Living trapped in-between spaces: Literary works of displaced Argentine women writers in Spain

Abstract

The dictatorships of South America motivated many writers to go overseas in the 1970s. Repression, persecution and the disappearance of intellectuals in Argentina created a need to look towards displacement and exile as alternatives to survive and escape from the atrocities committed by the regime that took power following the 1976 military coup. Some women writers found refuge in this new literary space: a place that allowed them to face the dilemma of ‘living in-between’ and at the same time to locate a part of the historical memory of Argentina. This article focuses on the works of Clara Obligado, Ana Becciu, Reina Roffé, Juana Bignozzi and Noni Benegas: transatlantic writers who fled to and installed themselves in Spain during this time of transition. This article studies the ‘writing of the double place’, the narrative of absence and memory of a place of origin. It also analyses the representation of Spain as a host site in their works and as a means of finding their voices, reflecting and conversing with their double existential situation of being ‘in-between’ spaces.