I found the structure of this book to be similar to Azuela’s The Underdogs, following the same progressive story split by short chapters. Carpentier’s The Kingdom of This World, though, has titled chapters that I found excellently highlighted the topic of each part. Whether it was utilized for foreshadowing or emphasizing a relevant phrase, the titles of the sections helped me think further into the themes introduced into each part, as well as what themes I should be thinking about. Macandal, for instance, introduced as a character in the earlier parts of the book, deconstructs himself into a concept and overarching philosophy for the revolution. Starting in the section Metamorphoses, Macandal’s impact on the story diversifies, as his name is brought up in relation to revolutionary motivation, nature, animals, and other things relating to revolutionary Haiti. His name even returns at the end of the reading, described as serving the people, and tied shortly after to Ti Noel himself, who reflects that he too is just a body who suffers and hopes for himself and others.
Carpentier’s writing also discusses religion, both implicitly and explicitly. The recorded lecture mentions the maintenance of spirituality and religious meaning within African and Native dances, and the absence of the same in Western dances. I think this idea parallels what I was considering when reading into the significance of religion, especially in the chapter “Santiago de Cuba’. in this section, Carpentier compares the slave’s religion to the landowner’s religion through the eyes of Henri Christophe, a Westerner. He views the slave’s religion as snake-like and witch-like, with possibilities of supernatural or ‘magical’ elements, while he views his own as normal, yet proceeds to pray to extra-terrestrial deities in the same way other religions would.
This perspective through Henri Christophe’s eyes is only one deviation from the usual perspective of Ti Noel. I think that this switching of narrator, as well as the third person perspective, helps to remove some of the emotion from the text. Compared to a first person perspective, Ti Noel seems a little unperturbed by the situations he views or gets involved in, but this element allows for a more omnipotent description of the process of the Haitian revolution and Macandal’s impacts on the slaves’ ideology.
If written in the first person, how do you think the text would change?