This dissertation maps out the novelistic production of a handful of writers that I have coined "the Hispanic Atlantic." This term refers to a cultural, financial, and geographical space in which the Atlantic Ocean functions as a site that connects Spain, Spanish America, and the United States. The novelistic production I study questions the traditional notion of national literature. At the same time, my research provides a new look at what, after Jünger Habermas, has been labeled as "postnational." More specifically, my dissertation studies the intersection of Spanish and Latin American writers as they relocate on both sides of the Atlantic, and by doing so, reach new levels of global success that were unprecedented in Hispanic national literature. My dissertation focuses on the narrative work of authors Agustín Fernández Mallo, Javier Marías, Arturo Pérez-Reverte, and Carlos Ruiz Zafón from Spain, as well as Roberto Bolaño and Boris Izaguirre from Latin America. In my analysis of their works, I carefully examine the way in which notions of national cultures and their aftermath are represented with a particular emphasis on the reception of those works on both sides of the Atlantic.Chapter one concentrates on Spanish writers that today are influential in the global market of the novel. I start by examining the literary production of Arturo Pérez-Reverte and Carlos Ruiz Zafón. More specifically, I analyze the unprecedented global best-seller status that these writers are experiencing beyond the Spanish publishing industry. Chapter two studies two specific authors that have been successful in Spain, Latin America, and the United States, but still have not experienced a global commercial success similar to the authors studied in chapter one. These authors are Javier Cercas and Javier Marías. The historical and sociological referent of the literature they are producing is ingrained in Spanish national culture rather than in globalization. In this chapter, I explore the sociological reality of literary awards and the impact they have on the way the Spanish publishing industry promotes authors beyond Spanish borders. Finally, I also examine the high modernist status inherent in the works these authors produce.Chapter three focuses on the writing of two successful Latin American authors: Roberto Bolaño and Boris Izaguirre. As a result of the influx of global immigration to Spain, several cities (Barcelona, Madrid, Seville) are becoming the residence of many Latin American writers who have stayed in Spain and are experiencing enormous achievement. One of the most important examples is the case of the Chilean Roberto Bolaño whose novelistic project has become a success of global proportions. In my analysis of these two novelists, I pay close attention to the way in which these novels concerned themselves with the cultural counterpoint of nationhood and cosmopolitanism. Chapter four analyzes the latest Spanish narrative which pays attention to the global market. The work produced by these novelists is quite influenced by the U.S. cultural industry. My study focuses on the novelistic discourse of Spanish writers Ray Loriga, Lucía Etxebarría, and Agustín Fernández Mallo, as well as Afterpop ́s cultural critic Eloy Fernández Porta. In my study of these authors, I focus on how these writers incorporate different manifestations of pop and mass culture in order to actively participate in the global markets of the publishing industry.
Read
