Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction: Glorifying the Needle and Thread
- 1 On Pins and Needles: Hypermodernity and Hyperclothing Ourselves
- 2 The Perfect Pattern: Dressmaking as a Political Tool in María Dueñas’s El Tiempo Entre Costuras
- 3 Lining with Surrealism: Spaces and Stitches in César Aira’s La Costurera Y El Viento
- 4 Unraveling Gender and Sexual Confinements in Pedro Lemebel’s Tengo Miedo Torero
- 5 An Honest Measuring Tape: Peripheral Places in Frances de Pontes Peebles’s The Seamstress
- 6 Tailoring Peace and Purpose: Sartorial Representations in Children’s Literature
- Conclusion: Final Notions: Toward Consumer Consciousness
- Works Cited
- Index
Introduction: Glorifying the Needle and Thread
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 February 2021
- Frontmatter
- Dedication
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- Introduction: Glorifying the Needle and Thread
- 1 On Pins and Needles: Hypermodernity and Hyperclothing Ourselves
- 2 The Perfect Pattern: Dressmaking as a Political Tool in María Dueñas’s El Tiempo Entre Costuras
- 3 Lining with Surrealism: Spaces and Stitches in César Aira’s La Costurera Y El Viento
- 4 Unraveling Gender and Sexual Confinements in Pedro Lemebel’s Tengo Miedo Torero
- 5 An Honest Measuring Tape: Peripheral Places in Frances de Pontes Peebles’s The Seamstress
- 6 Tailoring Peace and Purpose: Sartorial Representations in Children’s Literature
- Conclusion: Final Notions: Toward Consumer Consciousness
- Works Cited
- Index
Summary
[…] the gesture associated with the needle, seamstress, and sewing machine, it can be said to bring parts together with the purpose of constructing a new whole, a gesture that is aligned in opposition to fragmenting modernity […].
(Matich 242)[…] moreover, because of its imaginative evocation, literature conveys emotions and feelings about clothes that can highlight character and further the plot of a play or a novel; at times, […], fashion itself can be said to produce fiction.
(Ribeiro 1)Fashion is the “idea,” the non-real. With desires, dreams, and idealizations as its counterparts and companions, and as its main driving force – fashion is also fictive. Fashion, then, is a species of fiction.
(Wallenberg xv)In the face of a sartorial nightmare involving a cloth mishap, a meticulous tailor opts to design new uniforms for a general out of lively fabric featuring colorful fish and parrots, and the result is unprecedented: bilateral peace between neighboring rivals. In Rocío Martínez's Spanish children's book, El de-sastre perfecto (2010) [The Perfect Tailor/Disaster], a savvy sartorial protagonist exemplifies the empowered depictions of textile arts – whether needlework, tailoring or fashion design – that abound in contemporary Latin American and Spanish cultural representations of professions involving these artforms. I argue that while the seamstress as a relatable protagonist fell out of fashion after the nineteenth century, in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries representations of seamstresses re-emerge with a changed image. As a result, contemporary writers challenge the gendered limitations that were especially important in nation-building, and instead offer protagonists who break through the negative connotations involving sewing and morality. Although preoccupations regarding the delineations of private and public spheres often remain, recent sartorial figures deconstruct regional and national borders in addition to blurring gender and sexual borders. By questioning physical, geographical boundaries, the protagonists reflect the interconnected state of garment and textile industries in the global economy.
This rise of interest in the needle and thread is quite surprising: more than ever before, global culture has distanced itself from the sources of clothing and the agents behind the creation of garments. Once lauded expertise has been demoted to unskilled and exploited factory labor, resulting in decreased prices and quality and increased consumption and waste. Yet, literature and popularculture media platforms such as television, films, blogs and other forms of social media tell a different story.
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- Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2021