The Andes mountain range in Jaime Sáenz and Antonio Gil

Abstract

This paper analyzes the significations related to the Andean mountain chain in novels written three decades apart and from cities surrounded by Andean peaks: La Paz and Santiago. These novels are Felipe Delgado (1979) by Bolivian author Jaime Sáenz (1921-1986) and Cielo de serpientes (2007), by Chilean novelist Antonio Gil (1954). Some of the issues this text addresses are the place of Andean culture in these novels, the way in which that view is seen in relation to the cultural meanings prevailing in the cities represented in each text, and the tensions between cultural and literary values within the novels and from the authors’ time perspective. Since Antonio Gil’s texts implicit or explicitly address those of Sáenz, a central author in Bolivian contemporary literature almost unknown in Chile, they show a drive towards making regional social significations visible and to discuss the meanings that the Cordillera acquire in the globalized city.