De dioses y hombres: La negación de la cultura precolombina de México en “Coatlicue” de Elena Poniatowska y “Chac Mool” de Carlos Fuentes

Sammanfattning: The following study compares Carlos Fuentes’ “Chac Mool” (1954) with Elena Poniatowska’s “Coatlicue” (2003). Both literary works are short stories that belong to a literary genre known as the Fantastic, which is, in turn, a genre in which a reader will be met with a credible setting, not too different from their own, but in which various supernatural elements manifest themselves and disturb the stability and perception of the reader’s and/or the character’s reality. Furthermore, this study aims to show how both authors use this genre to allow the gods, which are main character’s in both short stories, to represent the undeniable presence of Mexico’s Mesoamerican culture, and how the human characters represent the negation and discomfort felt by members of Mexican society when confronted by their past and the past of their country. The conflicts that arise between both counterparts continues being of vast importance as they uncover matters that are still relevant in present-day society. A conclusion to this study shows how both Fuentes and Poniatowska include Fantastic elements and phenomena as catalyzers that pave the way for the transmission of the aforementioned themes and messages in both of their short stories.