Cumanda: nationalism and false reconciliation

I admire Mera's attempt to use literature as a way of reconciling two cultures made hostile by the Conquest. Any sincere attempt to understand the other is to me commendable. However, there are (perhaps epistemological) limitations to such attempts and recognizing them is perhaps the surest sign of respect of the other's singularity. The reconciliation enacted in Cumanda--expressed most clearly in the scene where Padre Domingo and Tongana/Tubon forgive each other--fails for two reasons: 1) it does not respect the singularity of the other, and 2) its sincerity is compromised by nationalism. The discourse with which Mera chooses to represent otherness is that of noble savagery, a fantasy created by a French philosophe (Rousseau) disabused by the 'civilized' pursuits of aristocratic salons. The reactionary or dark side of Rousseau's ideas, and a romantic movement characterized by anti-enlightenment irrationality to which they contributed, has been underlined by many scholars, most notably Habermas. The only way Mera is able to bridge the gap between americano and criollo is by representing the former within the morally suspect European ideology of romanticism and an archetype that is more a reflection of a bored Frenchman's imagination than it is of American reality as it really is. Secondly, Mera's attempt to project a literary reconciliation of the two cultures seems compromised by his nationalist politics. Is he really interested in understanding his indigenous countrymen (the condition sine qua non of any reconciliation, literary or otherwise) or is Cumanda more a contribution to the project of pacifying a Nacion imposed by criollos and created to serve their interests?