Beyond stereotypes: the image of basque immigrants in Robert Laxalt's "The Basque Hotel" and Martin Etchart's" The Last Shepherd"

Abstract

Early attempts to bring the Basque-American experience to literature were not rewarded until the success of Robert Laxalt, whose recognition helped to organize the public display of the Basque identity and culture in the United States. Indeed, the impact of his Sweet Promised Land in 1957 put an end to the invisibility of the Basques in America and became a vital piece in the visibility of the Basque immigrant sheepherders. This new attention was also extended to the American literary field where, a few years later, authors such as Martin Etchart would take Laxalt’s legacy. In such context, this paper is focused on the analysis of the representation of Basque immigrants in Robert Laxalt’s The Basque Hotel (1989) and Martin Etchart’s The Last Shepherd (2012). The essay firstly introduces the historical background of the Basques in the American West in order to provide an overview of the Basque Diaspora, as well as this minority community’s role in western American literature. Afterwards, Basque immigrants in both novels are analyzed from the point of view of cultural studies, focusing on two main critical categories in both books: ethnicity, with an emphasis on the struggles of a generation marked by the difficulties of assimilation and the dilemma of a self-identity; and class, revealing the obstacles that the Basque newcomers encountered when trying to rise in social status in order to achieve their “American Dream.” It is argued that Laxalt’s and Etchart’s works can be seen as narratives of conflicting identities in which their main characters display a sense of dual identification both with the Basque Country and with the American West.