4.2: National Independencies in Latin America

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The era known as “Emancipation” or of national independence in Latin America began around 1780 with the famous rebellions of communeros and that of Túpac Amaru, and it can be said that it ended around 1821, when the independence of Peru and the Mexican Empire was definitively declared. During these decades, all of Spain's continental territories in America, from what is now Mexico to Argentina, became independent from Madrid and began to form national states. Both dates are approximate, because in many countries wars and rebellions continued in favor of Spanish forces until the 1830s. The Caribbean territories of Cuba and Puerto Rico continued to be part of Spain until 1898.

“The Battle of Ayacucho”, by Martín Tovar (1827-1902).

The processes of independence

At the beginning of the 19th century, political tensions in the Spanish territories of America were explosive. The rivalry between the Creoles and the Peninsulars who represented the Crown in America (disparagingly called “chapetones” or “gachupines”) was evident. The inequalities and injustices of American societies also exacerbated social tensions. Consequently, the triumph of the French Revolution and the new government of Napoleon Bonaparte unwittingly triggered the processes of independence in the Spanish-American continent. When Napoleon took over the Spanish monarchy (1808-13), many Creoles declared their autonomy from the Peninsula and, after bloody wars that lasted until 1825, most of the new Spanish-American countries became independent (with the exception of Cuba and Puerto Rico, which did not separate from Spain until 1898). The Creole elite that led these struggles and who were in charge of the new governments, sought to create republics in the style of the French or Anglo-Saxon Enlightenment.

In the absence of a legitimate monarch since 1808, the Spanish-American colonies had to decide who to obey, and this brought to the surface existing social tensions. By 1811, Buenos Aries, Bogotá and Caracas had declared autonomous governments to replace Napoleon's captive king.

In Mexico, Father Miguel Hidalgo led a rebellion from the northern town of Dolores on September 16, 1810. The rumor spread, and nearly eighty thousand indigenous and mixed race people, under the image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, rose up to fight for the freedom of the country, with the aim of improving its precarious social situation. This led to a hardening of the Creole elite, who remained faithful to Spain until 1821. Something similar had happened in Peru: after the uprising of Tupac Amaru II, the Creoles had become allies with the colonial government, and it was only in 1824 that independence was declared, achieved by two armies that came from outside.

The wars for independence from Spain lasted almost fifteen years in South America, led from the north by the Venezuelan Simón Bolívar, and from the south by the Argentinian José de San Martín, who are therefore called the “Libertadores”. After difficult and heroic campaigns by Creole generals under the command of indigenous and mixed race soldiers, the armies of Bolívar and San Martín met in Lima and declared the definitive independence of the Spanish mainland colonies. Paradoxically, the South American elites decided to accept independence to avoid the liberal reforms that began in Spain in 1820 and that endangered the privileges of the Creoles. Thus, political independence did not involve profound social reform but, in general, a way of continuing the domination of the local elite. This was one of the reasons why it was not possible to unify the nations of Central and South America, because the Creoles were used to imposing their local authority almost like feudal lords and there was no established democratic tradition.

The disasters of violence did not end in 1824. Wars of separation between new nations, conflicts between political parties and local interests, mixed-race groups that claimed privileges thanks to their new military status, and indigenous and Afro-descendant sectors that were looking for a place in the new configuration of power, were the constant cause of violence and political instability throughout most of the 19th century in Latin America. Frictions between liberals (merchants) and conservatives (ranchers) were common, regions vied for the dominance of the central government and, in sum, many social conflicts in the colony remained unresolved, creating a volatile social environment. In a few decades, the four Spanish viceroyalties were transformed into eighteen sovereign countries, many of them with repeated civil wars. It is not surprising that, shortly before his death in 1830 and after seeing the division of his long-awaited Gran Colombia into three different countries, Simón Bolívar said: “America is ungovernable. Those of us who have served the revolution have plowed in the sea” (Winn 83).

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Heroism and Romanticism

The modern ideal of political and personal freedom, with strong nationalist or patriotic emotions, was a predominant note of American Romanticism, which seeks to emphasize the emotive in the artistic sphere.

An influential poet of this period was the Ecuadorian José Joaquín Olmedo (Guayaquil 1780-1847), who greatly contributed to the independence processes in South America. One of his poetic ambitions was to sing the epic of revolutionary battles, especially in “The Victory of Junín” (1825), which seeks to build a neoclassical hero presenting Simon Bolivar as “the son of Colombia and Mars” (God of War in classical mythology, v. 112), but it is also an aesthetic full of romantic patriotism:

We saw that when the flags are deployed from Peru and Colombia, the haughty legions are disturbed, the fierce dismayed Spaniard flees, or asks for surrendered peace. Bolívar won, Peru was free, and in triumphant pomp Sacred Freedom in the Temple of the Sun was placed. (v. 41-48)

We saw that, when the flags from Peru and Colombia were unfolded, the arrogant legions fear, the furious Spaniard flees in panic or, defeated, begs for peace. Bolívar won, Peru got free, and holy Freedom, with triumphant pomp, was placed in the temple of the Sun.

There is in this poem a didactic spirit that uses forms that are out of fashion in Europe, but which respond to the efforts of these poets to demonstrate their knowledge of the classics, and at the same time they express a nationalist and libertarian romantic passion that goes beyond neoclassical rationalism.

Other artists and writers seek to develop an American “me” of their own, incorporating non-Hispanic forms from their regions. For example, as mentioned in a previous chapter, the Peruvian Mariano Melgar (1791-1815), who had indigenous blood, wrote poems based on Yaraví, a lyrical and romantic genre of Quechua origin, like this one:

Come back, because I can no longer live without your love. Come back, my popcorn, go back to your sweet nest. Look, there are hunters who, with an evil zeal, will put you in their attractive deadly nets; and when they have arrested you they will give you cruel martyrdom . (v. 1-14)

Come back, for I can't live without your loving anymore. Come back, little dove, return to your sweet nest. Watch Out, For There Are Hunters Who, With Malign Intentions, Will Place Mortal Baits For You In Their Nets And, After Putting You In Prison, They Will Cruelly Torture You

With a romantic sensitivity to individual feeling and to the search for the typical or the folkloric as well as for its formal freedom, this poem goes beyond the aesthetic classifications of Europe, and could be considered as a precursor to indigenism. Notice the double level of meaning, at the same time talking about a personal relationship and the oppressive social situation in which the speaker and his beloved live.

A third example of this romantic sensitivity in relation to political emancipation is the poetry of José María Heredia (Cuba, 1803 - Mexico, 1839), who fought unsuccessfully for the independence of Cuba and was therefore exiled, represents the progressive rise of romanticism. In his first poems, his passion for justice and freedom are balanced with didactic notes and rationalizations typical of the neoclassicism he learned during his long education. However, he was also a translator of famous romantic poems by Chateaubriand and Byron, and his own later poetry develops a very passionate poetic self, focused on nostalgia and the idealization of his homeland. This is evident in his famous ode to “Niagara” (1825):

I never felt my miserable isolation, my abandonment, my regrettable heartbreak as I did this day... Could a passionate and stormy soul without love be happy...? Oh! If a beautiful woman worthy of me loved me and out of this abyss on the turbulent edge, my vague thought and my solitary walk would accompany me! Which one will enjoy looking at her face covered with slight paleness, and being more beautiful in her sweet terror, and smiling as she holds her in my loving arms ...! Delusions of virtue...! Ouch! , banished, without homeland, without love, I only look before me tears and sorrows. (v. 113-128)

Never like today I felt my sad isolation and loneliness, my regrettable lack of love... Could a passionate and turbulent soul be happy without love? ... Or, if a beautiful lady, worthy of me, could love me and accompany my vagrant thoughts and my lonely wandering in this abyss, turbulent edge! How would I enjoy her face become softly pale in watching this, become more beautiful when sweetly scared, and then smiling while I support her in my loving arms! ... Illusions of Virtue!... Wings! Exiled, homeless, loveless, all I see before me is weeping and pain!

This stanza is charged with emotion and completely focused on a self around whom the world revolves: for him there is Niagara, for him there should be his lover (“worthy of me”!) , and to feed their sensitivity and inspiration are absence and loneliness, nostalgia and vague thinking, and even exile and longing for a homeland. There is a certain baroque spirit in this dark, passionate, melancholic environment, and a fascination with complex subjectivity, with unsatisfied individual desire. Here the beautiful is the sad, the intense. A good example of nineteenth-century romantic sensibility (from the 19th century).

This is how the cultural production of the beginning of the 19th century in Latin America was shaping a space of autonomy from Europe, but of full belonging to Western tradition. The adventure of shaping new nations in the midst of conflicting forces was just beginning. This is what Bolívar wrote in his “Letter from Jamaica” (1815), a classic essay from this period:

It is difficult to foresee the future fate of the New World, to establish principles about its policy, or to prophesy the nature of the government it will eventually adopt. [...] We are a small human race; we inhabit a separate world, surrounded by vast seas. We are new to almost all the arts and sciences, although somewhat old in the uses of civil society. [...] We have hardly any vestiges of what it once was, and we are not Indians or Europeans, but rather a mixed species between the rightful owners of the country and the Spanish usurpers. In short, we are Americans by birth, but we get the rights of Europe. Rights that, however, we have to dispute and at the same time fight against the invaders. So we are in the most extraordinary and complicated case.

It is difficult to foresee the future fate of the New World, to set down its political principles, or to prophesy what manner of government it will eventually adopt. [...] We scarcely retain a vestige of what it once was, and we are neither Indian nor European, but a species midway between the legitimate owners of this land and the Spanish usurpers. In short, we are Americans by birth, but we derive our rights from Europe. However, we have to assert these rights, and at the same time we must defend ourselves against the invaders. This places us in a most extraordinary and complex situation.

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Neoclassical vs. Romantic Aesthetics

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Fuentes

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• Blanco Aguinaga, Carlos, et al. Social history of Spanish literature. Akal, 2000.
• Bolivar, Simon. “Response from a Southern American to a gentleman from this island (Henry Cullen)”. Jamaica, 1815.
• Carr, R. Spain 1808-1936. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982.
• Davies, Catherine, ed. The Companion to Hispanic Studies. Oxford University Press, 2002.
• Frank, Jean. History of Spanish-American literature. Barcelona: Ariel, 1983.
• Heredia, Jose Maria. “Niagara” 1825. Poems. Havana: National Council of Culture, 1965.
• Melgar, Mariano. “Come back because I can't anymore.” http://es.wikisource.org/wiki/Vuelve_que_ya_no_puedo.
• ---. “The Stonemason and the Donkey”. http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_cantero_y_el_asno.
• Olmedo, Jose Joaquin de. “The Victory of Junín: Song to Bolívar”. 1825. Cervantes Virtual Library. http://www.cervantesvirtual.com/servlet/SirveObras/13549441090132052976613/index.htm.
• Winn, Peter. Americas: The Changing Face of Latin America and the Caribbean. 4th ^ed. Berkeley: U of California, 2005.