History of an Argentine Passion

Abstract

In Eduardo Mallea (1903), Argentina found spokesman for its deepest, most genuine values and beliefs. Other writers before him had portrayed external realities of country but failed to penetrate its fundamental inner core. The frustration and pain Mallea feels when he observes erosion of Argentina's basic traditions pervade both his personal life and literary production. Mallea cut deeply into Argentina's soul and succeeded in analysing emotional and mental states of twentieth century Argentines caught up in a world of changing mores and ideologies. He is an intellectual and psychological novelist who sees modern man's anguish resulting more from a struggle of forces within his own psyche than from external, environmental forces. One of most important writers in Latin America, Mallea is author of some two dozen works of fiction and several volumes of essays. He wrote Historia de una pasi?n argentina in 1937, before publishing his first novel, and many of themes treated in this essay appear later in his novels and short stories. Any critical appreciation of profound meaning of such works as La bah?a de silencio, Chaves or Todo verdor perecer? can come only through an understanding of social and philo sophical issues contained in seminal essay. Indeed, close artistic and thematic relationship between Mallea essayist and Mallea novelist is nowhere more clearly seen than in Historia de una pasi?n argentina. Among themes evident in this essay and elaborated on in fictional form are following: 1) concept of what Mallea calls the two Argentinas, visible Argentina and invisible Argentina (The visible is materialistic, ostentatious, artificial veneer that country, especially Buenos Aires, lives with from day to day. The invisible Argentina is heart, genuine soul of country, its true but hidden values, its potential greatness): 2) man's lack of meaningful communication with his fellow man, his isolation and loneliness in an uncaring, chaotic world; 3) man's emotional mutism, his reluctance to share and to give of him self, his alienation in an impersonal society; and 4) crisis of Argentina's