Fairs // Santiago, literary city. Buenos Aires Book Fair 2023

A 50th anniversary of the coup d'état in Chile, the city of Santiago is the guest of honor to commemorate in Buenos Aires International Book Fair. From April 27 to May 15, 2023, Chilean writers reflected on and presented on old Santiago, its peripheries, the dictatorship and memories, childhood and the coup d'état, diasporas and migrants, the social outburst, champurria culture, diversity and human rights, among other topics. Three academics from the Universidad Alberto Hurtado were among the guests: the psychologist Elisabeth Lira, former dean of the Faculty of Psychology; the anthropologist Francisca Marquez, academic from the Department of Anthropology and Juan Cristobal Peña, academic from the Department of Journalism, both from the Faculty of Social Sciences at Universidad Alberto Hurtado.

A Book Fair that, from the perspective of a Chilean visitor, appears diverse, bustling with readers interested in observing, searching for the books they want to find, and listening to debate panels. Although for the Buenos Aires residents and organizers, this Fair has not had the massive number of visitors as in previous years -“”Nobody is in the mood with the crisis affecting us," says an organizer., the truth is that the murmur and the soundscape that covers the place is large. To the point that it is not always easy to hear those who present and launch their books. Large open halls follow one after another, the blue, red, yellow, green shed... Between the yellow and the green, Chile's two stands are located: a small wooden-paneled space where a comet star announces that the books of those who will present as guests are exhibited and sold there; and a large metal stand, which according to a Chilean writer reminds him of the structure of our temporary housing. Large white illuminated letters announce SANTIAGO, CHILE; Images of the city are projected onto the ceiling, and a dimly lit podium hosts the speakers, while the audience listens and young people nap or look at their phones sprawled on the cushions surrounding the speakers. The soundscape continues to envelop everything. Nevertheless, the Chilean guests, at the end of the afternoon, present reflections in which memories of the Coup d'état, the dictatorship, and the city of Santiago are always intertwined.

Juan Cristobal Peña participated as a panel moderator Fifty years after the military coup in Chile, alongside authors Carlos Cociña, Alejandra Costamagna, and Carlos Soto Román. The panel discussed how, despite the temporal distance and the wounds left by September 11, 1973, the repercussions of this historical event are still felt within Chilean society. Furthermore, Peña participated as a panelist alongside Evelyn Erlik and Cristián Alarcón in the panel To tell of the outbreak, analyzes the events of the Chilean revolt and its impact on society. The questions it sought to answer are: How is the history of a country that is undergoing a complex social process after the outbreak and rejection of the new constitution told? How can the history of a country that is in a tense political process due to its events be told? Finally, the journalist directed the Narrative Journalism Workshop, Non-Fiction Writing. The narrator in the first person singular, in which he reflected on the relevance of the narrator's prominence in stories.

For her part, the anthropologist Francisca Marquez participated in two panel discussions. The first of them addressed the relationship between Literature and Diaspora, in which she shared with authors Gonzalo León, Carola Martínez, and Sonia Budassi. Based on the evidence that the world has shrunk and migrations will not cease, the panel asks: How does a language travel? How does migration manifest in literature? On this occasion, Márquez presented the book “Relatos de una ciudad trizada. Santiago de Chile” and her research on migrant objects. Likewise, the academic participated with Francisca Yáñez, Lola Larra, and Carola Martínez, on the panel Childhoods under dictatorship.  In this debate, questions such as “What happens when a child is abruptly banished from their homeland?” and "How is childhood and adolescence narrated during dictatorship or exile?" were addressed, drawing from personal experience and literature. Academic Márquez presented the book "El Diario de Francisca. Septiembre 1973" to the audience, accompanied by a soundtrack that intertwined the songs heard by the girl, the bombing of the Palacio de la Moneda, and the voice of President Salvador Allende. The aim is thus to account for the paradoxes of this childhood experience during the dictatorship and the imprints it leaves on Chile's memory.

Finally, psychologist Elizabeth Lira participated in the panel Fragments of a memory alongside writers Francisco Ortega, Carlos Reyes, and Raquel Robles on how horror and memory can be narrated. The panel posits that the written word is one of the few testimonies of life that survives the atrocity of torture and disappearances during the dictatorship; letters, stories, chronicles, and poems stand as bridges against oblivion. Reading functions as a support for memory and brings us closer to truth and justice. The academic from the Faculty of Psychology also participated in the panel. Unequal along with Alejandro Aravena, Kathya Araujo, and Fernando Bercovich. In this panel, the psychologist referred to how inequalities have characterized the history of contemporary Chile, with cities and their places of memory being an expression and reflection of these inequalities that fester within our society.

Finally, it should be said that in these days of readings, lectures, talks, and meetings between writers and the public, spaces for encounter and conversation were established that commemorate traumatic historical events for the peoples of Argentina and Chile. While Argentina celebrates the 40th anniversary of the end of the dictatorship, Chile commemorates the 50th anniversary of its beginning. Two different milestones, but between which is woven a complex and painful thread that unites both cultures.