EL SENO ESCONDIDO: NODRIZAS Y NANAS COMO AGENTES MARAVILLOSOS EN LA NOVELA LATINOAMERICANA DE LA SEGUNDA MITAD DEL SIGLO VEINTE

In Latin America, wet nurses and nannies have played a relevant role in the transmission of legends, myths, medicinal knowledge, popular beliefs, and the religious practices of marginalized groups. This historical reality also ties them closely to the vitality of the marvelous real in Latin American culture and history as theorized by Alejo Carpentier. This dissertation focuses on examining the characters of wet nurses and nannies, especially in connection with the expression of the marvelous real in Latin American novels published in the second half of the twentieth century.
Employing primarily Alex Woloch’s theory of characterization, this dissertation explores the character space and position within the character system of la Vieja in El acoso (1956) by Alejo Carpentier, Peta Ponce in El obsceno pájaro de la noche (1970) by José Donoso, and Petra Avilés in La casa de la laguna (1996) by Rosario Ferré. They serve as marvelous agents introducing elements of the marvelous real in the narrative. These characters are at the center of an extensive network of cultural codes that signify different sources of the marvelous real in Latin American culture. The marvelous network they establish functions as a vindicating mechanism that leads to the penalization of the families that hire their services, who represent a decadent and oppressive social system, whereas the wet nurses or nannies embody the oppressed groups in society. This is a literary strategy to impart, at a symbolic level, the justice that traditionally has been denied, both textually and socially, to these women.