1. With the emergence in recent decades of performance art and theory, the actual performance texts produced by international avant-garde groups have received more attention than previously. See, for example, RoseLee Goldberg, Performance Art: From Futurism to the Present; Michael Kirby and Victoria Nets Kirby, Futurist Performance; and Mel Gordon (ed.), Dada Performance .

2. For additional descriptions of the Grupo Orkopata's activities, see chapter three of my doctoral dissertation, "The Avant-Garde in Peru: Literary Aesthetics and Cultural Nationalism," and David Wise, "Vanguardismo a 3800 metrot: El cato del Boletín Titikaka ."

3. For a more detailed account of futurism's impact in Spanish America, see Osorio's El futurismo y la vanguardia literaria en América Latina (the work does not include Brazil). See also Klaus Müller-Bergh's "El hombre y la técnica: Contribución al conocimiento de corrientes vanguardistas hispanoamericanas," in which the author affirms that futurism was perhaps the "principal catalyst" of Latin American vanguardism (286).

4. These citations are drawn (in order) from the second euforista manifcsto (LHA 231); the postumismo manifesto ( MPP 111); the "For creative spirits" manifesto of A Revista (GMT 338); the manifesto-statement of Rascacielos in the Trampolín series (n.p.); the third estridentismo manifesto ( MPP 159); the "Gesto" manifesto of noísmo (LHA 243); the first manifesto of estridentismo, Actual No. 1 ( MPP 106); the second estridentismo manifesto ( MPP 125); and the atalayismo manifesto (LHA 247).

5. Poggioli notes the frequency of hyperbolic imagery in international vanguardist discourse (72).

6. See, for example, Actual No. 1, the first estridentismo manifesto ( MPP 101-8); Roberto Mariani's " Martín Fiefro y yo" ( MPP 136-38); the Cuban "Declaración del Grupo Minorista" ( MPP 248-50); "Nuestro programa" from the Chilean little magazinc Nguillatún ( MPP 149-51); the manifesto appearing in the first issue of São Paulo's Klaxon (GMT 294-96); and the Verde manifesto from Cataguazes, Minas Gerais (GMT 349-52).

7. In keeping with the practice of Brazilian literary critics, I frequently refer to Mário de Andrade and Oswald de Andradc by their first names.

8. Subtitled both a retablo and a relación, this novel combines the clipped, synthetic narration typical of some vanguardist fiction with elements from theater, song, popular refrains, radio announcements, and illustrative woodcuts by Ramón Alva de la Canal.

9. See, for example, Icaza's theatrical piece Trayectoria, in which Magnavox 1926 is listed under works by the author as theater and is subtitled "farsa."

11. Such cataclysmic imagery is common in Artaud's essays on theater (collected in The Theater and Its Double ) and, more significantly, in his performative work "The Conquest of Mexico" (appearing in the same volume), a piece closely tied to Artaud's search in Mexico's indigenous cultures (the Tarahumara) for the type of metaphysical engagement he imagined for the theater.

12. The Chinfonía burguesa presents a singular challenge to the translator. Much of its verse is simply untranslatable; while some of the sense can be communicated, the verbal play, rhythm, and rhyme schemes cannot. For this reason, I present approximate literal translations of the shorter citations incorporated into my own text, but I do not translate the longer passages of the work's verse.

13. I have translated the stage directions in this section to provide a sense of the piece's interweaving of voices, but translating the dialogue itself would result in a loss of the passage's alliterative and onomatopoetic impact.

14. Similar terminology appeared in writings on theater by Latin American writers associated with the vanguards. Miguel Angel Asturias, for example, employs the term "teatro de digestión" in "Las posibilidades de un teatro americano" ( Paris 1924-1933 479).

15. For Carpentier's comments on contemporary European theater, see the collections Crónicas I—Arte, literatura y política ( OC 8), in particular, the section "Cine y Teatro," and Crónicas 2, in particular, "Jean Cocteau y la estética del ambiente" ( OC 9: 17-26) and "Medgycs, escenógrafo moderno" ( OC 9: 234-38).

16. In his landmark study Alejo Carpentier: The Pilgrim at Home, Roberto González Echevarría also examines this play in the context of the author's other early writings, in particular, ¡Écue-Yamba-Ó! (86-88).

17. Carpentier addressed the issue of modern filmmakers' portrayal of Latin American cultures in the short critical piece "México, según una película europea," published in September 1931 in Carteles . Expressing his concern about stereotypical representations, he noted, "If to film ourselves we count on foreigners, we can be sure of always being betrayed and deformed" ( OC 8: 389).

18. See Schechner's Performance Theory (especially 10-16) for a discussion of the ways in which performances generate the creation of a physical space separate from ordinary life.