Voces, gestos y signos : de oralidad a la escritura en "...Y no se lo tragó la Tierra" de Tomás Rivera

Abstract

This essay analyzes Tomás Riviera' s novel ". . . y no se lo tragó la tierra" as a landmark in Chicano literary history. The article explores the way in which Riviera sets out to chronicle the transition from a cultural past marked by a communal oral culture to a cultural present dominated by writing. The moment of transition from one world to the other is seen in the final paragraph of the novel, in which the young protagonist communicates by gestures with a young person he sees in the distance. In thus moving from voice to silence, the main character (and with him the novelist) poetically envisions his readership, as well as the process by which silent writing (somewhat paradoxically) manages to capture and transmit the words and the expression of Chicano farmworkers in the 1950s.