Sanctify Our Suffering World with Tears: Transamerican Sentimentalism in Joaquín Murieta Journal Article uri icon

Overview

abstract

  • Abstract; This essay explores the often-overlooked affective discourse that emerges from a close reading of the Mexican and European American women in the first Native American novel, John Rollin Ridge's sensational dime novel The Life and Adventures of Joaquín Murieta, the Celebrated California Bandit (1854). Through their investment in sentimental tropes such as the tearful scene, the angelic figure, and the untimely fainting fit, these women enact what I term a transamerican sentimental diplomacy that counters the attempt of the novel's men to define the United States via a nationalistic violence (the legacy of the U.S.-Mexican War). Through their tears, pleas, and actions, the women test the cultural and political milieu of the newly minted state of California. While the women's promotion of a peaceful paradigm for borderland interaction ultimately falls short, its undeniable presence is an important counterweight to the sensational violence in Joaquín Murieta that has thus far captivated critics.

publication date

  • September 1, 2008

Date in CU Experts

  • October 23, 2014 12:37 PM

Full Author List

  • Windell MA

author count

  • 1

Other Profiles

International Standard Serial Number (ISSN)

  • 0891-9356

Electronic International Standard Serial Number (EISSN)

  • 1067-8352

Additional Document Info

start page

  • 170

end page

  • 196

volume

  • 63

issue

  • 2