Figurations of Islandness in Argentine Culture and Literature: Macedonio Fernández, Leopoldo Marechal, and César Aira

This article explores islandness in the River Plate imaginary. Two modern foundational “island texts” – Thomas More’s Utopia and Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe – have exerted a formative influence on the Spanish-American colonial imagination, an influence inflected by the particular historical experience of the River Plate region and its dominant city, Buenos Aires. The figuration of islandness is examined in three twentieth century Argentine novels by Macedonio Fernández, Leopoldo Marechal, and César Aira. The article finds both continuity and evolution in the images of islandness in these novels.