Las brujas re-existen. "Las cosas que perdimos en el fuego" de Mariana Enríquez

Based on the seminal works of Carlo Ginzburg (1989) and Silvia Federici (2004), this study analyzes Mariana Enríquez’s tale “Las cosas que perdimos en el fuego” (eponymous volume 2016) with the aim of analyzing the resemanticization of the figure of the witch, in relation to the broad symbolism of fire and the social epidemics of anti-normative practices that highlight and dismantle the violence present in social forms, structures and discourses, mainly due to an implicit radicalization of the myth of beauty (Wolf [1990] 2022, Gancitano 2022). Starting from the dystopian aspect of the story, which places Enríquez's story within the so-called “counter- narrative of resistance” (Baccolini and Moylan 2003), we will see how the construction of the ‘new witches’ is based on a reaffirmation of the “body-territory” as the main place and vehicle of defense, resistance and “re- existence” (Hurtado and Walter Porto-Gonçalves 2022), not exempt, however, from chiaroscuros and problematizations; at the same time, we will reflect on how this renewed agency that vindicates an eternally monstrous corporeality dialogues with the semiotic construction of fear (Lotman 1998) and invites a necessary reflection on the delicate and eternal problem of form.