A Mystery without Enigma: Gothic, Urban Space and Exoticism in César Aira’s La luz argentina

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to analyze La luz argentina (1983), by César Aira, based on the verification that it constitutes the first urban-themed piece in the writer’s work. Our hypothesis is that the prolific series that makes up the urban cycle in Aira’s work, identified almost exclusively with the Flores cycle, is actually inaugurated with this novel. Although La luz argentina tells a story of interiors in which the city appears mostly indirectly, the characters’ refuge of intimacy does not constitute a hermetic and impermeable space but, on the contrary, is haunted by the outside. Thus, the city imposes its ghostly presence even in domestic life and not only through the nocturnal excursions of the characters.

Keywords

• césar aira
• literatura argentina contemporánea
• ciudad
• gótico