Spaces of Madness examines the role of the insane asylum in Argentine prose works published between 1889 and 2011. From a place of existential exile at the turn of the twentieth century to a symbolic representation of Argentine society during and immediately subsequent to the Dirty War, the figure of the asylum in Argentine literature has evolved along with the institution itself. The authors studied in Spaces of Madness include Manuel T. Podesta, Roberto Arlt, Leopoldo Marechal, Julio Cortazar, Adolfo Bioy Casares, Juan Jose Saer, Abelardo Castillo, Ricardo Piglia, and Luisa Valenzuela.

Spaces of Madness examines the role of madness and irrationality in the works of four key Argentine novelists: Julio Cortazar, Ricardo Piglia, Juan Jose Saer, and Luisa Valenzuela. Situating these works within the deconstructivist framework provided by Michel Foucault s History of Madness, Spaces of Madness demonstrates the ways in which the perceived superiority of reason to madness is called into question in light of the challenges posed by the atrocities of Argentina s Dirty War (1976-83). The works of the authors studied in Spaces of Madness reflect at times a wave of glorification of the...