| In The Poetics of Empire in the Indies, James Nicolopulos investigates
literary representations of sixteenth-century Iberian colonialism
and imperialism by analyzing Alonso de Ercilla's La Araucana, a narrative poem that recounts the initial phases of the Spanish conquest
of Chile in the mid-sixteenth century, and Luis de Camoens's Os
Lusíadas, the epic celebration of early Portuguese maritime
expansion in the Indian Ocean and beyond.
Delving into the epic traditions of the Classical, Medieval, and
Renaissance periods, Nicolopulos outlines practices of imitation
within the two poems, focusing specifically on La Araucana's employment of epic models. Having made powerful connections to Ercilla's
literary and critical predecessors, Nicolopulos demonstrates that
the contemporaneous publication of Os Lusíadas further
affected the content and presentation of La Araucana. In
so doing, he elucidates the rivalries—poetic, political, commercial—between
Spain and Portugal during this age of expansion.
An investigation into imitation and representation in colonial
texts, The Poetics of Empire in the Indies offers new connections
between two early literary representations of Iberian imperialism. |
|
|
