Tongue Ties : Logo-Eroticism in Anglo-Hispanic Literature

'Before it becomes a political, social, or even linguistic issue, bilingualism is a private affair, intimate theater'. So writes Firmat in this ground-breaking study of the interweaving of life and languages in a group of bilingual Spanish, Spanish-American and Latino writers. Unravelling the 'tongue ties' of such diverse figures as the American philosopher George Santayana, the emigré Spanish poet Pedro Salinas, Spanish American novelists Guillermo Cabrera Infante and María Luisa Bombal, and Latino memoirists Richard Rodriguez and Sandra Cisneros, Firmat argues that their careers are shaped by a linguistic family romance that involves negotiating between the competing claims and attractions of Spanish and English. "Before it becomes a political, social, or even linguistic issue, bilingualism is a private affair, intimate theater." So writes Gustavo Pérez Firmat in this ground-breaking study of the interweaving of life and languages in a group of bilingual Spanish, Spanish-American and Latino writers. Unravelling the "tongue ties" of such diverse figures as the American philosopher George Santayana, the emigré Spanish poet Pedro Salinas, Spanish American novelists Guillermo Cabrera Infante and María Luisa Bombal, and Latino memoirists Richard Rodriguez and Sandra Cisneros, Pérez Firmat argues that their careers are shaped by a linguistic family romance that involves negotiating between the competing claims and attractions of Spanish and English Front Matter....Pages i-xi Introduction....Pages 1-21 Saying Un-English Things in English....Pages 23-43 Love in a Foreign Language....Pages 45-67 Spanish-Only Body Talk....Pages 69-86 Mother’s Idiom, Father’s Tongue....Pages 87-106 Remembering Things Past in Translation....Pages 107-122 Spanish Passion, English Peace....Pages 123-138 Words That Smell Like Home....Pages 139-157 Epilogue....Pages 159-163 Back Matter....Pages 165-195 Perez Firmat looks at the effect of writing in Spanish and English in a group of bilingual Hispanic writers, including George Santayana, Pedro Salinas, Luis Cernuda, Calvert Casey, Guillermo Cabrera Infante, Maria Luisa Bombal, Sandra Cisneros, Richard Rodriguez and Judith Ortiz Cofer