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Abstract
The following article addresses Salvadoran Rafael Menjívar Ochoa’s crime fiction saga, which includes Los años marchitos (1990), Los héroes tienen sueño (1998), De vez en cuando la muerte (2002), and Cualquier forma de morir (2006). This article argues that each of Menjívar’s novels articulates a metaliterary reflection on crime fiction. Specifically, Menjívar explores two of the most fundamental aspects of this genre: the crime (generally, a murder) and the protagonist (traditionally understood as the investigator/hero). The author tackles the discursive creation of the idea of crime, particularly in the contexts of political and narco violence. Further, Menjívar provides a critical analysis of the role of the protagonist as an investigator/hero in postwar El Salvador. Through these novels, he continually invites us to consider the recent transformations experienced by crime fiction in contemporary Central America, from traditional detective novel to contemporary novela negra.
Notes
1 The 1990s is considered a decade of profound transformations in Central America. After the defeat of the Sandinistas in the election of 1990, and the signing of the peace accords that put an end to the civil wars in El Salvador (1992) and Guatemala (1996), the region witnessed a number of political, economic, and social transformations. Despite the promises of democratization, peace, and prosperity, these countries were struck by neoliberal policies that led to mass poverty and corruption, and what was once political violence became criminal violence. Within this context, overloaded with crime, violence, and corruption, it is not surprising that crime fiction has become a dominant genre.
2 See, Grinberg, Kokotovic, Rivera, Coello’s “El pícaro,” Quesada’s “¿Por qué estos crímenes?,” and Guzmán-Medrano, among others.
3 Both elements play a primary role in traditional crime fiction, as Amelia Simpson proposes: “Detective fiction is generally understood to be a type of narrative constructed around the solving of a crime problem, in which a detective, or a figure who carries out the function of a detective, is assigned a primary role” (10).
4 Although other Central American authors have reflected on crime fiction, we rarely find a sustained reflection across several works. For example, Sergio Ramírez published a compelling crime fiction novel in 1988, Castigo divino. However, he decided to return to traditional detective fiction in 2008 with El cielo llora por mí. According to Quesada, the latter novel “se decanta por una literatura más comercial, en la cual no hay un cuestionamiento profundo de hechos históricos, roles de género y de la sociedad después de los procesos revolucionarios” (“De Castigo divino” 60–61).
5 See, Giardinelli, Close’s “The detective is dead” and Contemporary Hispanic Crime Fiction, Simpson, Padura, Taibo II, Nicholls, and Noguerol. A concise history of Latin American crime fiction can be found in de Rosso’s “Para una historia.”
6 Testimonio became a symbol of popular struggle in Central America during the 1980s and early 1990s, in part due to the popularity of Rigoberta Menchú’s testimonio, edited by Elisabeth Burgos and published in 1983. This form of narration was supposed to embody people’s voice in opposition to official discourses and high culture. Zimmerman and Beverly perceived the emergence of testimonio as a transformation in literary production that might lead to profound transformations in society (see Literature and Politics 172–73). Testimonio had a profound impact on literary criticism, and as a result, several scholars devoted studies to the relationship between literature and testimonio (for example, see Craft).
7 The critical literature on the heroic figure is diverse. Joseph Campbell argues that there is a similar structure in ancient mythology regarding “the hero,” in which we continuously observe the “hero’s journey” (what Campbell calls the “monomyth”). Contemporary research in psychology and related disciplines has developed the idea of “the banality of heroism” to refer to heroic actions that are performed by ordinary people, extending the possibility of undertaking heroic deeds to any citizen regardless of their position in society (Zimbardo and Franco).
8 He is most likely killed by the squad we see in Cualquier forma de morir.
9 Before shooting Ortega and his squad, el Perro expresses his desire to become a hero: “Yo sí quiero ser jefe” (83).
10 The “New Man” was a concept used by Ernesto “Che” Guevara in his letter to Uruguayan editor Carlos Quijano in 1965, and it was widely spread in the 1970s and 1980s. According to “el Che,” the final goal of the revolution was not just to take control of the state, but also to give birth to a new selfless man who would conceive himself as an integral part of society.
11 Because of this, Coello argues that De vez en cuando la muerte should be read as an homage to novela negra (“Variantes del género negro”).
12 Linda Hutcheon defines parody as a “repetition with ironic critical distance, which marks difference rather than similarities” (xii). At the core of this repetition lies a permanent tension “between the potentially conservative effect of repetition and the potentially revolutionary impact of difference” (xii). As we observe in Menjívar’s novel, the narration makes an explicit transition from the conservative repetition to the revolutionary difference, making evident its parodic—and hence its critical—character.
13 In “Lectores imaginarios,” Piglia proposes that reading plays a crucial role in crime fiction. Most of these novels—from classic works that inaugurate the genre, like Edgar Allan Poe’s stories, to American hard-boiled—often present a close relationship between reading and the investigator. The importance of reading declines, according to Piglia, when the investigator reads “low quality” crime fiction novels. In Menjívar’s literature, crime fiction is frequently present. In addition to the examples I discuss here, in his first novel, El traidor de nunca jamás (1985), the protagonist reads Raymond Chandler’s The Simple Art of Murder (17).
14 While putting the idea of crime into question would not be novel today, it is important to stress that Los años marchitos was published in 1990, prior to the crime fiction boom in Central America. Hence, this novel is not only a pioneer in contemporary Central American crime fiction—along with Sergio Ramírez’ Castigo divino (1988)—but also represents a serious interrogation of the possibilities of this genre by the end of the twentieth century.
15 15 Although the primary concern of the novel is to address the problem of crime, it is also worth mentioning that the novel elucidates some relevant conclusions regarding the protagonist. The main characteristic of the narrator is his passivity. He observes much more than he acts, and his role on the squad is watching how others die. We have already seen the collapse of the protagonist figure in Los héroes tienen sueño and De vez en cuando la muerte; after observing how the hero/detective protagonist fades in these two novels, it is not surprising that the novel that closes this cycle presents an inactive protagonist. Further, José Colín proposes that the actions taken by the protagonist “no son producto de elección personal, sino exigidas por las circunstancias” (41).
16 This is the case with the director of the opposition newspaper, who does not do anything to escape or interfere, accepting in this way his fate: “No hizo nada cuando el Profesor puso un dedo en la boca para que no hablara, ni cuando el Ronco lo hizo subirse a la silla, después de colgar la cuerda de la lámpara, ni cuando se dio cuenta de que el asunto iba en serio. Preguntó por qué en voz baja, como para no despertar a su mujer” (67).
17 Some of these characters also reappear in the posthomous short stories volume Un mundo en el que el cielo cae y cae (2011). For more details about the intertextuality within Menjívar’s fiction, see the author’s blog, particularly the post entitled “Los héroes tienen sueño.”
Additional information
Notes on contributors
Ignacio Sarmiento
Ignacio Sarmiento is Assistant Professor of Spanish and Latin American history at the State University of New York at Fredonia. His research focuses on postwar Central American literature and culture.