This book tells the story of Sur, Argentina's foremost literary and
cultural journal of the twentieth century. Victoria Ocampo (its founder
and lifelong editor) and Jorge Luis Borges (a regular and influential
contributor) feature prominently in the story, while the contributions
of other major writers (including Eduardo Mallea, William Faulkner,
André Breton, Virginia Woolf, Alfonso Reyes, Octavio Paz, Waldo Frank,
Aldous Huxley and Graham Greene) are discussed. Politically speaking,
Sur represented a certain brand of liberalism, a resistance to populism
and mass culture, and an attachment to elitist values which offended
against the more dominant phases of Argentine thought, from Peronism to
the varied forms of nationalism, socialism and Marxism. Dr King examines
the journal's roots, its development and its demise, relating it to
other journals circulating at the time, and highlighting vital issues
debated in its pages, such as Argentine attitudes towards fascism during
the Second World War.