second chapter can be conceptualized as a kind of compendium of relevant sources and works, demonstrating that while the material consulted for the book is extensive, it does not make for compelling reading. Here we learn that a surprising amount of science fiction was published in Spain, and that costumbrismo and police novels, along with melodramas and adventure novels, were popular genres. As was the case in France, feuilleton or serial newspaper publications were important, and Verne was more popular than Wells. Darwin's theory of evolution was a matter of raging controversy, in direct conflict with spiritual life and the Catholic Church. I would suggest that a genealogy of works by nineteenth-century occultists such as Allan Kardec and Camille Flammarion might have been useful for readers who are not familiar with concepts that mix science and religion. Similarly, it might have been useful to mention the public reached by popular genres, including the number or type of newspapers in which these works were published or even literacy rates. Although the introduction promises a comparative study, the structure of separate chapters for each of the three novels at times hinders comparison. I also miss a discussion of the socio-political contexts in Argentina, Chile and Mexico in the late nineteenth century. This underlines the fact that the text is written for specialists who are already familiar with the cultures, politics and literary movements of these countries. [End Page 165] Chapter 2 is dedicated to the novel Viaje maravilloso del señor Nic-Nac by Eduardo Ladislao Holmberg, who believed in the didactic value of literature in general and science fiction in particular. Cano proposes to explore the author's "procedimientos escriturales y discursivos" (81) in order to understand how he juggles the discourse of science, evolution and spiritism. As Cano admits, this narrative strategy at times results in a type of "obscuridad casi absoluta" (82). While esotericism has been welcomed in works by modernist writers such as Darío, Lugones and Nervo, it has been much criticized in Holmberg's novel. Cano then argues that Holmberg uses "obscurity" deliberately as a dialectic tool to contrast two types of societies—one traditionally religious and the other spiritist...