Manuel Puig
Encyclopedia
General Villegas
General Villegas is a town in General Villegas Partido, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina.UN/LOCODE is ARVGS....
, Argentina, December 28, 1932 - Cuernavaca
Cuernavaca
Cuernavaca is the capital and largest city of the state of Morelos in Mexico. It was established at the archeological site of Gualupita I by the Olmec, "the mother culture" of Mesoamerica, approximately 3200 years ago...
, Mexico, July 22, 1990) was an Argentine
Argentina
Argentina , officially the Argentine Republic , is the second largest country in South America by land area, after Brazil. It is constituted as a federation of 23 provinces and an autonomous city, Buenos Aires...
author. Among his best known novels are La traición de Rita Hayworth (1968) (Betrayed by Rita Hayworth
Betrayed by Rita Hayworth
Betrayed by Rita Hayworth is a 1968 novel by the Argentine novelist Manuel Puig. It was Puig's first novel....
), Boquitas pintadas (1969) Heartbreak Tango
Heartbreak tango
Heartbreak TangoHeartbreak Tango is a novel by famous Argentine author Heartbreak TangoHeartbreak Tango is a novel by famous Argentine author Heartbreak Tango...
(English Translation), and El beso de la mujer araña (1976) (Kiss of the Spider Woman
Kiss of the Spider Woman (novel)
Kiss of the Spider Woman is a novel by the Argentine writer Manuel Puig. It is considered his most successful....
), which was made into a film by the Argentine-Brazilian director, Héctor Babenco
Hector Babenco
Héctor Eduardo Babenco is an Argentine-born Brazilian film director, screenwriter, producer and actor.He has worked in several countries including Argentina, Brazil and the United States....
and in 1993 into a Broadway musical
Kiss of the Spider Woman (musical)
Kiss of the Spider Woman is a musical with music by John Kander and Fred Ebb, with the book by Terrence McNally. It is based on the Manuel Puig novel El Beso de la Mujer Araña...
.
Life
Manuel Puig was born in General VillegasGeneral Villegas
General Villegas is a town in General Villegas Partido, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina.UN/LOCODE is ARVGS....
(in Buenos Aires province
Buenos Aires Province
The Province of Buenos Aires is the largest and most populous province of Argentina. It takes the name from the city of Buenos Aires, which used to be the provincial capital until it was federalized in 1880...
). After unsuccessfully studying architecture in the Universidad de Buenos Aires, he began working as a film archivist and editor in the city of Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
and later, in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
after winning a scholarship from the Italian Institute of Buenos Aires. Puig's dream was to become a screenwriter to write TV shows and movies. His career as a screenwriter never took off, however. In the 1960s, he moved back to Buenos Aires, where he penned his first major novel, La traición de Rita Hayworth
Betrayed by Rita Hayworth
Betrayed by Rita Hayworth is a 1968 novel by the Argentine novelist Manuel Puig. It was Puig's first novel....
. Because he had leftist political tendencies and also foresaw a rightist wave in Argentina, Puig moved to Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
in 1973, where he wrote his later works (including El beso de la mujer araña).
Much of Puig's work can be seen as pop art
Pop art
Pop art is an art movement that emerged in the mid 1950s in Britain and in the late 1950s in the United States. Pop art challenged tradition by asserting that an artist's use of the mass-produced visual commodities of popular culture is contiguous with the perspective of fine art...
. Perhaps due to his work in film and television, Puig managed to create a writing style that incorporated elements of these mediums, such as montage and the use of multiple points of view. He also made much use of popular culture (for example, soap opera
Soap opera
A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...
) in his works. In Latin American literary histories, he is presented as a writer who belongs to the Postboom and Post-modernist
Postmodernism
Postmodernism is a philosophical movement evolved in reaction to modernism, the tendency in contemporary culture to accept only objective truth and to be inherently suspicious towards a global cultural narrative or meta-narrative. Postmodernist thought is an intentional departure from the...
schools.
Puig lived in exile throughout most of his life. In 1989 Puig moved from Mexico City to Cuernavaca
Cuernavaca
Cuernavaca is the capital and largest city of the state of Morelos in Mexico. It was established at the archeological site of Gualupita I by the Olmec, "the mother culture" of Mesoamerica, approximately 3200 years ago...
, Mexico
Mexico
The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
, where he died in 1990. In the official biography, Manuel Puig and the Spider Woman: His Life and Fiction, his close friend Suzanne Jill Levine writes that Puig had been in pain for a few days prior to being admitted to a hospital, where he was told that his gallbladder
Gallbladder
In vertebrates the gallbladder is a small organ that aids mainly in fat digestion and concentrates bile produced by the liver. In humans the loss of the gallbladder is usually easily tolerated....
was inflamed and would have to be taken out. After the surgery, while Puig was recovering, he began to choke and gasp. The medical team was unable to help Puig. His lungs had filled with fluid, and he died of a heart attack at 4:55 a.m. on July 22, 1990.
The 2004 movie Vereda Tropical, directed by Javier Torres, depicts the period when Puig lived in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The writer's role is played by the actor Fabio Aste.
Work
Critics such as Pamela Bacarisse divides Puig's work into two parts: his early novels, which "attracted an enormous audience by weaving into his narratives the artistic 'sub-products' of mass culture"; and his later books which have "lost their popular appeal" as they evidence "a depressing, even unpalatable, vision of life, no longer even superficially sweetened by palliatives as the mass-media elements are left behind".Three translations of his work have been recently reprinted by Dalkey Archive Press
Dalkey Archive Press
Dalkey Archive Press is a publisher of fiction, poetry, and literary criticism in Illinois in the United States, specializing in the publication or republication of lesser known, often avant-garde works...
:
- 2009: Betrayed by Rita Hayworth
- 2010: The Buenos Aires Affair
- 2010: Heartbreak TangoHeartbreak tangoHeartbreak TangoHeartbreak Tango is a novel by famous Argentine author Heartbreak TangoHeartbreak Tango is a novel by famous Argentine author Heartbreak Tango...
Novels
- 1968: La traición de Rita Hayworth
- Betrayed by Rita HayworthBetrayed by Rita HayworthBetrayed by Rita Hayworth is a 1968 novel by the Argentine novelist Manuel Puig. It was Puig's first novel....
, Translator Suzanne Jill Levine, Dalkey Archive Press, 2009, ISBN 9781564785305
- Betrayed by Rita Hayworth
- 1969: Boquitas pintadasBoquitas pintadasBoquitas pintadas is a 1974 Argentine film, it was adapted by the novel of the same name. The English translation is named Heartbreak Tango....
; Seix Barral, 2004, ISBN 9789507314308- Heartbreak TangoHeartbreak tangoHeartbreak TangoHeartbreak Tango is a novel by famous Argentine author Heartbreak TangoHeartbreak Tango is a novel by famous Argentine author Heartbreak Tango...
- Heartbreak Tango
- 1973: The Buenos Aires Affair (The Buenos Aires Affair)
- 1976: El beso de la mujer araña; José Amícola, Jorge Panesi, Editors, Fondo De Cultura Economica, 2002, ISBN 9788489666450
- Kiss of the Spider WomanKiss of the Spider Woman (novel)Kiss of the Spider Woman is a novel by the Argentine writer Manuel Puig. It is considered his most successful....
, reprint Random House, Inc., 1991, ISBN 9780679724490
- Kiss of the Spider Woman
- 1979: Pubis angelical (Pubis AngelicalPubis angelicalPubis Angelical is a 1979 novel by acclaimed Argentine novelist Manuel Puig. It is perhaps Puig's work most influenced by pop culture. This can be seen in the montage imitating narrative technique, soap opera and science fiction elements...
) Seix Barral, 1979, ISBN 9788432213793 - 1980: Maldición eterna a quien lea estas páginas (Eternal Curse on the Reader of These PagesEternal Curse on the Reader of These PagesEternal Curse on the Reader of These Pages is a 1980 novel by Argentine novelist Manuel Puig. As in other works by Puig, the story is formally experimental, consisting of mostly unattributed dialogue, digressing into stories within stories...
) - 1982: Sangre de amor correspondido (Blood of Requited Love)
- 1988: Cae la noche tropical (Tropical Night Falling)
Plays and screenplays
- 1983:
- Under a mantle of stars: a play in two acts, Lumen Books, 1985, ISBN 9780930829001
- 1983: El beso de la mujer araña (Kiss of the Spider WomanKiss of the Spider Woman (play)The 1983 stage play Kiss of the Spider Woman is an adaptation of Manuel Puig's same title novel by the author himself.Novelist, screenwriter and playwright Manuel Puig wrote two plays while living in exile...
) - 1985: La cara del villano
- 1985: Recuerdo de Tijuana
- 1991: Vivaldi: A Screenplay (in Review of Contemporary Fiction №3)
- 1997: El misterio del ramo de rosas (1987) (Mystery of the Rose Bouquet)
- 1997: La tajada; Gardel, uma lembranca
External links
- A Conversation with Manuel Puig (Interview took place during a weekend in September 1979, after Puig was part of a Congress of Hispanic-American Writers in Medellin, Colombia.)
- Manuel Puig: Una aproximación biográfica. Eine Multimedia-Biographie auf CD-ROM. Buenos Aires 2008. ISBN 978-987-05-4332-9