Emir Rodriguez Monegal
Encyclopedia
Emir Rodríguez Monegal was a Uruguay
Uruguay
Uruguay ,officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay,sometimes the Eastern Republic of Uruguay; ) is a country in the southeastern part of South America. It is home to some 3.5 million people, of whom 1.8 million live in the capital Montevideo and its metropolitan area...

an scholar, literary critic, and editor
Editing
Editing is the process of selecting and preparing written, visual, audible, and film media used to convey information through the processes of correction, condensation, organization, and other modifications performed with an intention of producing a correct, consistent, accurate, and complete...

 of Latin American literature
Latin American literature
Latin American literature consists of the oral and written literature of Latin America in several languages, particularly in Spanish, Portuguese, and indigenous languages of the Americas. It rose to particular prominence globally during the second half of the 20th century, largely due to the...

. From 1969 to 1985, Rodríguez Monegal was professor of Latin American contemporary literature at Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...

. He is usually called by his second surname Emir R. Monegal or Monegal, sometimes ERM, or erroneously Emir Monegal.

Described as "one of the most influential Latin American literary critics of the 20th century" by the Encyclopædia Britannica
Encyclopædia Britannica
The Encyclopædia Britannica , published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia that is available in print, as a DVD, and on the Internet. It is written and continuously updated by about 100 full-time editors and more than 4,000 expert...

, Monegal wrote key books about Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda was the pen name and, later, legal name of the Chilean poet, diplomat and politician Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto. He chose his pen name after Czech poet Jan Neruda....

 and Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...

, and the Britannica Macropædia
Macropædia
The 17-volume Macropædia is the third part of the Encyclopædia Britannica; the other two parts are the 12-volume Micropædia and the 1-volume Propædia. The name Macropædia is a neologism coined by Mortimer J. Adler from the ancient Greek words for "large" and "instruction"; the best English...

 notice of the later. He was a part in "The Boom" of 1960s Latin American literature as founder and 1966–1968 editor of his influential magazine Mundo Nuevo
Mundo Nuevo
Mundo Nuevo was an influential Spanish-language periodical, being a monthly revista de cultura dedicated to new Latin American literature. Sponsored by the Ford Foundation, it was founded in 1966 by Emir Rodríguez Monegal in Paris, France, and distributed worldwide...

.

(1921-1965) Early career

In 1921, Emir Rodríguez Monegal was born on July 28 in Melo
Melo
Melo is the capital city of the Cerro Largo Department of north-eastern Uruguay. It is located at the centre of the department, on the intersection of Route 7 with Route 8, south of Aceguá and the border with Brazil. Other primary roads to the city are Route 26 and Route 44. The stream Arroyo...

, Cerro Largo Department
Cerro Largo Department
Cerro Largo Department is a department of Uruguay. Its capital is Melo.-History:During the 19th and early 20th centuries, when intermittent periods of civil war occurred in Uruguay, the department was a stronghold of the Blanco party...

, Uruguay
Uruguay
Uruguay ,officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay,sometimes the Eastern Republic of Uruguay; ) is a country in the southeastern part of South America. It is home to some 3.5 million people, of whom 1.8 million live in the capital Montevideo and its metropolitan area...

. He had the double-barrelled name
Double-barrelled name
In English speaking and some other Western countries, a double-barrelled name is a family name with two parts, which may or may not be joined with a hyphen and is also known as a hyphenated name. An example of a hyphenated double-barrelled surname is Bowes-Lyon; an example of an unhyphenated...

 Rodríguez Monegal (erroneously "Rodríguez-Monegal" in some texts) but was often referred to as R. Monegal or Monegal only, a Spanish naming custom when the first surname is extremely common.

From 1945 to 1957 (age 24 to 36), he edited the literary section of the Montevideo
Montevideo
Montevideo is the largest city, the capital, and the chief port of Uruguay. The settlement was established in 1726 by Bruno Mauricio de Zabala, as a strategic move amidst a Spanish-Portuguese dispute over the platine region, and as a counter to the Portuguese colony at Colonia del Sacramento...

 weekly Marcha. He was one of the first to recognize early on the importance of Borges
Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...

, seeing him and his family frequently after 1945, and taking him for model to the point of pastiche. Conversely, he got a cameo in a pseudo-autobiographical Borges short story:
In 1949 (age 28), he won a scholarship from the British Council
British Council
The British Council is a United Kingdom-based organisation specialising in international educational and cultural opportunities. It is registered as a charity both in England and Wales, and in Scotland...

 for a year's study at the University of Cambridge
University of Cambridge
The University of Cambridge is a public research university located in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest university in both the United Kingdom and the English-speaking world , and the seventh-oldest globally...

; he went to study under F. R. Leavis
F. R. Leavis
Frank Raymond "F. R." Leavis CH was an influential British literary critic of the early-to-mid-twentieth century. He taught for nearly his entire career at Downing College, Cambridge.-Early life:...

 and complete a project on Andrés Bello
Andrés Bello
Andrés de Jesús María y José Bello López was a Venezuelan humanist, poet, lawmaker, philosopher, educator and philologist, whose political and literary works constitute an important part of Spanish American culture...

. During 1949 to 1955 (age 28 to 34), he was also editor of Número, a Montevideo literary magazine. In 1952, he became friend with Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda was the pen name and, later, legal name of the Chilean poet, diplomat and politician Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto. He chose his pen name after Czech poet Jan Neruda....

, who would later lend him his intimate papers for Monegal's biography of Neruda.

In 1956 (age 35), Monegal obtained the equivalent of a Ph. D.
Doctor of Philosophy
Doctor of Philosophy, abbreviated as Ph.D., PhD, D.Phil., or DPhil , in English-speaking countries, is a postgraduate academic degree awarded by universities...

 at the Facultad de Humanidades (Faculty of Letters)
University of the Republic, Uruguay
The University of the Republic is Uruguay's public university. It is the most important and country's largest university, with a student body of more than 80,000 students. It was founded on July 18, 1849 in Montevideo, where most of its buildings and facilities are still located. Its current...

, Montevideo, for his research on .

(1966-1968) Mundo Nuevo

In 1966 (age 45), Monegal founded the influential literary monthly Mundo Nuevo
Mundo Nuevo
Mundo Nuevo was an influential Spanish-language periodical, being a monthly revista de cultura dedicated to new Latin American literature. Sponsored by the Ford Foundation, it was founded in 1966 by Emir Rodríguez Monegal in Paris, France, and distributed worldwide...

as a project sponsored by the Ford Foundation
Ford Foundation
The Ford Foundation is a private foundation incorporated in Michigan and based in New York City created to fund programs that were chartered in 1936 by Edsel Ford and Henry Ford....

. Published in Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...

 in Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

, it was distributed worldwide. Monegal directed it with full editorial control until July 1968, after a political smear campaign alleging a CIA funding eventually led to his resignation. Mundo Nuevo contributed to the 1960s publishing phenomenon dubbed "The Boom" in Latin American literature that led to many Latin American writers being published outside of their home countries and gaining critical recognition.

(1969-1985) Yale University

In 1969 (age 48), Monegal was appointed professor of Latin American contemporary literature at Yale University
Yale University
Yale University is a private, Ivy League university located in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States...

. From 1970 to 1973 (age 49 to 52), he was chairman of the Latin American Studies
Latin American Studies
Latin American studies is an academic discipline dealing with the study of Latin America and Latin Americans.-Definition:Latin American studies critically examines the history, culture, politics, and experiences of Latin Americans in Latin America and often also elsewhere .Latin American studies...

 program and associate chairman of the Department of Romance Languages
Romance languages
The Romance languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family, more precisely of the Italic languages subfamily, comprising all the languages that descend from Vulgar Latin, the language of ancient Rome...

. From 1973 to 1976 (age 49 to 55), he was chairman of the Spanish and Portuguese
Differences between Spanish and Portuguese
Although Portuguese and Spanish are closely related, to the point of having a considerable degree of mutual intelligibility, there are also important differences between them, which can pose difficulties for people acquainted with one of the languages who attempt to learn the other...

 Department.

From 1969 to 1977 (age 48 to 56), he was a member of the editorial board of Revista Iberoamericana (University of Pittsburgh
University of Pittsburgh
The University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...

) and from 1972 to 1977 (age 51 to 56) he was consulting editor of Review, a tri-quarterly published by the Center for Inter-American Relations in New York.

Also, from 1975 to 1982 (age 54 to 61), he was a visiting lecturer in seven universities in Brazil, and a visiting professor at the University of Southern California
University of Southern California
The University of Southern California is a private, not-for-profit, nonsectarian, research university located in Los Angeles, California, United States. USC was founded in 1880, making it California's oldest private research university...

 and the University of Pittsburgh
University of Pittsburgh
The University of Pittsburgh, commonly referred to as Pitt, is a state-related research university located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. Founded as Pittsburgh Academy in 1787 on what was then the American frontier, Pitt is one of the oldest continuously chartered institutions of...

.

In 1985 (aged 64), Monegal died on Thursday 14 November at Yale's infirmary in New Haven, Connecticut
New Haven, Connecticut
New Haven is the second-largest city in Connecticut and the sixth-largest in New England. According to the 2010 Census, New Haven's population increased by 5.0% between 2000 and 2010, a rate higher than that of the State of Connecticut, and higher than that of the state's five largest cities, and...

, U.S.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 He was survived by his wife, Selma Calasans Rodríguez, and three children: Joaquín Rodríguez Nebot, of Mexico City; Alejandro Rodríguez, of Montevideo, Uruguay; and Georgina Rodríguez Nebot, of Stockholm.

Legacy

  • His 1966–1968 work with Mundo Nuevo
    Mundo Nuevo
    Mundo Nuevo was an influential Spanish-language periodical, being a monthly revista de cultura dedicated to new Latin American literature. Sponsored by the Ford Foundation, it was founded in 1966 by Emir Rodríguez Monegal in Paris, France, and distributed worldwide...

    , as well as his books and lectures, was influential for the spread of Latin American literature, launching the career of such as Guillermo Cabrera Infante
    Guillermo Cabrera Infante
    Guillermo Cabrera Infante was a Cuban novelist, essayist, translator, and critic; in the 1950s he used the pseudonym G. Caín.A one-time supporter of the Castro regime, Cabrera Infante went into exile to London in 1965...

    , Severo Sarduy
    Severo Sarduy
    Severo Sarduy was a Cuban poet, author, playwright, and critic of Cuban literature and art.-Biography:...

    , and Manuel Puig
    Manuel Puig
    Manuel Puig was an Argentine author...

    , and contributing to the internationalization of writers such as Gabriel García Márquez
    Gabriel García Márquez
    Gabriel José de la Concordia García Márquez is a Colombian novelist, short-story writer, screenwriter and journalist, known affectionately as Gabo throughout Latin America. He is considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th century. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in...

    , Carlos Fuentes
    Carlos Fuentes
    Carlos Fuentes Macías is a Mexican writer and one of the best-known living novelists and essayists in the Spanish-speaking world. He has influenced contemporary Latin American literature, and his works have been widely translated into English and other languages.-Biography:Fuentes was born in...

    , and Mario Vargas Llosa
    Mario Vargas Llosa
    Jorge Mario Pedro Vargas Llosa, 1st Marquis of Vargas Llosa is a Peruvian-Spanish writer, politician, journalist, essayist, and Nobel Prize laureate. Vargas Llosa is one of Latin America's most significant novelists and essayists, and one of the leading authors of his generation...

    .

  • His April 1968 article (reused in a chapter of his 1970 Borgès) introduced the concept of "Biorges". According to him, when Adolfo Bioy Casares
    Adolfo Bioy Casares
    Adolfo Bioy Casares was an Argentine fiction writer, journalist, and translator. He was a friend and collaborator with his fellow countryman Jorge Luis Borges, and wrote what many consider one of the best pieces of fantastic fiction, the novella The Invention of Morel.-Biography:Adolfo Bioy...

     and Jorge Luis Borges
    Jorge Luis Borges
    Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...

     collaborated under the pseudonyms H. Bustos Domecq
    H. Bustos Domecq
    H. is a pseudonym used for several collaborative works by the Argentine writers Jorge Luis Borges and Adolfo Bioy Casares.-Origin:Bustos Domecq made his first appearance as F...

     or B. Suárez Lynch, the results seemed written by a new personality, more than the sum of its parts, which he dubbed "Biorges" and considered in his own right as "one of the most important Argentine prose writers of his time", for having influenced writers such as Leopoldo Marechal
    Leopoldo Marechal
    Leopoldo Marechal was one of the most important Argentine writers of the twentieth century.- Biographical notes :...

     (an otherwise anti-Borgesian), or Julio Cortázar
    Julio Cortázar
    Julio Cortázar, born Jules Florencio Cortázar, was an Argentine writer. Cortázar, known as one of the founders of the Latin American Boom, influenced an entire generation of Spanish speaking readers and writers in the Americas and Europe.-Early life:Cortázar's parents, Julio José Cortázar and...

    's use of fictional language and slang in his masterpiece Hopscotch.

  • His 1966 biography of his friend Pablo Neruda
    Pablo Neruda
    Pablo Neruda was the pen name and, later, legal name of the Chilean poet, diplomat and politician Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto. He chose his pen name after Czech poet Jan Neruda....

    , who accepted to lend him his personal papers, remains a key book on the topic. Similarly, his 1970 study and 1978 biography of his friend Borges
    Jorge Luis Borges
    Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...

     remain key books.

  • In June 1985, Monegal famously derided philosopher Jacques Derrida
    Jacques Derrida
    Jacques Derrida was a French philosopher, born in French Algeria. He developed the critical theory known as deconstruction and his work has been labeled as post-structuralism and associated with postmodern philosophy...

    , alleging an obfuscated recycling of Borges's ideas (from essays and tales such as (1928), (1933), "Pierre Menard" (1939), "Tlön
    Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius
    "Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius" is a short story by the 20th century Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges. The story was first published in the Argentine journal Sur, May 1940. The "postscript" dated 1947 is intended to be anachronistic, set seven years in the future...

    " (1940), (1951)), opening his article with:

Books

  • 1950: ("José Enrique Rodó
    José Enrique Rodo
    José Enrique Rodó Piñeyro was a Uruguayan essayist. He called for the youth of Latin America to reject materialism, to revert back to Greco-Roman habits of free thought and self enrichment, and to develop and concentrate on their culture.He cultivated an epistolary relationship with important...

     in the twentieth century")
  • 1956: ("The trial of the parricides. The new Argentine generation and their masters.", study of the dismissal of Borges, Mallea, and Martínez Estrada in Argentina)
  • 1961: ("The roots of Horacio Quiroga
    Horacio Quiroga
    Horacio Silvestre Quiroga Forteza was an Uruguayan playwright, poet, and short story writer....

    ")
  • 1961: ("Storytellers of this America", seventeen essays on prominent fiction writers of contemporary Latin American literature)
    • Expanded to thirty-four writers in two volumes (1969 and 1974)
  • 1963: ("Eduardo Acevedo Díaz
    Eduardo Acevedo Díaz
    Eduardo Acevedo Díaz , was a Uruguayan writer, politician and journalist.-Early life:...

    . Two versions of a same theme.")
  • 1964: (with Homero Alsina Thevenet, "Ingmar Bergman
    Ingmar Bergman
    Ernst Ingmar Bergman was a Swedish director, writer and producer for film, stage and television. Described by Woody Allen as "probably the greatest film artist, all things considered, since the invention of the motion picture camera", he is recognized as one of the most accomplished and...

    . A cinematographic playwright.")
  • 1966: ("The immobile traveler: an introduction to Pablo Neruda
    Pablo Neruda
    Pablo Neruda was the pen name and, later, legal name of the Chilean poet, diplomat and politician Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto. He chose his pen name after Czech poet Jan Neruda....

    ")
    • (1973, French)
  • 1967: ("Genius and character of Horacio Quiroga
    Horacio Quiroga
    Horacio Silvestre Quiroga Forteza was an Uruguayan playwright, poet, and short story writer....

    ")
  • 1968: ("The exile: life and work of Horacio Quiroga
    Horacio Quiroga
    Horacio Silvestre Quiroga Forteza was an Uruguayan playwright, poet, and short story writer....

    ")
  • 1969: ("The other Andrés Bello
    Andrés Bello
    Andrés de Jesús María y José Bello López was a Venezuelan humanist, poet, lawmaker, philosopher, educator and philologist, whose political and literary works constitute an important part of Spanish American culture...

    ")
  • 1970: (French, "Borges
    Jorge Luis Borges
    Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...

     by himself")
    • (1979, Spanish)
  • 1976: ("Borges: towards a poetic reading"), erroneous title printed for ("Borges: towards a poetics of reading")
    • (1980, Portuguese)
  • 1978: Jorge Luis Borges: A Literary Biography
    • (1982, Italian)
    • (1983, French)
    • (1985, Spanish)

Articles

Selected among more than 330 articles and notices:
  • 1955: , in: Número 27
    • Expanded, in: (1969)
  • 1968: , in: Mundo Nuevo
    Mundo Nuevo
    Mundo Nuevo was an influential Spanish-language periodical, being a monthly revista de cultura dedicated to new Latin American literature. Sponsored by the Ford Foundation, it was founded in 1966 by Emir Rodríguez Monegal in Paris, France, and distributed worldwide...

    22
  • 1972: , in: TriQuarterly
    TriQuarterly
    TriQuarterly Online is a not-for-profit American literary magazine published twice a year at Northwestern University that features fiction, nonfiction, poetry, drama, literary essays, reviews, a blog, and graphic art....

    25
  • 1974: "Borges, Jorge Luis", in: Encyclopædia Britannica
    Encyclopædia Britannica
    The Encyclopædia Britannica , published by Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., is a general knowledge English-language encyclopaedia that is available in print, as a DVD, and on the Internet. It is written and continuously updated by about 100 full-time editors and more than 4,000 expert...

    , Macropædia
    Macropædia
    The 17-volume Macropædia is the third part of the Encyclopædia Britannica; the other two parts are the 12-volume Micropædia and the 1-volume Propædia. The name Macropædia is a neologism coined by Mortimer J. Adler from the ancient Greek words for "large" and "instruction"; the best English...

     Vol. 3
  • 1974: "Borges, a Reader", in: diacritics 4
  • 1975: , in: Yates, A. Donald, ed. (1975)
  • 1976: , in: Revista Iberoamericana 42
  • 1985: , in: Maldoror 21
    • "Borges and Derrida. Apothecaries", in: Aizenberg, Edna, ed. (1990). Borges and His Successors. The Borgian Impact on Literature and the Arts.

Edited

  • 1950: ("Uruguayan literature of the twentieth century", compilation of essays and documents)
  • 1957: ("José Enrique Rodó
    José Enrique Rodo
    José Enrique Rodó Piñeyro was a Uruguayan essayist. He called for the youth of Latin America to reject materialism, to revert back to Greco-Roman habits of free thought and self enrichment, and to develop and concentrate on their culture.He cultivated an epistolary relationship with important...

    : complete works")
  • 1963: ("José Enrique Rodó
    José Enrique Rodo
    José Enrique Rodó Piñeyro was a Uruguayan essayist. He called for the youth of Latin America to reject materialism, to revert back to Greco-Roman habits of free thought and self enrichment, and to develop and concentrate on their culture.He cultivated an epistolary relationship with important...

    : pages", anthology)
  • 1966: ("The Uruguyan tale", short-story anthology)
  • 1966: ("Juan Carlos Onetti
    Juan Carlos Onetti
    Juan Carlos Onetti was an Uruguayan novelist and author of short stories.A high school drop-out, Onetti's first novel, El pozo, published in 1939, met with his close friends' immediate acclaim, as well as from some writers and journalists of his time...

    : the faces of love", erotic texts anthology)
  • 1968: ("The art of narration", interviews with leading Hispanic prose fiction writers)
  • 1970: ("Juan Carlos Onetti
    Juan Carlos Onetti
    Juan Carlos Onetti was an Uruguayan novelist and author of short stories.A high school drop-out, Onetti's first novel, El pozo, published in 1939, met with his close friends' immediate acclaim, as well as from some writers and journalists of his time...

    . Complete novels and tales", anthology)
  • 1977: The Borzoi Anthology of Latin American Literature, 2 volumes (with Thomas Colchie)
  • 1979: ("Hispanic masters of the 20th century", with Suzanne Jill Levine)
  • 1980: (collection of critical essays on Pablo Neruda
    Pablo Neruda
    Pablo Neruda was the pen name and, later, legal name of the Chilean poet, diplomat and politician Neftalí Ricardo Reyes Basoalto. He chose his pen name after Czech poet Jan Neruda....

    )
  • 1981: Borges: A Reader (anthology, with Alastair Reid
    Alastair Reid
    Alastair Reid is a poet and a scholar of South American literature from Galloway in Scotland. He is known for his lighthearted style of poems and for his translations of South American poets Jorge Luis Borges and Pablo Neruda. Although he is famous for translations, his own poems are gaining note...

    )
    • (1984, Spanish)

See also



External links

Official sites
http://www.archivodeprensa.edu.uy/biblioteca/emir_rodriguez_monegal/index_02.html – the Emir Rodríguez Monegal website (a few documents in English): biography, bibliography, interviews, article collection, etc.

Online works

About Monegal

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