“La mano nella terra”. Spaesamento e redenzione di un “conquistatore conquistato” nel Paraguay del XVI secolo

Abstract

In her short story “La mano en la tierra” Josefina Pla outlines a “postmodern” portrait of the sixteenth-century <em>hidalgo</em> Don Blas, whose language is initially marked by the difference between Western hegemonic discourse and the subdued and subaltern Otherness of the natives. However, he gradually realizes not only the estrangement effect of his contact with the guarani people, but also a sense of displacement due both to the semantic crisis caused by contamination and his sense of alienation within his own family. Only at the end, thanks to the blue colour of his mestizo son’s eyes, does he recognize himself as a foreigner among foreigners, as half of a world which is completed by the Other, and reach a reconciliation that opens the door to the counter-conquest of future Americans.