La preocupación por el arraigo territorial caracteriza innegablemente la escritura del jesuita Juan Pablo Viscardo, el precursor de las independencias hispanoamericanas. Este ejercicio muy personal de búsqueda de sentido a partir del pasado se sitúa en la intersección de la Historia colectiva de su región, el Perú, y de la historia de vida individual. Desde el exilio que lo conduce a Italia y a Inglaterra, la deuda del jesuita con su territorio natal es total. Describe detenidamente la tierra y el agua que marcaron su infancia, dos elementos que forman parte integrante del decorado de cada día del niño criollo que vaga y vagabundea por el sur peruano. El jesuita es sensible a la calidad de su entorno, su aspecto estético, y la prodigalidad y la comodidad que aporta a sus habitantes. Viscardo, que sufre desde el exilio de la « presencia-ausencia » del territorio que nunca verá de nuevo, reanima una geografía que hay que liberar del yugo español.
The concern of the territorial implanting characterizes the writing of the Jesuit Juan Pablo Viscardo, the precursor of the Spanish-American independences. This very personal exercise of research for sense from past is situated in the intersection of the collective History of its region, Peru, and of the history of individual life. Since the exile which leads him in Italy and in England, the debt of the Jesuit towards its native territory is constant. He would moreover be more exact to say about the earth and about the water which marked his childhood, so much these two elements are an integral part of the set of every day of the Creole little boy dreaming, roaming and wandering in the Peruvian South. The Jesuit is sensitive to the quality of his environment: his esthetic aspect, the prodigality and the comfort which he brings to his inhabitants. Viscardo, which suffers during the exile of what it will not see again, refreshes a geography whom he wants to free from the spanish yoke.