Estilo: lo sublime y la violencia neoliberal en la poesía de Dolores Dorantes

Abstract:Estilo is a collection of prose poems written in exile by poet, journalist and activist Dolores Dorantes, after the author suffered an attack by organized crime for her work with Documentación y Estudios de Mujeres A.C., a grassroots organization that collected testimonies of women affected by the so-called "war on drugs". This paper analyzes Dorantes' critical appropriation of an average Mexican style (Luis Felipe Fabre), which under the ahistorical guise of the sublime reproduces sexism, elitism and corporatism. I argue that this appropriation of the sublime, both in its rhetorical (Pseudo-Longinus) and aesthetic (Burke, Kant and his followers, etc.) meanings, aims to visibilize the intertwining between the public discourse on drug trafficking and the diffuse violence of the narco-machine (Rosanna Reguillo), especially against women.