Debajo de mi vestido ardía un campo con flores alegres como los niños de la medianoche
Alejandra Pizarnik
Before these two books existed a different work: Encerradas. Mujer, escritura y reclusión. Purificación Mascarell also edited that edition. Much of what is written there resurfaces here, in this issue of Arte y Letras, each contributing materials for a debate that remains essential today. I emphasize the word intervention from the start. If writing does not move people to act, what is it really about? A literature that does not provoke action once the book is closed is, beyond literature, something else: merely words. Empty chatter. A pause before the soup cools after it has already left the flame. In both texts — Antoni Gómez’s piece and the one that organizes with its own work and other writings by Purificación Mascarell — the same fiery creative energy is apparent, energy that in many cases could turn to ashes. Yet time, even if it sounds cliché, will set things right. The women who appear in El foc i la cendra and the many who navigate the fascinating chapters of Escrito en la carne currently hold a central place in the artistic landscape: the past, the present, and the enduring. In fact, as stated in the first of those texts, their names, those women’s names, will endure far beyond the figures who sometimes acted as their jailers.
El cuerpo de la mujer ha sido diseñado por los hombres. También la escritura sobre/en ese cuerpo: a critic that could be summarized as saying that female bodies are excellent instruments of male biocontrol, writes Mascarell in the introduction to the following chapters. From motherhood to victims and detectives in crime fiction, moving from the personal to the political as Kate Millett did, to prostitution, a topic that surfaces especially when Virginie Despentes appears, I recalled Grisélidis Réal, along with disability, migration, illness, and the archetypes of witch, femme fatale, and vampire. These texts probe a scholarly yet accessible approach, blending narrative clarity with a propensity to draw conclusions. The journeys of women who rose from the ashes of their own creation, sometimes becoming prey to the flames their contexts ignited, are mapped from Marina Tsvetàjeva to Amy Winehouse, and include Nina Simone, Susan Sontag, Janis Joplin, Camille Claudel, Simone Weil, Emma Reyes, Elizabeth Smart, Rita Hayworth, Lucia Joyce, Charlotte Salomon, Ingeborg Bachmann, and Lucia Berlin. The aim is clear: these women would, to a meaningful degree, insist on their singularity as creators, even if some did not enjoy a victorious ending, as the text notes. These are stories of perseverance and persistence, of making space through art despite pressure and barriers.
El cuerpo, described as a “territory occupied,” as Jorie Graham put it in Deprisa, can be liberated through writing. The liberation, however, requires a distinct kind of writing, not the colonizing or domesticated version that diminishes the body to a mere object. It is crucial that the voices here come from women and others who write from lived experience, while still engaging the reader with narrative form and accessible analysis. Adrienne Rich, another name that echoes throughout Escrito en la carne, asks, Would I keep saying to myself and to this body that it is mine to claim and to carve out space for? That question frames the discussion around El Encierros and what reclusión means to different women across time. The two volumes—El foc i la cendra and Escrito en la carne—work together, not as a simple pairing, but as a synthesis that reaffirms why reading matters when a book demands action. It is not about elitism; it is about choosing texts that illuminate what is happening in the world. Reading these books is not a passive act; it is an invitation to engage and, ultimately, to act. The challenge remains: to pick up the work and see how it compels a response. Action is the test, and a call to read with intention resonates throughout the collection.
So, the dialogue continues: the focus on women who shape and unsettle tradition, the insistence that writing can be a form of resistance, and the persistent question about how literature shapes resistance in a society that often silences dissent. The conversations sparked by these two volumes persist in the contemporary discourse about women’s voices in art and literature, reminding readers that what is written is not only a record of experience but a prompt to reconsider the boundaries of creativity and social engagement. The pages argue for a more attentive, more courageous reception of works by women who confront power, question norms, and demand space for a fuller humanity. The message is clear: a book that does not move the reader toward action is incomplete, and these volumes call readers to action with unmistakable clarity and urgency.
Action is urged, as a powerful call to life, to witness and to participate in the ongoing conversation about women, art, and society. It is not merely a passive venture but a directive to engage deeply, to examine the ways bodies and voices are shaped, and to respond with courage and creativity. When the film of thought runs, it is time to rise and say, with renewed energy, here is where we stand, here is where we will push forward, and here is where we will keep the flame of inquiry alive.