METÁFORA REVISTA DE LITERATURA Y ANÁLISIS DEL DISCURSO

Editorial N.º 15

Comité Editorial — 2025-08-15

En su entrega número 15, la revista Metáfora presenta el dossier “Escrituras (in)sumisas. Literatura de la disidencia sexual en Latinoamérica del siglo XX-XXI”, editado por Richard Leonardo-Loayza y compuesto por siete trabajos. El primero de ellos corresponde a Marcel Velázquez, quien aborda, desde las cuestiones del higienismo moral, del humor y de la memoria homosexual, el llamado episodio de La Laguna, que tuvo lugar en el distrito de Barranco en 1959. Luego encontramos la investigación de Janellis Leonardo, quien explora la bisexualidad en la novela Confesiones de Dorish Dam. El tercer trabajo es de Estefanía Di Meglio y la autora repara en la disidencia sexual femenina que existe en el libro En breve cárcel, de Sylvia Molloy.

MULTIDIMENSIONAL POETIC SUBJECT AND THE COLLECTIVE FORCE OF LANGUAGE IN THE POETRY OF ALEJANDRO ROMUALDO

Alex Morillo Sotomayor — 2025-08-15

The analyzed poetic texts will make it possible to identify key elements for understanding a particularly significant feature in the work of Alejandro Romualdo: the rich versatility with which the lyrical subject is configured and relates to the process of poetic creation. This versatility will be proposed in this paper as a manifestation of poetic multidimensionality, a notion that will be defined through the theoretical approaches of Gilles Deleuze, Jacques Derrida, Ramón Pérez, Dominique Combe and José María Pozuelo in order to highlight the aesthetic value of an author who managed to coherently integrate his social commitment with a conception of language in which both its logic and collective scope are decisive. In this regard, through the concept of poetic multidimensionality, we will explain how Romualdo’s various lyrical subjects not only name the world but also make it intervene in language through a form of writing that embodies or incarnates the visceral and everyday reality of human experience. Through this operation, Romualdo offers a poetic voice charged with collective meaning, establishing an artistic proposal whose ideological orientation is grounded in a communal vision of language.

BETWEEN ‘LIMITS AND BORDERS’: SURREALIST POETIC EXPRESSION IN VIENTO O MUERTE, BY JOSÉ MARÍA DE LA ROSA

José Manuel Martín Fumero — 2025-08-15

José María de la Rosa (1908-1989) remains, to this day, one of the least known authors of surrealist poetry. His timid nature, together with the fact that his poetic work was published late, are two of the traits that, to a certain extent, can help justify the omission of his lyrical production in many critical studies on the Bretonian movement both within the framework of Spanish literature and in the island context. And all this despite the fact that, without a doubt, he is one of the poets in whom surrealist poetic expression penetrated with notable depth beyond, even, the moment of surrealist explosion that occurred in the Canary Islands under the protection of a publication as artistically receptive as was Gaceta de Arte (1932-1936). In this article we propose to analyse his fourth collection of poems, Viento o muerte, to show, firstly, that surrealist aesthetics was for De la Rosa something more than a specific stage in his creative development and, secondly, to delve deeper into the fact that surrealist writing was for this author the ideal channel for linking life and literature.

A CRUEL, IMAGINARY AND PERVERSE VOICE. PSYCHOANALYTIC ANALYSIS OF THE POEM “XXVIII” BY TRILCE BY CÉSAR VALLEJO

Jhonny Jhoset Pacheco Quispe — 2025-08-15

In the poem “XXVIII” of Trilce (1922), by César Vallejo, a cruel attitude develops because it is long to rebuild, through voice and memories, the extinct home due to the mother’s death. Thus, the maternal voice, the object of desire of the poetic announcer, is absent and impossible to recover despite the illusory projections of the stem in its daily existence. From this compulsive obsession, the lyrical self shows its cruel nature in search of family sounds with the objective of dodging the symbolic and being imaginary so as not to mean the real: the extinction of the word, the fenence of the home and the death of the mother. With the above, in this article the cruel, imaginary and perverse voice that implies the lyrical self, the mother and the paternal figures present in the text in question is analyzed, as well as its implications generated as the cruel father, the significant phallus, the voix acoustimatique, among other aspects. Likewise, a comparative analysis is carried out with the poem “LXI”, of the same book, in which the convergence and difference of the aforementioned topics is observed. To support what has been said, the concepts of the cruelty of Antonin Artaud explained in his book El teatro y su doble (1938) are used, in addition to various concepts of the psychoanalysis of Jacques Lacan and Mladen Dolar, the ideas of Roland Barthes and definitions of Slavoj Žižek. The analysis tool is hermeneutics.

POETIC DISCOURSE AND GENRE FLUCTUATION IN JULIO MARTÍNEZ MESANZA’S EUROPA (1983)

Ainoa Begoña Sáenz de Zaitegui Tejero — 2025-08-15

This paper discusses the eclectic approach to literary genre as a means to renew poetic discourse in Europa (1983) by Julio Martínez Mesanza. Singled out as epic poetry by literary critics since its publication, Europa presents themes and motifs traditionally associated with the genre, as well as a strong historical referentiality. It is our goal to show how, beyond its epic roots, the poems in Europa are open to a wide array of genres —from didactic poetry to the epigram—, with undertones from mystic and philosophical poetry, and a narrative spirit underlying a fragmentary poetic self which shifts from epic to a polyphonic, pluralistic lyrical poetry. To the purely formal aspects accompanies a progression in values that, while not canceling the epic code, exceeds the chronological boundaries of the genre to encompass the ethics of early lyrical poetry and the Judeo-Christian tradition. In our paper, we focus on the intertextuality between Europa and classical literature, approaching textual analysis through a comparative methodology. On a theoretical level, we base our argumentation on the idea of text as a confluence of quotations proposed by Roland Barthes, and in Stephen Greenblatt’s notion of textual margins as a means to explore peripheral voices otherwise unheard. In doing so, we pursue a theoretical and critical approach to Martínez Mesanza’s work as a mosaic of rhetorical and ideological discourses that mirrors the making of Europe itself: not as a monolithic entity, but rather as a collage of voices, cultures, and ways to understand the human.

THE PURPLE FLAG OF THE SEÑOR DE LOS MILAGROS: DISCOURSE AND IDENTITY

Marco Lovón — 2025-08-15

In Peru, there are numerous cultural celebrations dedicated to Catholic saints, but few attract as many people as the devotion to the Lord of Miracles. Every October, thousands of faithful pay homage to this image, and in recent years, the purple flag has emerged and become popular as a distinctive symbol. This banner, inspired by the national flag but with purple stripes and the image of Christ of Nazareth, has transcended its ornamental function to become an emblem of collective identity. The purpose of this article is to analyze the purple flag and the discourses surrounding it, considering its symbolic, cultural, religious, and economic dimensions. It studies its origin, dissemination, and institutionalization, as well as its use in homes, public spaces, and Peruvian communities abroad. The research concludes that the purple flag, created by popular demand, represents Nazarene identity and reinforces a sense of belonging through discourses of faith, devotion, and tradition.

MORAL HIGIENISM, HUMOUR AND HOMOSEXUAL MEMORY IN LA LAGUNA DE BARRANCO’S EPISODE (LIMA, PERÚ, 1959)

Marcel Velázquez Castro — 2025-08-15

The Ball of La Laguna de Barranco (1959) constitutes a significant event in the history of homosexuality in Lima. In a context of aparent modernization and a slight increase of sexual freedom, the event movilized the repressive aparatus (both policial and judicial) and was represented as a “scandalous” and “provoking” incident by the serious and the sensationalist press, which retrieved the language linked to moral higienism in order to condemn it. The present article seeks: a) to explain the different perspectives in press representations acording to the nature and ideological position of the diaries that covered it; b) to analize a humoristic text by Sofocleto on the event, which ratifies the patriarchal moral values of traditional society; c) to review the role of catholic-inspired civil associations that condemmed the event, and the conflict with the only liberal association that defended it; and d) to identify the cultural strategies of memorialization from the homosexual comunity through a fictional tale. We conclude that the moral higienism discourse acquired strenght against the threat of the hegemonic gender-sexual values; that humour was employed by the press as a dispositive for repression and denigration of the homosexual individual; and that the episode’s relevance can be perceived in its inclusion on an emergent archive of homosexual memory that recreates it.

WOMEN AND BISEXUALITY. LOVE STORIES IN THE CONFESSIONS OF DORISH DAM (1929) BY DELIA COLMENARES

Janellis Leonardo Masías — 2025-08-15

In the novel Confessions of Dorish Dam (1929) by Delia Colmenares (Piura, 1887-1968), the author highlights the presence of sexual dissidence in aristocratic Lima life in the early decades of the 20th century, focusing primarily on the bond established between two elite female characters. In this article, I propose to analyze this relationship and demonstrate that the novel’s diegesis addresses bisexuality more than lesbianism, as some of the specialized criticism that studies Colmenares’s book maintains. To do so, we will analyze the text from the perspective of gender studies, lesbian studies, and bisexual studies. We consider that the novel, despite the thematization of the bond between two women, does not exclude other forms of sexual dissidence that cannot be simply defined as lesbianism. Furthermore, it is proposed that the novel does not seek to exalt dissident relationships but, on the contrary, questions and condemns them.

DICTATORSHIP, PRIVATE SPACE, BREAKUP OF BINARY SYSTEM AND GENDER PERFORMATIVITY. ABOUT EN BREVE CÁRCEL (1981), BY SYLVIA MOLLOY

Estefanía Di Meglio — 2025-08-15

The proposal of this paper is to do a discoursive and textual analysis of the novel En breve cárcel (1981, Spain) by Sylvia Molloy. The goal is to study the production and publication circunstances of the book. The aim is to analyse the voice of the lesbian characters in relationship with the body reappropriation and new significance of the private space of houses (the room where the female character writes her story of pasion with her lovers). From that point, it is produced the critical point of view about the private space, as a territory without political content and also destined to reproductive works as a responsabilty of women. The paper also studies the articulation with the love triangle as a way of critic toward the binary logic. The last objective of the paper is to analyze the deconstruction of genre performativity (Judith Butler), based on all the previously mentioned elements. Because of all this, the novel is a resistance praxis against the latest military (and patriarchal) Argentinean dictatorship (1976-1983).

TOWARDS A LITERARY CLASSIFICATION OF CANTO DE DOLOR, NO REPITAN LA CANCIÓN. THE STORY OF ALEX BROCCA (1999)

Renato Robles Valencia — 2025-08-15

This article aims to provide a literary classification of the novel Canto de dolor, no repitan la canción. The story of Alex Brocca (1999). Basically, it is proposed that the work falls into the category of confessional autobiography, light literature and learning novel or bildungsroman. In order to support this classification, the characteristics of each term will be presented and a comparison will be made with certain fragments of the novel. The purpose of this is to demonstrate the correspondence between the assigned label and the work. Likewise, the socioeconomic context will be analyzed to show how the cultural factors of the late twentieth century and early twenty-first century are closely related to the category given to Brocca’s novel, while it reproduces the idiosyncrasy of Peru at that time. With this procedure, phenomena such as the light is coupled with the format of the chicha diary that penetrates cultural representations such as Brocca’s novel.

THE PICTORIAL METAPHOR IN EL JARDÍN DE LAS DELICIAS (1999) BY VIOLETA BARRIENTOS

Judith Mavila Paredes Morales — 2025-08-15

This article undertakes a detailed analysis of the ekphrasis developed between the poetry collection El jardín de las delicias by Peruvian writer Violeta Barrientos, published in 1999, and the celebrated homonymous pictorial work by the Flemish painter Jheronimus Bosch, also known as Hieronymus Bosch. Barrientos’s poetic text not only appropriates the visual language of the painting but also reworks it in order to propose a renewed interpretation of the medieval imaginary. Through a sustained dialogue between the literary and the pictorial, the author constructs an interpretation grounded in the figurative field of metaphor, in which simile, allegory, and synesthesia play a central role. In this way, the text unfolds an alternative vision of the body, desire, and pleasure. To examine this creative and hermeneutic process, the concepts of General Textual Rhetoric will be employed, as our interest lies in identifying the functioning of rhetorical figures related to ekphrasis, insofar as this device operates in service of metaphor. Furthermore, the category of pleasure will be addressed through an approach that articulates queer studies with psychoanalysis, with the aim of deepening the understanding of how the work challenges and resignifies normative notions of sexuality and representations of the body.

IN SEARCH OF A TRAVESTI/TRANS UTOPIA: JOY AND WELL-BEING IN THE POETRY OF GIA LUJURIA, GRETEL WARMICHA, AND SANDRA DIAZ

Javier Muñoz-Díaz — 2025-08-15

This article discusses the poetry of three travesti/trans artists from Peru (Gia Lujuria, Gretel Warmicha, and Sandra Diaz), who engage in a multidisciplinary artistic practice that denounces the colonial heteronormative system and celebrates racialized sexual dissidence. In particular, I am interested in analyzing the experiences of travesti /trans joy and well-being presented in the poetry collections Lucifer y los siete ocho pekados capitales (Lujuria, 2022), Antología Poética 19-21 (Warmicha, 2022), and (A)post-illa: Tras el rayo (Diaz, 2023). I argue that these poetry collections articulate a utopian dimension based on strategies of “loca-lization” (Ochoa, 2004) and disidentification (Muñoz, 1999) with the majority discourse to build alternative worlds. In this sense, Gia Lujuria deconstructs the Christian discourse that demonizes sexual dissidence to postulate the anti-reproductive and anti-capitalist utopia of the encounter between equals; Gretel Warmicha rejects the mandate of cis-passing to explore the well-being of the relationships between humans and other-than-humans; and Sanka Diaz proposes the reindigenization of sex-gender dissidence and colonized territories to recover ancestral fertility.

“THE TWISTED FORMS OF THE MACHO”. OLD AGE AND SEXUAL DISSIDENCE IN BELLEZO (YO ME MUERO SIN PATRIA) BY RAGGS

Richard Leonardo-Loayza — 2025-08-15

In recent years, there has been an increase in studies focusing on the LGBTQ+ community. However, one underexplored topic in this field is the relationship between old age and homosexuality. Latin American literature is no exception; few books have addressed this relationship. One text that addresses this topic is Bellezo (yo me muero sin patria) (2023) by RAGGS, the pseudonym of Rafael García-Godos Salazar (Lima, 1979). The objective of the following article is to analyze the representation of the older sexual dissident in the RAGGS poetry collection. It is proposed that this collection of poems is important because it is one of the first literary works to address the aging of sexual dissidents in Peru. While this is true, it is also true that the representation of this condition is problematic because it reiterates some of the stereotypes that have served heterosexuals to subordinate homosexuals, as they are portrayed as hypersexualized individuals, dependent on their bodies. In the world represented in the collection of poems, sexual dissidents are only fulfilled beings in their youth, when their bodies are desirable and they can have sexual relations. Once they grow older, their lives cease to have meaning because their bodies are no longer attractive to others. To develop the proposed analysis, some contributions from the studies of sexual dissidence, homoeroticism, and queer studies are drawn upon.

“CREO QUE ESTAMOS LOGRANDO EL INGRESO DE NICOMEDES SANTA CRUZ EN EL CANON LITERARIO PERUANO”

Carolina Sthefany Estrada Sánchez — 2025-08-15

Es doctora en Literatura peruana y latinoamericana y, actualmente, docente de la Facultad de Letras y Ciencias Humanas de la Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos, así como también investigadora de la Tradición oral y musical afroperuana, y de la iconografía negra.

Luján Sandoval, Sergio Antonio. La representación de la poesía transcultural en Ande (1926) de Alejandro Peralta

Adriana Sofia Arapa Bejarano — 2025-08-15

El estudio de las vanguardias literarias peruanas ha conocido, en los últimos años, un interés crítico que cuestiona las narrativas centrales del canon literario peruano, las cuales privilegian la experiencia limeña y dejan en los márgenes las propuestas intelectuales regionales. En el contexto de esta relectura del canon, las vanguardias surandinas, especialmente aquellas expuestas en el Boletín Titikaka (1926-1930), se han convertido en el foco de atención.

Ortiz, Rodolfo. Nudos y enredos: Revistas andinas del siglo XX

María Belen Ortega Pintado — 2025-08-15

La historia intelectual andina del siglo XX, con frecuencia relegada a los márgenes de las narrativas dominantes, encuentra en Nudos y enredos una recuperación crítica que no se limita a llenar vacíos documentales, sino que replantea, a partir de sus bases, las formas de entender el pensamiento cultural desde los Andes.

Belli, Carlos Germán. En un comienzo la ternura. La poesía vanguardista de Oquendo de Amat

Orlando Mateo Heredia Mendoza — 2025-08-15

En un comienzo la ternura. La poesía de Oquendo de Amat es el rescate editorial de la tesis doctoral de Carlos Germán Belli, publicada en 1980. Se trata de un análisis contextual, temático y formal de 5 metros de poemas (1927) y otros textos sueltos de Oquendo de Amat, poeta vanguardista de obra breve que retoma un auge a propósito del concretismo literario de la época de Belli (1950 en adelante), del discurso de Vargas Llosa en el premio Rómulo Gallegos (1967) y de la consecuente reedición de sus poemas.