The Vindication of the Female Role in Elena Garro’s Los recuerdos del porvenir

Abstract

The aim of this work is to analyze the vindication of the female role in the novel Los recuerdos del porvenir (1963) by Elena Garro (1916-1998), since the writer reviews the place that women have occupied in Mexican history and society, showing the numerous conflicts related to their social position, education received, stereotypes imposed, among others. However, the author, at the same time, tries to go beyond simple criticism and proposes a new vision for the problems of her female characters, either through innovation in narrative techniques (investment of time, new spaces, use of a female narrator), or by making the roles imposed by society on women more obvious, to show the absence of a free will or the lack of free will in female characters. All of the above in order to observe the construction of the role of women in the different roles and sectors of Mexican society, whether as daughter, mother, wife, lover, prostitute, and so on; and through the different eras of our country, fostering a reflection in the reader on female stereotypes in current Mexican society.