Critical readings on the american Baroque

Abstract

Baroque aesthetics has moulded artistic and literary production during the period in which the colonial order was consolidated in Spanish America. But apart from its peak in the 17th. century, it has had various derivations in the 20th century through recognition and reinforcement of its meaning carried out by a group of writers.

Besides the critical and historiographical problems that Baroque presents to literary scholars, we have to add the process of appropriation, adaptation and reshaping which this aesthetics has undergone in Latin America. Our hypothesis is that the ‘Indias Baroque’ produced not only great creative works but also plural theoretical proposals through the period,

We propose to approach a selection of texts in the historiographical, critical and theoretical mood referring to Baroque in different times and various perspectives. The chosen corpus include the ‘ Apology in favour of Don Luis de Góngora’ by Espinosa Medrano, opinions by Juan María Gutiérrez and Rubén Darío in the 19th century and the proposals made by Alfonso Reyes, Pedro Henríquez Ureña and Mariano Picón-Salas in the 20th century.

We propose to make a metacritical journey in order to give a historical character to opinions developed about Baroque in Latin America.