Multiform Monsters: The Representation of Jews in Nineteenth-Century Peruvian and Ecuadorian Narrative

Abstract

In this article, I study the representations of Jews in nineteenth-century narrative from Peru and Ecuador. I demonstrate the influence of the legend of the Wandering Jew both in popular oral narratives and in the genre of the serial novel. The analysis of the novels of Aréstegui, Gorriti and Salazar Arboleda shows: a) the validity of medieval stereotypes revitalized by the Gothic genre; b) the ambivalence of the Jewish character who possesses magical or economic power, but intense and fragile emotions; c) the violent symbolic exclusion from the rest of the community of male Jewish characters who obscenely display their passion for money and sex.