Rhetorical Monstrosity and Female Agency in Adelaida García Morales’s El Sur

BACKES, HEIDI

Bulletin of Hispanic Studies (2019), 96, (7), 731–745.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.3828/bhs.2019.44
Language: English
Pages: 15

Abstract

This article examines the role of Gothic monstrosity in the establishment of female agency in Adelaida García Morales’s 1985 novella El Sur, drawing connections between the post-Civil War setting of the text and García Morales’s perspective as a Transition-era author. Throughout the novella, the mother character uses rhetoric as a powerful tool to create and manipulate the monster image that she projects onto her husband, Rafael. El Sur ultimately speaks to feminist concerns of a loss of power in Franco’s patriarchal dictatorship: by allowing her protagonist and the other female characters to regain control through the use of the monstrous (and, in the protagonist’s case, through the acceptance of her own inner monster), García Morales represents the surge in feminism in Spain during the post-Franco period, at the same time expressing a certain amount of anxiety over the possibility of losing this newly found political voice.

Este trabajo examina el papel de la monstruosidad gótica en la creación de la agencia femenina en El Sur de Adelaida García Morales (1985), estableciendo conexiones entre el ambiente de la post-guerra y la perspectiva de García Morales como autora de la Transición española. Por toda la novela, el personaje de la madre utiliza la retórica como una herramienta poderosa para crear y manipular la imagen del monstruo que le asigna a su esposo, Rafael. El Sur destaca las preocupaciones feministas de la pérdida de poder en la dictadura patriarcal de Franco: al dejar que su protagonista y otros personajes femeninos recuperen el control por el uso de lo monstruoso (y, en el caso de la protagonista, por aceptar su propia monstruosidad interior), García Morales representa el feminismo creciente en España durante el período post-Franco mientras que también expresa cierta ansiedad por la posibilidad de perder esta nueva voz política.

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