Circles of Madness: Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo/Circulos de locura: Madres de la Plaza de Mayo.

• Author: Mujica, Barbara

It is impossible to dwell dry-eyed on the poems and photographs of this remarkable book. Chilean author Marjorie Agosin pierces our consciousness with the anguish of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, women who lost their children during the violence that seized Argentina from 1976 to 1983. Her images tumble from the page in profusion, bombarding us, enraging us, and, finally, consoling us, for from the Mothers' struggle against oppression springs a new sense of solidarity and hope. The translations by Celeste Kostopulos-Cooperman render exquisitely the richness of Agosin's verse. The photographs that accompany these poems are immensely powerful. D'Amico and Sanguinetti capture not only the pain of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, but also their courage and determination. These are women who will not be intimidated, who demand an accounting.

On March 24, 1976 General Jorge Rafael Videla seized power in Argentina. The military junta dissolved the legislature and imposed martial law, initiating a reign of terror that was to last for years. In 1977 the Argentine Commission for Human Rights attributed to the government some 2300 murders, 10,000 arrests and from 20,000 to 30,000 disappearances. The violence subsided under the leadership of General Leopoldo Galtieri, who came to power in 1981. In 1983 democracy was restored when Raul Alfonsin attained the presidency in the first free election in a decade. The words and images of Circles of Madness are a tribute to the "disappeared" - the men and women, mostly young, who were detained, tortured and murdered in secret - and, especially, to the mothers and grandmothers who marched day after day in the Plaza de Mayo in Buenos Aires, demanding that their loved-ones be returned or accounted for.

The military regime tried to discredit the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo by calling them madwomen. In his Afterword, written just after Galtieri's rise to power, Julio Cortazar credits the Mothers with Videla's downfall and reminds us that some of the greatest visionaries in the history of the world have been called mad. " . . . Let's continue our folly:" he writes, "there is no other way to put an end to that reason that vociferates its slogans of order, discipline, and patriotism."

Circles of Madness bears witness to the suffering, courage and camaraderie of these women, who were instrumental in inducing national and international pressure against the military regime and finally bringing it...