Concerning angels: evolution of the fantastic latin-american story in the 20th century

The fantastic represents a constant in Latin American narrative of the 20th Century. This article analyses the presence and evolution of this narrative mode in Latin American literature through the study of four short stories, each representing a different literary trend: the 'modernismo' of marvellous tone ('El ángel caído', Amado Nervo), the demystifying magical realism ('Un señor muy viejo con unas alas enormes', Gabriel García Márquez), the transgressive post-boom ('El ángel caído', Cristina Peri Rossi), and the feminist post-modernism ('Moraleja para ángeles', Sonia González Valdenegro). The main theories on the fantastic are reviewed and used in the particular analysis of the short stories: from the classic distinction established by Todorov between the marvellous, the uncanny, and the fantastic to the most recent critical studies (Lucie Armitt, Remo Ceserani, etc.), including other decisive and essential contributions such as those by Rosemary Jackson and Irène Bessière.