The Dionysian Disintegrations of Horacio Castellanos Moya's Tragic Antiheroes
Abstract
This dissertation presents analyses of six of Horacio Castellanos Moya’s antiheroes. The impetus for this study came from Alberto Moreiras’s article “The Question of Cynicism” (2014), which challenges Beatriz Cortez’s estética del cinismo—a theory that has dominated the academic discourse surrounding Castellanos Moya for the last two decades. Moreiras concludes his article by linking the political perspective of Castellanos Moya’s writings to tragedy rather than cynicism. The present study investigates whether Moreiras’s idea applies to Castellanos Moya’s works characterologically: are Castellanos Moya’s antiheroes tragic? This problem is resolved through psychological-affective character analyses.
Chapter One establishes that many of Castellanos Moya’s protagonists deviate from the archetypal patterns laid out by the heroes of epic and testimonio; therefore, they are anti-heroes. This chapter posits, moreover, that Castellanos Moya’s antihero narratives are Dionysian, in terms of the Apollo–Dionysus dichotomy presented in Friedrich Nietzsche’s The Birth of Tragedy (1872). Continuing this Nietzschean line of thought, the “Dionysian disintegrations” of Castellanos Moya’s antiheroes are conceptualized as metaphorical deaths that culminate in two possible states: tremendous horror or blissful rapture. The narratological paths to these states are marked by the self-boundary-altering emotions of menace and enchantment (Susan Beth Miller) and by shocking encounters with the dark side of the self, or the “shadow” (Carl Jung and Erich Neumann).
The subsequent chapters illustrate the Dionysian disintegrations of Castellanos Moya’s protagonists. Chapter Two examines Erasmo Aragón of Desmoronamiento (2006), El sueño del retorno (2013), and Moronga (2018), as well as José Zeledón of the short story “Némesis” (1993) and the novels El arma en el hombre (2001), La sirvienta y el luchador (2011), and Moronga (2018). Chapter Three examines Edgardo Vega of El asco (1997) and Laura Rivera of La diabla en el espejo (2000). Chapter Four examines Eduardo Sosa of Baile con serpientes (1996) and the unnamed protagonist ofInsensatez (2004).
Finally, this dissertation concludes that Castellanos Moya’s antiheroes are tragic because their narratives are centred on metaphorical deaths. This emphasis echoes the self-obliterating Dionysian impulse that Nietzsche views as the essence of tragedy.