Overview

The Politics of Literary Prestige provides the first comprehensive study of prizes for Spanish American literature. Covering state-sponsored and publisher-run prizes including the Biblioteca Breve Prize – credited with launching the ‘Boom’ in Spanish American literature – the Premio Cervantes and the Nobel Prize for Literature, this book examines how prizes have underpinned different political agenda. As new political positions have emerged so have new awards and the role of the author in society has evolved. Prizes variously position the winners as public intellectual, spokesperson on the world stage or celebrity in the context of an increasingly globalized literature in Spanish. Drawing on a range of sources, Sarah E.L Bowskill analyses prizes from the perspective of different stakeholders including states, publishers, authors, judges and critics. In so doing, she untangles the inner workings of literary prizes in Spanish-speaking contexts, proposes the existence of a prizes network and demonstrates that attitudes to cultural prizes are not universal but are culturally determined.

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9781501376030

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Reviews

An indictment of some eight decades of literary history, Bowskill's solidly researched book begins by tracing a shift in literary prizes for Spanish-language texts. Starting in the 1940s writers received literary awards, sometimes sponsored by the state itself, for the quality of their work and for their reputation as political authorities. By the end of the 20th century a new type of prized author began to emerge as an allegedly independent and global celebrity on display for photos and tours, sometimes in absence of discussion of the award-winning text. This second brand of recognition favors profit-driven private funding, thanks to publisher-sponsored awards. The question of whether literature has taken a turn for the worse under this change finds a sly answer in chapter 6, which documents the devastating inequity of both sorts of literary prizes. Table after table of data supports Bowskill's 'conservative' estimate: three quarters of all literary prizes go to male authors . The Politics of Literary Prestige examine a rigged game beyond the usual accusation of merely contemporary decline. --Emily Hind, Professor of Spanish, University of Florida, and author of Dude Lit: Mexican Men Writing and Performing Competence, 1955-2012 (2019) The Politics of Literary Prestige is a valuable addition to and expansion of the ground-breaking work of the likes of Mario Santana, Deborah Cohn and Diana Sorensen on the Lain American Boom and the social, political and cultural networks that supported and promoted it. Using a remarkable range of sources, Bowskill covers the Boom authoritatively, but also revealingly unveils the missing women writers of the Boom, and offers new perspectives on developments with regard to gender and indigenous identity, as well as surveying the most recent directions in the literary prize circuit and the alternatives to it. She also penetratingly discusses literature about literary prizes. This is an important book which is hugely informative and insightful, but which also makes visible the politics of literary prestige and nuances the social role of the author beyond that of public intellectual. It is indispensable reading for anyone who wishes to understand Spanish American literature in the context of its national and global processes of production and consumption. --Philip Swanson, Hughes Professor of Spanish, University of Sheffield, UK, and editor of Landmarks in Modern Latin American Fiction (2014) This is a much-needed and very ambitious study of the literary prize system in Spanish America and how complex and ever-changing cultural, political and identity factors underline the way in which prizes are organized at national, continental and transnational levels. The study argues very compellingly for the concept of prize networks, thus highlighting the reciprocal or relational nature of literary prizes across the Spanish American world, and its multiple methodologies - engaging the sociology of books, book history and cultural studies - have produced a vast, meticulously-researched and very original study that develops new paradigms about how prizes function in many contexts. It will be invaluable to all those study Spanish-language texts within their contexts of production, promotion and reception. --Par Kumaraswami, Professor of Latin American Studies, University of Nottingham, UK, and author of The Social Life of Literature in Revolutionary Cuba: Narrative, Identity, and Well-being (2016) Since The Economy of Prestige (2005) by J. English, we have been waiting for a comprehensive study on the literary prizes for Spanish American Literatures. Sarah E.L. Bowskill succeeds in presenting her case that the network of national and international prizes is a system interwoven by politics of prestige intersected by nation-state imaginaries, publishers' plans and markets, gender and linguistic identities. --Anadeli Bencomo, Professor of Contemporary Latin American Literature, University of Houston, USA, and author of Entre heroes, fantasmas y apocalipticos. Testigos y paisajes en la cronica mexicana (2011)

An indictment of some eight decades of literary history, Bowskill's solidly researched book begins by tracing a shift in literary prizes for Spanish-language texts. Starting in the 1940s writers received literary awards, sometimes sponsored by the state itself, for the quality of their work and for their reputation as political authorities. By the end of the 20th century a new type of prized author began to emerge as an allegedly independent and global celebrity on display for photos and tours, sometimes in absence of discussion of the award-winning text. This second brand of recognition favors profit-driven private funding, thanks to publisher-sponsored awards. The question of whether literature has taken a turn for the worse under this change finds a sly answer in chapter 6, which documents the devastating inequity of both sorts of literary prizes. Table after table of data supports Bowskill's 'conservative' estimate: three quarters of all literary prizes go to male authors . The Politics of Literary Prestige examine a rigged game beyond the usual accusation of merely contemporary decline. * Emily Hind, Professor of Spanish, University of Florida, and author of Dude Lit: Mexican Men Writing and Performing Competence, 1955-2012 (2019) * The Politics of Literary Prestige is a valuable addition to and expansion of the ground-breaking work of the likes of Mario Santana, Deborah Cohn and Diana Sorensen on the Lain American Boom and the social, political and cultural networks that supported and promoted it. Using a remarkable range of sources, Bowskill covers the Boom authoritatively, but also revealingly unveils the missing women writers of the Boom, and offers new perspectives on developments with regard to gender and indigenous identity, as well as surveying the most recent directions in the literary prize circuit and the alternatives to it. She also penetratingly discusses literature about literary prizes. This is an important book which is hugely informative and insightful, but which also makes visible the politics of literary prestige and nuances the social role of the author beyond that of public intellectual. It is indispensable reading for anyone who wishes to understand Spanish American literature in the context of its national and global processes of production and consumption. * Philip Swanson, Hughes Professor of Spanish, University of Sheffield, UK, and editor of Landmarks in Modern Latin American Fiction (2014) * This is a much-needed and very ambitious study of the literary prize system in Spanish America and how complex and ever-changing cultural, political and identity factors underline the way in which prizes are organized at national, continental and transnational levels. The study argues very compellingly for the concept of prize networks, thus highlighting the reciprocal or relational nature of literary prizes across the Spanish American world, and its multiple methodologies - engaging the sociology of books, book history and cultural studies - have produced a vast, meticulously-researched and very original study that develops new paradigms about how prizes function in many contexts. It will be invaluable to all those study Spanish-language texts within their contexts of production, promotion and reception. * Par Kumaraswami, Professor of Latin American Studies, University of Nottingham, UK, and author of The Social Life of Literature in Revolutionary Cuba: Narrative, Identity, and Well-being (2016) * Since The Economy of Prestige (2005) by J. English, we have been waiting for a comprehensive study on the literary prizes for Spanish American Literatures. Sarah E.L. Bowskill succeeds in presenting her case that the network of national and international prizes is a system interwoven by politics of prestige intersected by nation-state imaginaries, publishers' plans and markets, gender and linguistic identities. * Anadeli Bencomo, Professor of Contemporary Latin American Literature, University of Houston, USA, and author of Entre heroes, fantasmas y apocalipticos. Testigos y paisajes en la cronica mexicana (2011) *

Author Information

Sarah E.L. Bowskill is Senior Lecturer in Latin American Studies at Queen’s University Belfast, UK. She is the author of Gender, Nation and the Formation of the Twentieth-Century Mexican Literary Canon (2011).

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