DISCURSIVE PRACTICES AND CRITICAL PRACTICES IN THE UNPUBLISHED EPISTOLARY OF JOSÉ DONOSO

Abstract

The unpublished epistolary of José Donoso is an incredibly rich repository for understanding the ways in which the Chilean writer constructed his authorial figure, what we can call his ‘literary stance’ in terms of Jérôme Meizoz. Drawing from the letters preserved in various writers' archives located in the Firestone Library at Princeton University, it is possible to elucidate some of his positioning strategies, as well as to understand the critical practices that Donoso carried out in these epistolary dialogues. In this article, I want, on one hand, to briefly describe the Donosian correspondence preserved in the Firestone Library and, on the other, to delve into the way in which the Chilean writer understands himself as both a creator and a literary critic.