Sex, the Body, and Human Subjectivity in Luis Gotyisolo's Erotic Novel "Escalera Hacia el Cielo"

Best known for his tetralogy Antagonía , Luis Goytisolo began his literary career under the Franco dictatorship and soon developed a reputation as an intellectual's writer. His intricate and sinewy prose challenged readers to follow his narrators down labyrinthine paths of extended metaphors, embedded clauses and erudite references. Interestingly enough, the novels of Goytisolo published in the last decade lack the narrative complexity and structural experimentalism characteristic of his earlier works. These 90s novels include: Estatua con palomas (1992), Mzungo (1996), Placer licuante (1997), and Escalera hacia el cielo (1999). Some might feel that his change to a more traditional narrative style indicates a compromise of his intellectual project and wonder if he has succumbed to the pressures created by the commercialization of Spanish fiction.