Novel
Juan de la Rosa: Memoirs of the Last Soldier of the Independence Movement
Juan de la Rosa
Nataniel Aguirre · 1885
Synopsis
An old colonel, who calls himself the last soldier of the independence movement, tells of his childhood in Cochabamba. Juanito is ten and lives with his mother, Rosita, a lacemaker, under the protection of fray Justo and alongside his friend Alejo; he witnesses the city's uprising on 14 September 1810. When his mother dies, a lady of the town, doña Teresa, takes him in, then sends him far away, to Las Higueras. He returns as Goyeneche's royalist troops draw near and the city prepares to defend the hill of San Sebastián.
Context
The novel appeared in 1885 in the newspaper El Heraldo de Cochabamba, under the sole name of its narrator, and its attribution remains disputed: a 2013 study sees in it the work of two hands, manuscripts signed J. de la R. that Aguirre would have edited. In 1906, the Bolivian Congress had his works published: the book reappeared in 1909 from the widow of C. Bouret, in Paris and Mexico, with a preface by Eufronio Viscarra and, this time, the name of Aguirre. Ricardo Palma read and quoted it; it is one of the few Bolivian novels known outside the country in its time. Critics hesitate between historical novel and romantic novel.
Who it is for
In Spanish, with no French translation, translated into English; it is best to have skimmed the history of the independence of Upper Peru before opening it.
Prizes and reception
Selected in 2011 among the fifteen fundamental novels of the country; Menéndez y Pelayo regarded it as the best Spanish-American novel of its century.
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