Rafael Pinedo’s Trilogy: Dystopian Visions and Populist Thought in Argentina’s Turn-of-the-century Narrative

Abstract

The three short novels written by Rafael Pinedo (Argentina, 1954–2006) before his untimely death are increasingly attracting the attention of academic researchers, not only because of their complexity but also because of their take on Argentine politics and ideology. The following article analyzes how these novels operate within what Tom Moylan defined as a critical dystopian narrative. By narrating each story as a future world in agony, where all social interactions are described with a militant pessimism, the novels envisage the consequences of the populist’s policies grip on the country’s social and cultural environment. I argue that Plop (Casa de las Américas Prize 2002), Frío (Finalist for the 2004 Planeta Prize), and Subte can be read as a trilogy since they propose a radical thought experiment about the limits of the social and cultural practices of populist policies, as well as a mise-en-scène of its hijacking and betrayal of utopian values. The article also underlines how, despite its pessimistic tone, the novels offer a glimmer of hope by returning to basic concepts of community and empathy.

Keywords:

• Dystopia
• populism
• Neoliberalism
• Argentina
• Rafael Pinedo

Notes

1. Frío was a finalist for the 2004 Planeta Prize given by the homonymous press, but remained unpublished for seven more years.

2. Unfortunately, most Latin American sf has yet to be translated into English and most of the novels I am going to mention in the pages that follow are not available to non-Spanish-speaking American or British readers.

3. The Peronista movement (or Justicialismo) has been the most influential political force in Argentina since it coalesced as a de facto party in the 1940s. Organized around its founder, Juan Domingo Perón (1895–1974), and sustained by coopted unions, the movement encompasses a wide variety of rightist and leftist ideological programs, as well a great variety of social and economic interests. Peronismo can be described as a populist party, with a strong corporatist economic base and a social patronage system. The core membership of the party and its affiliates is made up of blue collar workers, peasants, and the lower brackets of the middle class. During the 1960s, part of its youth branch turned into an armed movement that attempted to radicalize Peronismo’s social programs.

4. The Argentine literary field has deep ideological roots in the nineteenth century liberal modernization project that serves as its common matrix regardless of any individual writer’s political allegiances. The corpus that constitutes this matrix is generally labeled ‘foundational narrative and/or discourse’. Including essays such as Facundo (1845) by Domingo Faustino Sarmiento (1811–1888), these narratives provided a blueprint for the modernization process: cities were to be the seat from where illustrated classes would carry out their vision; hence the term ‘lettered city’ was also coined to described the project’s location. Issues such as the civilization-barbarism dichotomy, the role of intellectuals in the state, or the management of power through the regulation of state institutions that the three novels I discuss here either articulate or browse, were first posed in Argentine narrative in the nineteenth century and were seminal for various political debates for the next 150 years (Kurlat-Ares and Silvia 2006).

5. See Stillman Peter G. 2003. Dystopian Critiques, Utopian Possibilities, and Human Purposes in Octavia Butler's Parables. Utopian Studies vol. 14, no. 1: 15–35.

6. Different factions of the Justicialista Party under varied banners have won elections in Argentina since 1989. The de la Rúa presidency which could have interrupted the cycle came to an abrupt end with the 2001–2002 crisis as explained earlier.