Desarrollo este estudio en dos partes. En la primera, estudio las formas del género ensayístico (actitud recesiva e intrusa) determinantes de los contenidos y enunciación del discurso cronístico de Joaquín Edwards Bello. El corpus de análisis son las 3006 páginas de los cuatro volúmenes de crónicas de Edwards Bello, seleccionadas y recopiladas por Roberto Merino. Enseguida, basándome en estudios sobre el patrimonialismo y el casuismo (R. Morse, O. Paz, M. Góngora, Cl. Véliz, C. Stoetzer, etc.), demuestro la vigencia de estas dos instituciones sociales, políticas e ideológicas coloniales en el mundo y sociabilidad chilenas de la primera mitad del siglo XX, tal como las critica Edwards Bello. Consulto bibliografía crítica de Gabriela Mistral, Héctor Soto, Leonidas Morales y Marina Alvarado. En la segunda parte, demuestro que la crítica de Edwards Bello al patrimonialismo y el casuismo vigente en la sociabilidad chilena del XX, se sirve de recursos oníricos, fantasiosos (el fantasma psicoanalítico) y deconstructivos (proxemia, heterología). Con ellos, Edwards Bello no confunde la pluralidad de sentidos de sus crónicas con verdades hipostasiadas. Enseguida, su crítica de “fantasmas” sigue un derrotero antitético. Valparaíso y sus ciudadanos, ciudad en transformación constante en su modernidad astral, se opone a un Santiago conventual, con súbditos coloniales (“la santiaguinería”), que es mausoleo de esqueletos triásicos enclavado en un paisaje cordillerano de espanto. Esta antítesis (“base de mi literatura” —declara) entre ciudades y ciudadanos/ súbditos da vida plural a su crítica ensayístico-cronista. ABSTRACT: This paper is divided in two parts. In part one, the chronicle discourse of Joaquin Edwards Bello is studied under the scope of recessive and intrusive intersubjective attitudes, proper of the essay genre form. I consider that these two intersubjective attitudes determine the contents and enunciation of his chronicle discourse. The corpus analyzed are the 3006 pages comprising the four volumes of Edwards Bello's chronicles, selected and compiled by Roberto Merino. Critical bibliographies of Gabriela Mistral, Hector Soto, Leonidas Morales and Marina Alvarado on Edwards Bello’s literature have been consulted for this. Presently, based on research on patrimonialism and casuistry (R. Morse, O Paz, M. Góngora, Cl. Véliz, C. Stoetzer, etc.), the prevalence of these two political, social and ideological colonial institutions in the Chilean reality and social discourse in the first half of the twentieth century, as criticized by Edwards Bello, is demonstrated. The second part proves that Edwards Bello's criticism of the patrimonialism and casuistry that prevailed in the Chilean social discourse of the first half twentieth century uses dream-like, fantastical (the psychoanalytic fantasme —as understood by Lacanian literature) and deconstructive (proxemics, heterology) resources. Thanks to them, Edwards Bello does not confuse the plurality of meanings in his chronicles with hypostatic truths. Next, his criticism based on these fantasmatic approaches follows an antithetical course. Valparaiso and its citizens, a city in constant transformation because of its astral modernity, oppose a conventual Santiago with colonial subjects (the "santiaguinería"), both of them buried in a mountain range landscape of horror, which is a mausoleum of Triassic skeletons. These antitheses ("the basis of my literature", as he declares) between a modern Valparaiso/a colonial Santiago and their respective citizens/subjects render varied life to his essayist-chronicalist plural criticism.