The Masking of Evil in La palabra de los muertos o Ayacucho hora nona by Marcial Molina Richter

Abstract

Although still insufficiently attended by critics, the poem La palabra de los muertos o Ayacucho hora nona (1988), by Marcial Molina Richter, is one of those that best shows how violence impacts in the construction of a poetic discourse. Considering this aspect, our article proposes that Western European and original Andean notions about evil coexist in this poem, which is manifested in the transfer from the idea of the duality of good and evil towards one of parity or complementarity of those concepts. To demonstrate this, we analyze the text from the concepts of Jean Baudrillard and Beatriz Sarlo on dissimulation and memory, respectively, and we also attend to the study of Andean thought and the appeal to tradition, both identifiable in the poem. The sum of all these elements makes Ayacucho hora nona one of the best books produced during the time of terrorism.