Stories in boxes: Augusto Monterroso’s short story collections

摘要

In her study on short story collections in Spanish literature, Antonaya Núñez-Castelo (2000) states that there is a lot of ambiguity in literary criticism, as the “ciclo de cuentos" is generally not recognized as a specific genre. In this paper I will focus on the Guatemalan author Augusto Monterroso, whose work reveals some problematic issues concerning short story collections. The author calls his books “simple deposits" or “boxes" to explain the fact that he puts all kind of texts together: short stories and essays, but also translations of other authors, as he did for instance in Movimiento perpetuo (1972). The metaphor of the box is probably just another trick of Monterroso, known for his humour and complexity. In reality, there are several aspects that link the different texts in Movimiento perpetuo, creating a unity within the book. Furthermore, in his essays, Monterroso has written a lot about the formal features of the short story, its relation to the novel and its marginal status in literary criticism. It is also noteworthy that the author himself published an anthology of short stories, together with Bárbara Jacobs, Antología del cuento triste (1997). The selected authors have been essential for them as writers. This explains the intertextual perspective of my analysis. Among the many references to other authors in Monterroso’s work, short story writers are standing out: Joyce, Darío, Borges, Kafka, Cortázar, Poe, etc. Monterroso’s comments on their work can help us to better understand his vision on the making of short story collections.