Narcoepics: A Global Aesthetics of Sobriety

273 Pages·2012·4.38 MB·English

by  Hermann Herlinghaus

Narcoepics

Narcoepics

A Global Aesthetics of Sobriety
Hermann Herlinghaus

NEW YORK • LONDON • NEW DELHI • SYDNEY
Bloomsbury Academic
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First published 2013
© Hermann Herlinghaus, 2013
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
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permission in writing from the publishers.
No responsibility for loss caused to any individual or organization acting on
or refraining from action as a result of the material in this publication can be
accepted by Bloomsbury Academic or the author.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Herlinghaus, Hermann, 1954–
Narcoepics : a global aesthetics of sobriety / by Hermann Herlinghaus.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4411-0778-7 (pbk. : alk. paper)—ISBN 978-1-4411-2198-1
(hardback : alk. paper) 1. Latin American literature—20th century—History and criticism.
2. Latin American literature—21st century—History and criticism. 3. Globalization in
literature. 4. Narration (Rhetoric) I. Title.
PQ7081.H417 2013
860.9’98—dc23
2012029464
EISBN: 978-1-6235-6517-6

Typeset by Newgen Imaging Systems Pvt Ltd, Chennai, India
To my father Hermann Herlinghaus, film historian (1931–1989)

Contents

Acknowledgments ix
1 “ Pharmakon” and “Pharmakos”:
Prolegomena for a Janus-Faced Modernity 1
Counterpoint, not other 1
Remembering the “Psychoactive Revolution”:
Provincializing the West 5
On the meaning of dissociation, and the logics of denial 10
Unlearning fear, absolving the ghost of the “Pharmakos”:
An open genealogy 20
2 Aesthetics of Sobriety: Approximating Narratives
from the Hemispheric South 27
Ethics at an impasse: Toward abnormal interpretation 27
Humiliating sobriety—a surreptitious path 32
Thinking poverty, relocating aesthetics 41
3 Heterogeneous Genealogies: From the Latin American
Narco-Novel to Narcoepics 51
Prolegomena 51
First, Mexican encounter with the low-level drug business:
Diario de un narcotraficante (Angelo Nacaveva) 53
Demoniac intoxication, construction of guilt, and the
predicament of cynicism: Mariposa Blanca (Tito Gutiérrez Vargas) 66
Cinematic writing and the acting brain of a killer:
“Lehrstück” about the borders of citizenship
(Nostalgia de la sombra, Eduardo Antonio Parra) 82
viii Contents
4 The Political “Baroque” of the Pablo Escobar Story:
Pablo Escobar, auge y caída de un narcotraficante (Alonso Salazar) 93
Ominous questions 93
A “Revolution without philosophers” 98
The “Rainmaker” from the Global South: Power and predicament 104
The drama of extradition, and the impossible sovereign 112
Coda 123
5 Female Castaways: Delirio, Plasma, and Displacements
from Oppression 127
“También las mujeres pueden” 127
The impossible healing: Delirio (Laura Restrepo) 129
Toward an ecological aesthetics, postoptimistic:
Plasma (Guadalupe Santa Cruz) 141
6 From “Pharmakon” to Femicide: 2666 (Roberto Bolaño) 157
Thinking from the “Pharmakon,” approaching
literature otherwise 157
Globalized academics in the wake of cosmopolitanism 161
Placebo intellectuals 178
Benno von Archimboldi, the “Amphibian” 191
“The Part about the Crimes”—Another Almanac of the Dead 208
Bibliography 233
Index 245
Acknowhledgments
This book takes little for granted, and it does not leave widespread assumptions in their
place. If this were to be phrased in one single sentence it might say that the strongest
narcotics in modern societies are not what they are deemed to be. “Narcoepics” is a
heuristic concept. Paradoxically, it has more to do with sobriety than with intoxication.
Here we find the surprising aesthetic and ethical insight that sets today’s narcoepics
apart from those modern artistic works since the nineteenth century, which were
related to writers’ creative experimentation with psychoactive substances. Narcoepics
are linked to affective and epistemic terrains as they have been articulated, during the
past several decades, in the Hemispheric South.
Narcoepics: A Global Aesthetics of Sobriety grew out of my teaching and research at
the University of Pittsburgh between 2007 and 2010. Its writing was, at that same time,
accompanied by the colloquy with friends and colleagues in Germany, especially with
Karlheinz (“Carlo”) Barck. In September, 2009, thanks to Beatriz González-Stephan, José
Aranda, and Caroline Levander, I was invited to participate in the Emerging Disciplines
symposium at Rice University’s Humanities Research Center, at which I addressed
the formative role played by conflicts over psychoactive substances within different
dynamics of transatlantic and hemispheric “modernization.” The professional synergy
and wholehearted support that I encountered at this memorable event was crucial,
and, shortly afterwards, I completed the definite outline for the book. During the fall
semester of 2010, the Humanities Center at the University of Pittsburgh awarded me a
Faculty Fellowship, allowing me to enjoy a more concentrated tide of writing.
The final writing phase was traversed by an interesting and contrapuntal
experience—my transition from Pittsburgh to the University of Freiburg in 2011.
Undoubtedly, I have benefitted from working with graduate students at Pitt’s Department
of Hispanic Languages and Literatures, yet I quickly found that Freiburg’s students of
Romance Languages and Literatures were eager to share the new texts and segments of
knowledge that I began to introduce into my teaching. Lisa Quaas, doctoral candidate,
capably helped me through the completion of the manuscript, when daily duties at my
new institution threatened to delay the process.
Two international congresses that I had the opportunity to coordinate are related
to the intellectual trajectory of the book, as well. The first, “Narcoepics Unbound:
New Narrative Territories, Affective Aesthetics, and Ethical Paradox,” took place in
April, 2008, at the University of Pittsburgh. The names of the actively participating
scholars and artists show the scope of a joint reflection—Elmer Mendoza, Víctor
Gaviria, Felipe Aljure, Catherine L. Benamou, Rebecca E. Biron, Nancy D. Campbell,
Elaine Carey, Beatriz González-Stephan, Cynthia Steele, Juana Suárez, Richard
DeGrandpre, Luis Duno-Gottberg, Mark Cameron Edberg, Curtis Marez, Julián
Olivares, and Elijah Wald. The second symposium, entitled “The Modern Concept