Cristina Peri Rossi is an established writer. She has amassed a substantial body of work that amounts to twelve books of fiction, six of poetry, and one of essays. Yet generic classifications of her work on the basis of standard terminology prove to be unsatisfactory if not futile. The disappearance of generic boundaries is due mainly to a confluence of languages and to a unified artistic perception that does not heed the call of discursive thought, responding instead to a poetic attitude, a lyrical vision. Her tales break down the logical interrelation of their parts and renounce all novelistic development and anecdotal mimesis in favor of the presentation of states of consciousness as images. The lyrical attitude, playful exploration of reality, metaphorical profusion, and digressive and cumulative forms are all signs of a poetic reality, a total experience intolerant of boundaries.

Born on 12 November 1941 in Montevideo, Peri Rossi...