Irrelevant to Gretchen's query but I have to say it: the greatest novel
about quitting smoking is undoubtedly *La coscienza di Zeno* by Italo Sveno
(1923).  "Ultima sigaretta" is proverbial in Italy.  Sorry.  Lowell Edmunds


On Tue, Oct 27, 2009 at 6:42 PM, Gretchen Pierce <[log in to unmask]>wrote:

> Hello Everyone,
>
> This a third-hand question that was on the Latin American History
> listserv.  I'm hoping someone here might have some good answers.
>
> Thanks,
> Gretchen
>
> Hi,
>
> I'm a Victorianist English graduate student  and I am very interested in
> Latin America and the Caribbean during the 19th century in addition to
> Europe.  I'm working on a project and I'm hoping that someone on the list
> could help me locate some texts.  Any help would be wonderful.
>
> Last semester, I did some work with 19th century European novels that have
> a racially ambiguous, prominent female who smokes or handles tobacco (or
> both).  I'm interested in the ways in which race (and perhaps especially
> ambiguous race) is somehow linked to tobacco, and also the way race and
> tobacco are linked to the commodification of these women. (In addition,
> these women are usually "transgressive" women who often die at the end of
> the novel).
>
> Now, I'm trying to do a similar study, but of representations of smoking
> women in *Latin America*  and/or the Caribbean.   I've been gearing my
> search towards Cuba, but really any nation of origin would work.  I'm not
> having much luck.
>
> Any suggestions for texts to look at would be greatly appreciated. I'm
> looking for any of the following:
>
> - Latin American novels (from Cuba or somewhere else) from the 19th century
> with a significant female character who smokes or handles tobacco.
> -a 19th century Latin American artist (or several) who portrays women and
> tobacco,
> - cigar/tobacco art with women
> -any thing else you could suggest.
> -if you could suggest any novels with women who are deeply associated with
> rum or some other means of smoking (marijuana, opium), that might work, too.
>  I'm looking in particular for tobacco but any references to women who are
> deeply associated with another "masculine" commodity might work.
>
> Because my study has thus far dealt with racially ambiguous women, I'm
> particularly interested in finding representations of mulata or mestiza
> women, but I'll take anything you can think of.
>
> Anything help/direction you could provide would be *greatly* appreciated.
>
> Thanks so much for your time.
>
> Best,
> Jackie
>
>