From Carmen Balcells to indent literary agency. Mapping and characterizing the literary agent of Latin American literature
Abstract
This article addresses the role played by literary agents as increasingly decisive actors in the international projection of Latin American literature. It offers a brief historization of their emergence and consolidation up to the current context of globalization, including a partial mapping of the most influential agencies in the management of Latin American authors’ rights. It also proposes an approach to the novel El jardín de al lado, by José Donoso, as a text that fictionalizes the moment of appearance of the agents in the Spanish-speaking world and the tensions generated by their emergence. Among the conclusions, it is argued that the role of agents is not merely to manage rights but that their intervention has a creative character and serves to cohere the transnational literature market.Keywords:
literary agents, globalization, Latin American literature, gatekeeper, transnational marketReferences
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