Biography, history and writing on Amparo Dávila

Abstract

This text is a journey through crucial passages in the life of Amparo Dávila, which show how the craft of a writer that was born in central Mexico and travels to the capital of the country where she consummates her emancipation and consolidates her creative space is forged. Here are traced features of a work, and the circumstances that allowed the flourishing of its author and the field of the prevailing intellectual hierarchies; she coincided and was part of the Half-Century Generation, and Alfonso Reyes was her intellectual guide and protector in our Republic of letters. We establish the writer, who was from Zacatecas, in socio-cultural moments in Mexico, and we explore the assessment of her work by figures such as Julio Cortázar. Even though her work was classified as “fantastic” (ungraspable, supernatural), here it is observed how, from different approaches, the assessment of Dávila’s work delves into social contradictions and inner enigmas of the human condition that transcends fashions and classifications. Moreover, it is evident how the personal biography of a writer affects the formation, promotion, and fullness of their writing project, although this implies a complex process of interaction of creators, institutions, social imaginaries and reception of readers.