Maria del Pinar Blanco, DBC Pierre’s Blood Meridian: Cosmopolitan Returns and the Imagination of History. Symbiosis, 11.1 (April 2007)

This essay was originally published in Symbiosis: A Journal of Anglo-American Literary Relations, Volume 11.1 (April 2007) pp. 59-74

Essay Topics and Keywords:

DBC Pierre, The Last Aztec, Montezuma, Henry James, The American Scene

An extract from this essay:

"In my correspondence with DBC Pierre, I asked him what his thoughts were on the related terminologies of cosmopolitanism and a ‘cultural homelessness,’ to which he replied: ‘Cosmopolitanism is a nice word—perhaps that’s it. If so, it is a state reached through a condition of homelessness, followed by searching and incomplete assimilation, followed by what the heck, pónganme un taco (give me a taco).’ And thus the return never becomes a journey to a heart of darkness, but an active conversation with past events and living presents as a way of looking back and moving forward within and without identity."

Maria del Pinar Blanco

Affiliation: New York University