The way of the author publishing in Chile is harder. He goes to a printer with his book, makes a personal contract, pays the bill, and then has to market his wares. Any advertising is performed at his own expense and he must depend for sales upon the local bookstores. He is secure of receiving encouraging reviews in the local press, unless he has become unpopular in any particular quarter for, perhaps, political reasons, and the bookstores always seem proud to display the groups of “autores chilenos” upon their shelves. But, in the case of a serious, non-fiction book, the author rarely prints more than 200 copies, and thinks himself lucky if he sells 50. A novelist who has already achieved something of a name probably prints 500 copies and may reasonably expect to sell half that number.
The lack of professional publishers all over Spanish America appears to be due chiefly to mental dependence upon other countries and particularly upon France. By far the greater proportion of books offered for sale in any Spanish American town is French, or translations into Spanish of French books, the list ranging from such classics as the works of Voltaire, Rousseau and Nordau to Zola, Dumas, Anatole France, Guy de Maupassant and the more modern writers of fiction. Conan Doyle’s detective tales still sell freely in Latin America, as do the works of Scott, Kipling, Rider Haggard, Hardy, and a few other “standard” English authors, in Spanish translations some of which are not so much incredibly bad as extraordinary misfits. The oddest translation of this kind that I have ever picked up from a Latin-American bookstall was of Sudermann’s “Mill.” I found it on a forlorn newsstand in interior Nicaragua, and kept it as a shining example of the difficulty of translating into a Latin from a Teutonic tongue. Neither the speech of the German peasants, the routine of the mill, the ideas or scenery “went” in Spanish, and it is at least partly because a French story translates so happily that Latin America is flooded with French literature. All these translations are made in Europe, and are generally published in Madrid; as a result, Latin America reads, in the main, what Spain reads.
Under these circumstances it is admirable that the slender stream of Chilean literature persists. Examining the output, one concludes there are today two main classes of producers: first, the authors who are true artists, pricked by the age-old necessity for writing, and secondly the propagandists who for the sake of public service, or political reasons, wish to present their views. In the delicate mid-shades one finds the genuine historian; the personage whose aim is to achieve a literary reputation; and the sound economic essayist.
As regards history Chile has been well served by her own sons. The bright spirit of Benjamin Vicuña Mackenna, descendant of one of the distinguished Irish settlers in Chile, informs his “History of Chile,” while excellent work was also done by Barros Arana in his monumental record. It would be difficult to exaggerate the value of another series of productions by José Toribio Medina. This delver into archives has been producing for many years the result of tireless and critical work, the books being printed “en casa del autor” (in the author’s house). His series of “Documentos ineditos para la Historia de Chile” run to twenty volumes; we are also indebted to him for a detailed and fully documented account of the Inquisition in Chile, in addition to similar works dealing with the Inquisition in Peru and Mexico. He is, in fact, one of the most indefatigable workers in the Latin-American field of history. Among other living historians of Chile is Dr. Domingo Amunátegui Solar, Rector of the University of Chile, while Chilean geography owes much to Don Ernesto Greve, head of the Geographical Board in the Public Works Department in Santiago and to the devoted work of Dr. J.G. Guerra.
Of political monographs, Chile has sufficient writers of this class of work coming from the ranks of journalists as well as from those of the professional politician; a glance at a pile of such pamphlets leads inevitably to the conclusion that only a small proportion can possibly be disposed of by sales. But among the political writers whose essays are frequently of wider interest is the author of “The Neutrality of Chile,” Enrique Rocuant.
The distinguished engineer, Santiago Marín Vicuña, is one of the best Chilean writers upon economic subjects, his range covering railways, mines, irrigation, ports, canals, etc. The press of the excellent Mercurio of Santiago reprints in book form many of these and kindred articles of national concern, performing sound work in bringing the acute problems of the country before the public, never more needed than in republics where continuity of domestic as well as foreign policies is often lacking.
In the realm of fiction it cannot be said that Chile is rich. She has never yet produced a great novel. But there is consolation in the fact that neither have most of her sister states, the greatest wealth of literature, particularly of the genuinely national school, flowering in Portuguese and not Spanish America; the novels, belles lettres, historical studies and poetry of Brazil have been and are poured forth in quantities that are torrential compared with the thin streams from many other Latin-American countries. The fact is curious when one considers the present strength of Spanish literature compared with that of Portugal. It would be unfair to Spanish America if one did not seek an explanation of her attenuated literary production on other grounds than those of mental capacity, and unfair to Chile if her output were not considered in relation to that of all other parts of Spanish America. Spanish America during the major part of the nineteenth century underwent constant political upheavals resulting in the preoccupation of the most brilliant men with presidential disputes and, not infrequently, the exile of the most active citizens from a share in their country’s advancement and ideas. Behind the former Spanish colonies lay, also, a traditional acceptance of formalities and inhibitions that were far from encouraging to intellectual development.
Nevertheless, here and there rose bright founts of literary production during last century. It is not surprising that the best of these originated in the regions where the viceregal courts had been established for three hundred years, where the Royal Audiences and universities had been set up and a nucleus of well-educated people settled. The best-known novel of South America (aside from Taunay’s famous “Innocencia”), the sentimental “Maria” of Jorge Isaacs, is not a case in point, however, for the author, writing in proud and intellectual Colombia, was the son of an English Jew.
But amongst the shining examples to be found is the list of novels put out by José Milla in Guatemala, and the work of Ricardo Palma in Lima. Milla, an indefatigable worker of fine intellectual training, put most of his romantic-historical novels into a colonial setting, and enjoyed a great local vogue, while the “Tradiciones de Peru,” although purporting to be legendary rather than fiction, strikes a somewhat similar note.
Chilean literature has not developed along like lines. Here the development of the novel was chiefly based upon the internal political struggles of the country during the later part of the nineteenth century, and, with such themes as that of the revolution against Balmaceda fading from public interest, the military-patriotic story has yielded to two chief classes, the society novel and pictures of the life of Chilean peasants and workmen.