Representations of the crowd at the intersection of politics and literature: outlines of a popular aesthetic and an anti-popular aesthetic

Abstract

This article explores different ways of representing crowds and their implications in aesthetic and political dimensions. While its focus extends beyond Peronism, it inherently considers the perception and construction of the multitude that manifested on October 17, 1945. Initially, it analyzes fundamental narratives such as Edgar Allan Poe's "The Man of the Crowd" and Esteban Echeverría's "The Slaughterhouse. " Building on this foundation, it contrasts works like Domingo Sarmiento's Facundo and José Hernández's Martín Fierro with Lucio V. Mansilla's An Excursion to the Ranquel Indians, suggesting that the latter presents significant novelties in the configuration of popular otherness. The article also addresses the representation of the Peronist crowd through various testimonies from the period, including those provided by Raúl Scalabrini Ortiz and Leopoldo Marechal, noting that the public discourse of the time reveals continuous tensions between the popular and the anti-popular. Simultaneously, it posits that the differences between popular aesthetics—which promotes interaction with otherness and multiplicity—and anti-popular aesthetics—which denies and homogenizes it—are fundamental to understanding these tensions. Finally, it mentions some lines of continuity in contemporary literary production and emphasizes that all aesthetics carry political implications.