Hi all,
This week I discuss Distant Star. Here, I expand on what life may have been like during the years of late Allende/early Pinochet, the horrendous self-destruction of extreme fascist ideology, and justice (what is it?)
I hope you like Machuca, and La muerte y la doncella (if you watch them)
Question: Should one ought to take matters of justice/retribution into their own hands? Does that not leave opportunity for wholly unobstructed chaos (if all ‘take matters into their own hands)? At what cost should the state have complete authority on matters of punishment? (Answer 1 or many!)
Curtis HR
Thanks for the movie recommendation, I haven’t seen Machuca but now it’s on my list. The Pinochet dictatorship is a form of necropolitics, not fascist but neoliberal. Although Bolaño suggests the similarity with Nazism, this comparison also slips under the change of space and time. Nor is the vanguard of the beginning of the century the same as what we read in Latin America. Returning to Borges’ themes, the tension between difference and repetition is raised. If you liked this novel, 2666 might be interesting for you, where Bolaño continues this line of thought. On the other hand, how would you contrast Dorman’s vision with that of Bolaño on the post-dictatorial period, with respect to affections?
Machuca’s a great movie, though I don’t remember that the kid was indigenous… I remember it having more to do with class than race. (But it’s a long time since I watched it… I saw it when the film first came out, in Santiago.)