THE MAGIC MAGE OF DISORDER: A READING OF TALES BY SILVINA OCAMPO
“surreal”, fantastic, magic realism, Silvina Ocampo
La furia y otros cuentos is the third book written by Argentine writer Silvina Ocampo, which was published in 1959 by Sur. The work includes 34 stories that, in different ways, insert the “surreal” into daily life, through strange characters, narrators and unconventional environments. The objective of this dissertation is to verify if the short stories in this book can indicate a literary framework as belonging to the fantastic genre, magic realism and/or surrealism; or whether they express her own literary genre. The methodology to be used will be based on bibliographic research, applying the critical-analytical method. Starting from the construction of Ocampo’s biographical and literary profile, based on Enriquez (2018), Ulla (2014), Fernández (2017) and Sousa (2017), I proceed with a theoretical approach of the fantastic genre, the magic realism developed in Argentina and the techniques of surrealism, based on Roas (2014), Todorov (2017), Chiampi (2015), Rodrigues (1988; 2003), Paz (1974) and Choza (2011), among others. With these readings, the concepts frequently used in discussions of the above mentioned genres will be approached, like the unheimlich (FREUD, 1976), the double (RANK, 2013; FREUD, 1976; HOGLE, 2005; BOTTING, 2002), real/unreal (ROSSET , 2008) and the abject (KRISTEVA, 1982; SPOONER and MCEVOY, 2007). In the end, I indicate a possible position for Ocampo in the literary tradition, through the analysis of the narrative strategies explored by the writer in her short-stories collection titled La Furia y otros cuentos. I also approach the possible intertextual dialogue of the texts with other works pertaining to the literary and cultural tradition (GILBERT, GUBAR, 2000; WOOLF, 2014), in order to point out the individual marks of Silvina Ocampo's writing (KLINGENBERG, ZULLO-RUIZ, 2016; ELIOT, 1919).