Iphigenia

Rating:
Summary: A definite, timeless classic!
Review: I first learned of this book when I watched the Venezuelan miniseries many years ago. I was haunted by how contemporary its theme still is: a smart, sophisticated young woman trying to adapt to her family's facade of wealth, falling in love with a social climber, and eventually trying to settle for a well-to-do suitor and live out a life of boredom. This book should be read by women of all ages - the story is beautifully told, you will feel transported to the Caracas of the early 20th century.

Rating:
Summary: A must for all women
Review: I wish I had come across this book years ago. De la Parra startled me with some of her ideas. Although her main character lived at about the turn of the century in South America, her experiences give me insight into my own. It is beautifully written and engrossing.

Rating:
Summary: Should be a Feminist Classic
Review: Parra's book seems light years ahead of time, an insightful critique of Latin machismo and oppression that makes a frontal attack on forced matrimony, organized religion, sexual mores and the domestic sphere. Though the heroine's flightiness and indecision are bound to irritate some readers, its crucial to keep in mind that the author was single-handedly clearing space for a feminine (if not a Feminist) perspective within the confines of a deeply patriarchal and misogynistic narrative framework, one that systematically relegated women characters to passive, at times silent, roles. Here, Parra takes up a common enough trope--that of the orphaned young woman ripe for marriage and pursued by multiple suitors--and shatters the mold, giving her protagonist not only a voice, but a consciousness. Maria Eugenia is certainly one of the first heroines in Latin American fiction to openly question her position in society and to rail against the fact that she is little more than a pawn in the hands of men and older, scheming women. She is an unforgettable character even if--quite inevitably--she fails in the end to actually remove herself from the patriarchal structures that so violently work to keep her mind and body in check. The book is not perfect, of course, it could not be considering that its primary purpose seems to blaze a trail, but for all its windiness and occasional lapses into vapidity, it is an important work, one that deserves a critical revival, if not a wide readership.