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In Linea Nigra: An Essay on Pregnancy and Earthquakes (transl. Christina MacSweeney, 2022), Jazmina Barrera describes the recent surge of literary texts on motherhood as “a rupture, counter-canon books” that experiment with form. These texts tend to be fragmented and hybrid; they reflect, in many ways, the disorienting experience of becoming a mother. This growing counter-canon includes Isabel Zapata’s In Vitro: On Longing and Transformation (transl. Robin Myers, 2023). Zapata, like Barrera, seeks to destigmatize discussion of the female body by describing, in intimate detail, the physical and emotional transformations that accompany pregnancy and childbirth. While the literary techniques employed in these and other texts are not new, they treat similar themes. The growing number of books that experiment with structure while elevating narratives of maternity raises the possibility of a genre of motherhood literature. This chapter uses Linea Nigra and In Vitro as case studies in order to explore motherhood literature as a genre that is made cohesive not just by its subject matter but by certain stylistic characteristics.

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Jazmina Barrera, Isabel Zapata, and the “Counter-Canon” of Motherhood Literature

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  • 发表日期：

    2025年

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  • Victoria Livingstone

摘要

In Linea Nigra: An Essay on Pregnancy and Earthquakes (transl. Christina MacSweeney, 2022), Jazmina Barrera describes the recent surge of literary texts on motherhood as “a rupture, counter-canon books” that experiment with form. These texts tend to be fragmented and hybrid; they reflect, in many ways, the disorienting experience of becoming a mother. This growing counter-canon includes Isabel Zapata’s In Vitro: On Longing and Transformation (transl. Robin Myers, 2023). Zapata, like Barrera, seeks to destigmatize discussion of the female body by describing, in intimate detail, the physical and emotional transformations that accompany pregnancy and childbirth. While the literary techniques employed in these and other texts are not new, they treat similar themes. The growing number of books that experiment with structure while elevating narratives of maternity raises the possibility of a genre of motherhood literature. This chapter uses Linea Nigra and In Vitro as case studies in order to explore motherhood literature as a genre that is made cohesive not just by its subject matter but by certain stylistic characteristics.