Contemporary Peruvian Chronicle: Sanguineous Great Great Grandson of the Indias Chronicle

Abstract

The Latin American chronicle enjoys wonderful health. This hybrid species has become during the last decade in our best literary product of export. Names like Juan Villoro, Alberto Salcedo Ramos, Martin Caparrós, Juan Pablo Meneses, Leila Guerriero, among others, sprinkle the continent from top to bottom. Similarly, the graphical universe of our hemisphere, from Mexico to Argentina, thanks to these talents, is filled with extraordinary magazines where the chronicle and the great reportage are always present. In this point the question arises: Why does Peru highlight in the Latin American chronicle firmament? The answer, surely, is because it has a rich generation of chroniclers, and in addition, because it has one of the most important magazines of the sort. These answers, nevertheless, send us a new question: And so why does Peru count with the greater amount of good chroniclers in Latin America? We sent a hypothesis: Peru has been the country that better has kept the tradition from the Indias Chronicle, in that we now found the seed of the new urban chronicler’s race. In that sense, this essay pretends to answer to that academic restlessness with general and particular ways, approaching the Latin American and, in special, Peruvian tradition of the chronicle. For achieving this, it takes like foundation the Indias chronicle, its identity, evolution and modernization. Cross-sectionally, it takes care of the great subjects that the Latin American chronicle shakes: the violence, the extravagance, the solitude, the death.