Gilberto Owen, Chronicler of the Colombian House of Representatives in El Tiempo: a Subversive Style

Abstract

In this article, I propose to demonstrate at what point Gilberto Owen became a chronicler or reporter of the Colombian House of Representatives in early September 1933. To do so, first, I present the news that allow placing the author of “Perseus vanquished” as Oliverio Perry’s successor in the registration of parliamentary debates; then, I offer a textual analysis of the first Owenian chronicles from a rhetorical perspective, in order to demonstrate Owen’s authorship and the implications of this work in a polemic with Jorge Eliécer Gaitán in the first days of October; Finally, I trace a leitmotif that runs through the chronicles between September 7 and 17, in order to confirm the consistency of the style and the reiterated topics that the newcomer chronicler employs to give cohesion to a series of chronicles, in essence, unconnected.