Violence in literature : the romance of violence in Latin America

Abstract

The purpose of this essay is to analyse what could be seen as a transformation of a genre of fiction, the novel of violence. In sociological tradition, various authors have chosen the detective novel as a research object to explain modernity. This sociological tradition in studies of detective fiction allows us to suggest the emergence of another form of romance, the novel of violence, in the last thirty years. In México, the latest works of Carlos Fuentes (México, 1928-2012) belong to this genre of novels. Also, Elmer Mendoza (México, 1949-) who write about the detective and the organised crime. In the novels of violence, crime and solution are secondary, because violence is seen as a structuring element of social reality. New forms of murders arise: violent crimes, international drug trafficking, sexual abuse and violence, rape, corruption, and torture. These forms appear as an aesthetic of “brutalism” and “cruelty”. The world of the novel of violence is a world without law, defined by the ineffectiveness or simply the absence of the police or the judiciary. There is a lack of a legitimate authority, formal or informal, signifying the crisis of the judicial system. But, also, this literature appears to have worldwide lectors in late modernity.