Latin American Literature Commons^™

The Genesis Of La Desesperanza By José Donoso , Mary Lusky Friedman

Studies in 20th & 21st Century Literature

This study analyzes the seven hundred pages of working notes made by the Chilean writer José Donoso as he created La desesperanza, his 1986 novel about the return of a Chilean exile to his homeland. These notes, made in two sustained working sessions, one in the year beginning in December 1980 and the other in the first eight months of 1985, reveal a particular modus operandi: intent on inventing characters who were believable and complex, Donoso subordinated every other aspect of the work—plot, technical considerations like point of view and register, and even the ideas the novel would …