The spectacle of peace and the politics of memory in postwar El Salvador: On miguel huezo mixco's la casa de Moravia

Abstract

This article examines Miguel Huezo Mixco's La casa de Moravia (2017), a novel that weaves together El Salvador's postwar present and its insurgent past, as recalled by a former FMLN guerrilla, who serves as the narrator-protagonist. I argue that the novel posits a conception of historical memory that functions as an antidote to the ideological divides that run through postwar society. Rather than reify the insurgency as a heroic feat, La casa de Moravia conjures the all-too-human frailties and energies of that moment, in particular the reckless but generative passions it had unleashed. For the protagonist, the memory of the past is more than mere nostalgia for a spirit of adventurousness that no longer has a place in the political and technocratic culture of postwar El Salvador. What his recollections bring to life is a way of perceiving the world that is both visionary and earthbound, utopian and tragic, and thus capable of speaking back to the information-saturated yet imaginatively sterile present. By recuperating the spirit and splendor of El Salvador's revolutionary past, La casa de Moravia reveals the deeper implications of postwar disenchantment.