SOURCE: Prieto, Rene. “The Ambiviolent Fiction of Severo Sarduy.” Symposium 39, no. 1 (spring 1985): 49-60.

In the following essay, Prieto explores the themes of death and mutilation in the novels of Severo Sarduy, noting that his characters are always changing, with destruction often acting as the agent for change.

La muerte—la pausa que refresca—forma parte de la vida.

Severo Sarduy, Cobra

C'est en somme d'un codage de la pulsion de mort, dont Freud nous dit qu'elle est antérieure à l'objet et à l'amour, qu'il s'agit dans le récit obscène.

Julia Kristeva, Histoires d'amour

To say that ambivalence, exaggeration and multiplicity play a major role in the recent novels of Severo Sarduy is to belabor a point for reasons which only the temper of these very works can justify. Saturation and redundance, even critical, are as topical to Sarduy's fiction as transformation and evolution are typical of his...