Derivative Lives: Biofiction, Uncertainty, and Speculative Risk in Contemporary Spanish Narrative

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The title of this book, Derivative Lives, alludes to the challenge of finding ones way within the contemporary market of virtually limitless information and claims to veracity. Amid this profusion of options, it is easy to feel lost in spaces of uncertainty where biographical truth teeters between the real and the imaginative. The title thus also points to the prolific market of biographical novels that openly and intentionally play in the speculative space between the real and the fictional. Drawing on theories of risk and uncertainty, Derivative Lives considers the surge in biofiction in Spain and globally, relating literary expression to concepts such as circumstantiality, derivatives, speculation, and game studies.

Reviews

A brilliant analysis of the Spanish biofictional novel within the wider context of contemporary thought. Virginia Rademacher examines research from both within and beyond the field of literary criticism to show how biofiction as a genre challenges the notion of history as an abstraction or an irretrievable reality by depicting how real people deal with specific historical situations. Rademacher's command of modern history, intellectual currents, and the Spanish bio-novel is indeed impressive. * Brbara Mujica, author of Frida, Sister Teresa, I Am Venus and Miss del Ro *
With case studies drawn from some of contemporary Spains most exciting writers, this is an original and compellingly theorized exploration of how biofiction works to understand, vex, exploit, or otherwise experiment with questions of uncertainty, identity, and risk in the supermodern present. Rademacher engages playfully and productively with disciplinary discourses emerging from fields such as law, finance and economicswhich similarly contend with competing claims to truth and valueand dives deep into the circumstantial and speculative games that authors play when they write fiction about reality. * Samuel Amago, Professor of Spanish, University of Virginia, USA *
Considering the rich field of Spanish biofiction in relation to concepts of uncertainty, speculation, and risk in a post-truth age, Rademachers Derivative Lives establishes an exciting interdisciplinary nexus. In the course of this study, Rademacher expands the scope and ambition of biofiction studies. * Bethany Layne, Senior Lecturer in English Literature, De Montfort University, UK *
Derivative Lives nos ofrece una profunda, amena, necesaria y muy interesante indagacin de las borrosas fronteras entre lo real y lo ficticio, en un mundo cada vez ms impreciso en donde ni siquiera la propia identidad resulta fiable. Derivative Lives offers us a deep, entertaining, necessary, and very interesting investigation of the blurred borders between reality and fiction, in an increasingly imprecise world where even ones own identity is not reliable. * Rosa Montero, writer, author of El peligro de estar cuerda (2022) *

Author Bio

Virginia Newhall Rademacher is Professor of Hispanic Literature and Cultural Studies at Babson College, USA. She has published widely on genre, identity, and new narrative formats, including the contemporary surge in biofiction. Among others, her publications have appeared in a/b:Auto/Biography Studies, American Book Review, Persona Studies, Economistas, Hispanic Issues, Journal of Spanish Cultural Studies, Ciberletras, and Monographic Review.