Imaginaries of Capitalist Destruction in <em>Tikal Futura. Memorias para un futuro incierto (novelita futurista)</em>, by Franz Galich

Abstract

This article analyzes the novel Tikal Futura. Memorias para un futuro incierto (novelita futurista) (2011), by the Guatemalan author Franz Galich (1951-2007). From an interdisciplinary approach and a Marxist critique of political economy, using Marx´s concept of “metabolic rift,” I argue that Galich's dystopia can be read as a symbolic and critical response to capitalist rationality that conceives of nature as an unlimited source of exchange values. The novel questions neoliberal rationality in which human and non-human nature are seen from the logic of costs and benefits mediating our relationship with the world through the commodity form. Finally, I argue that the novel allows us to read the current environmental crisis through the concept of Capitalocene.