Biofiction, literary public memory and bad conscience: Teresa de Jesús and Cristina Morales

Abstract

This article focuses on the so-called authorial biofiction to analyse its mnemonic dimension in the contemporary context of the idea of posterity and its implication in the postautonomous logic of the current literary field. The starting point for this is the consideration of Cristina Morales's approach to Teresa of Jesus through the three editions of the novel initially entitled Malaspalabras (2015) and then Introducción a Teresa de Jesús (2020) and Últimas tardes con Teresa de Jesús (2020). Ultimately, it raises the characteristics of an authorial figure who constructs herself from a creative exercise of bad conscience, in which the complex relationship with a canonical author turns to be decisive.