Fashioning Feminism in Cuba and Beyond: The Prose of Gertrudis Gaomez De Avellaneda: 8 (Caribbean Studies) - Tapa dura

«Brígida Pastor is certainly one of Cuban studies' foremost authorities on both nineteenth-century Cuban literature and, specifically, on Gómez de Avellaneda. This study will encourage both an awareness and a reassessment of this significant but perhaps underestimated writer in the light of new knowledge and new ideas on female-authored fiction and with Pastor's incisive vision.» (Dr. Anthony Kapcia, Director of the Forum for the Study of Cuba, University of Wolverhampton)
«Brígida Pastor's book is an insightful, original and comprehensive study of the nineteenth-century Cuban author, Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda. Pastor presents a convincing analysis of Avellaneda's prose works, using current psychoanalytical, gender based theory to reveal the writer's importance in advancing feminist thought in Cuba and the Hispanic world generally. It also includes discussion of some of Avellaneda's work which have been hitherto largely ignored. This is an ideal text for scholars and students of Spanish and Latin American Studies, as well as those with a special interest in Cuban literature and gender studies.» (Professor Olga Cabrera, Universidade Federal de Goiás and Centro de Estudos de Caribe no Brasil, Editor of the Journal 'Revista Brasileira do Caribe')
«This excellent new work contributes to contemporary theories of gender. It reveals that even in the Hispanic tradition, seminal writers such as Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda sought to deconstruct the representation of gender well before the advent of post-modernism's explosion of interest in the topic. Dr. Pastor's sensitive and beautifully researched book reclaims for Avellaneda her rightful place at the vanguard of Hispanic feminism.» (Professor Nara Araújo, University of Havana/Colegio de México)

Though open public discussion of the oppression of women was precluded by the nature of Hispanic societies during the nineteenth century, some Hispanic women - among them the Cuban writer Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda - subtly sought to promote ideas of emancipation. Focusing upon her autobiographical letters and a selection of her novels, and drawing on contemporary psychoanalytical feminist theory, this book traces the evolution of Avellaneda's feminism, showing how she developed a series of narrative techniques and stylistic resources to explore male and female self-representation, and subvert the existing textual tradition. Fashioning Feminism in Cuba and Beyond establishes Avellaneda at the forefront of both Cuban and Hispanic nineteenth-century literature and feminist thought.