Pasajes de escritura. Texto y paratexto. Las notas de Caramelo

MARÍA LAURA SPOTURNO

Writing the Landscape/Landscapes of Writing

Instituto Franklin, Universidad de Alcalá

Lugar: Alcalá de Henares, Madrid; Año: 2010;

Abstract (Nota: La publicación exige que el resumen aparezca solo en inglés. Transcribo el texto enviado y aceptado para la publicación) This paper explores the construction of different enunciative spaces associated with the paratextual level in Caramelo or Puro Cuento. A Novel (Cisneros 2002). More specifically, this study attempts at explaining the enunciative and discursive mechanisms of the endnotes accompanying some of the chapters of the novel, while accounting for the relationship between text and paratext. Critics have drawn attention to the endnotes in the novel as one of its most distinctive aspects (Kline 2002, McCracken 2003, Paulino Bueno 2007, Van Hecke 2007, Ledwith 2008, Bilevich 2009). Following Genette ([1987] 2001), we will argue that notes provide a second discursive level which is crucial for the constitution of global discourse in terms of its texture, and the reading effects and shades of meaning it may convey. Three kinds of notes can be distinguished in Caramelo: fictional notes, historical-cultural notes and metadiscursive notes. According to our hypothesis, these notes, which can be regarded as mechanisms of discursive control (Zoppi Fontana 2007), are set to replace (paratextual) marginality into the centre of action in order to question the notions of centre and margin. Concerning the reading dynamics configured as from the notes, our analysis will show that reading instructions tend to define a general indication which leads readers into their interpretation of the whole novel, not just of the notes, and which contributes to the construction of a certain discursive image (Ducrot 1984, Amossy 1999) associated with the fictional entity responsible for the enunciation of the novel; i.e. the Author.