Iphigenia (University of Texas Press)

"...I didn't want to tell you the truth for anything in the world, because it seemed very humiliating to me..." The truth is that Iphigenia is bored and, more than bored, buried alive in her grandmother's house in Caracas, Venezuela. After the excitement of being a beautiful, un-chaperoned young woman in Paris, her father's death has sent her back to a forgotten homeland, where rigid decorum governs.Two men - the married man she adores and the wealthy fiance she abhors - offer her escape from her prison. Which of these impossible suitors will she choose? "Iphigenia" was first published in 1924 in Venezuela, where it hit patriarchal society like a bomb. Teresa de la Parra was accused of undermining the morals of young women with this tale of a passionate woman who lacks the money to establish herself in the liberated, bohemian society she craves. Yet readers have kept the novel alive for decades, and this first English translation now introduces its heroine to a wider audience. Teresa de la Parra was also the author of "Las memorias de Mama Blanca" ("Mama Blanca's Souvenirs"). Translator Bertie Acker is a professor emerita of Spanish at the University of Texas at Arlington.