(Re)construction of a Recent Past: Memory and Writing in Uruguay: The Case of Oblivion by Edda Fabbri

Abstract

The testimonial literature that emerges during the late 1990s in Latin America has as a main theme the rescue of the memory centered on State violence during the military dictatorships that occurred in previous decades. In the Uruguayan case, the testimonial writing from former female political prisoners will account for the silent and stormy life behind bars, and for the necessary companion relationships that make possible to resist. One example of this is Oblivion by Edda Fabbri, a testimonial novel awarded with the Casa de las Américas Prize in 2007. The purpose of this article is to identify how, in Oblivion, the testimonial voice of a former political prisoner who was a member of the Tupamaros National Liberation Movement tries to reconstruct the memory of her past as a prisoner through a series of fragmented images kept in her body. The writing, although insufficient, will be established as the means by which the speaker will express the pain, with no intention of focusing on facts, but with the purpose of leaving a trace of a violent past, which, in turn, allows to seek forgiveness. The paradox between memory and oblivion constantly present in the testimony plays a major role in such a search. The analysis will center its attention on three major themes for discussion: the link between time and memory, the connection between pain, body and writing, and the idea of oblivion as forgiveness.