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Article published In:
Transnational Image Building: Linking up Translation Studies, Reception Studies and Imagology
Edited by Paola Gentile, Fruzsina Kovács and Marike van der Watt
[Translation Spaces 10:1] 2021
► pp. 5–25

National images and their reception through football literature

La pena máxima by Santiago Roncagliolo

ORCID logo | KU Leuven

As demonstrated extensively by translation studies, national images and their reception undergo significant changes in the transfer process to another culture. From this perspective, La pena máxima by Roncagliolo is an interesting case: not only is the plot tied in with the theme of football, which is widely believed to embody national identity, but it has also been commented on in different target cultures. The reception study displays how the images of Argentina and Peru, which the novel deconstructs by using the 1978 World Cup as a pretext to expose the atrocities perpetrated by their respective totalitarian regimes, are perceived in the Hispanic context and in the French and Dutch literary systems into which they have been translated. While the Argentinian and the French reviews skate over the gruesome reality, the Peruvian, the Spanish and the Dutch ones assume the negative images by emphasizing their socio-political relevance.

Keywords: reception studies, imagology, football literature, national image, Santiago Roncagliolo, La pena máxima
Article outline
  • Introduction
  • Football literature and national image building in Latin America
    • The intellectualization of football
    • The imagological relevance of football
  • La pena máxima: National images deconstructed
  • Reception of the Argentinian and Peruvian national images
    • Quantitative aspects
      • Number of reviews
      • Distribution of reception values
    • Qualitative aspects
      • The hispanic reception divided
      • The French reception: Suspense and exoticism
      • The Dutch reception: Fighting the totalitarian menace
  • Conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 1 June 2021
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ts.20007.sna
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