Tag Archives: narration

10Apr / 2023

Fever Dream

This book is probably my personal favourite read of the course so far, as I feel like it’s the most narratively enjoyable one to date. The entire pace of the book, the going back and forth between Amanda trying to recall what happened and tell David, to Amanda experiencing all these weird events with Nina was so tastefully paced that the tension builds very nicely and the focus of the book is very taut. In some ways this sort of reminds me of Jordan Peele movies, where the feeling of dread is very palpable and you cling on to each moment in an effort to figure out this situation. This is probably one of the only books that I read as quickly as I did. There are a lot of notable elements to this novel, such as the book opening with Amanda trying to recall back, or ending with her husband trying to figure out more what happened. All these “set ups” to the novel contribute something more to the effect of the story and adds a lot of dimension and richness to the method of storytelling; I really have a lot of admiration for the way this story was crafted.

After watching the lecture video, I realized there was a lot of contextual background that needed to be known if you wanted to understand the story much more clearly. And I think this sort of answers the question in the lecture video; the lack of explanation around what is going on magnifies the feeling of mystery and anxiety because you DON’T know what is going on, and you sure as hell wanna figure it out because it’s making you anxious. I think that the mystery of the circumstance also builds to the more mystical elements of the book, such as the later concepts of soul-switching and animals randomly dying. Altogether, the story reads more like you’re experiencing a fever dream 😉

Another interesting thing I noticed is, I somehow understood without knowing it that the author was female. I think this might come from the depiction of Nina and Amanda’s relationship, or the familiarity of the socialization between females when looking at the interactions between Amanda and Carla, but I think even beyond that this book’s worldview was very much portrayed through a feminine lens for me somehow.

To finish off with a question to you all, Im curious how you guys felt about the soul switching part of the book. Do you believe in the idea of souls and why or why not? To extend, what do you think about the woman’s ability to switch souls?

Posted in Schewblin

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03Apr / 2023

Papi: from the eyes of a child

The book this week was quite a change a pace compared to the other reads in this course. The narration from the child’s perspective is quite a unique one compared to other books with a youthful and innocent narrator; there are a lot of nice stylistic touches that reminded me of my own childhood as well. In particular, the narrator created a list (I’m not quite sure what the point of it was) that detailed how the world is broken up into 3 places, or types of “spells” such as yawning and “attacks”. I don’t know where the childhood fixation on creating weird lists of things comes from, but I think the effect of the text was very strong. It certainly reminded me of all the goofy things I was up to as a child, and really brought me back to how you view life when you are younger. Perhaps that is a child’s own way to figure out and establish some control for the world around them, as if to say “I was here, and I experienced all of this, and I want you to know that I figured all this out”.

One thing I didn’t expect from this book was for the focus to not be solely on how parental roles influence the way our lives play out, or to outline the different ways different parents and their actions influence the way children grow up (basically, some form of trauma dump). Obviously the focus of the book is the relationship between these characters within this family, but the personal relationship (or emotional development, better put) between the narrator and Papi are quite distant at times, speaking from seeing a choppy focus of her emotional journey with these parental figures through all these tumultuous events. I think a better example/ piece of evidence would be how Mami is portrayed throughout this story, and how her significance to the narrator is not really conveyed, as if they way they live together isn’t moulding who she is as a person. They merely appear as “figures”. To some effect, the distance does highlight that gap between her and Papi, in that he is often not there when he says he will be or shows up when it wasn’t expected of him to. This probably reveals a message about distant fathers and the fascination and admiration that comes with such an enigmatic figure.  But I think another reason for this portrayal is to convey a broader message that isn’t limited to the theme of “family” or “parental figures”, as Jon said in the lecture video, maybe it is to convey other effects such as the portrayal of the macho cacique archetype, or some broader societal meaning.

To end with a question, how did you feel about the narrator’s childlike storytelling; did it remind you of anything, or was there anything especially notable to you about it? Why so?

Posted in Indiana

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13Mar / 2023

Captain Pantoja and the Secret Service

Reading the first few pages of this novel already made me nauseous; needless to comment on the rest of the book which was only more and more outrageous as it went along. From the descriptors of the maths that are required to run a brothel, to completely grotesque descriptors about Captain Pantoja’s hemorrhoids, or cult like activities of sacrificing humans. The content was abhorrent, although the writing itself was quite interesting.

One thing I do appreciate is the changing form of writing format, for a letter, to a mission report (?) to just a dated narration. The different formats that is utilized adds so much dimension to each characters perspectives and their jobs. With each format change, the language also changes drastically, which is not always achieved across authors, so it was quite impressive that the tone of the story shifts so much depending on what context you were hearing it from. I personally enjoyed the bits where you would jump back and forth between 2 situations; I could visualize it like a movie with its jump cuts and I thought the effect of that choice was very special.

Regardless, I find the way the book deals with the subject matter a bit alarming, since there is a certain sense of dehumanization when describing the prostitutes and women broadly, and I think that might raise some red flags about the way this book was intended as “comedy”. I know of many people, on justifiable grounds, who wound find this completely inappropriate, and I think that is why “black comedy” remains controversial. To some degree, I recognize that might be the point of this book, as I have read that the author had his work based on facts, but it is still appalling to see sex work described as going on “convoys” or taking about servicing 20 men a day as if it’s just a statistic. The only image I have from that is a woman tired out on a mattress, just used, waiting for it to start over again and again and again. Frankly, I can’t find anything comedic about that. The depiction of the circumstances of the prostitutes weren’t depicted all disingenuously though; even at the core of these stories, its made clear that poverty was the root cause of prostitution, and that only coupled with the abhorrent conditions they are forced to work in, whether in slave-driving brothels, or walking door to door with no semblance of security in their jobs. Thats why it wasn’t only a steady stream of money that allured the prostitutes to join the secret service, but also the respect that is given with the position. In this sense, the novel reminds us about these real events in history and provides a thought provoking depiction of it.

Lastly a question to all: what do you think the broader significance of the cult was, with the place it has within this story?

Until next time,

Kelly

Posted in Vargas Llosa

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06Mar / 2023

Part 2: One Hundred Years of Solitude

Jon was right, the ending of the book was such a shattering surprise. Now looking back at the entirety of the novel, magical realism is done here like no other, and I certainly cannot imagine any book written of a similar nature that can even live up to, much less overtake the writing of Garcia Marquez. In my opinion, this book is undisputed as a must read and deserves an immortal place in the literature canon. Another thing I have noticed now is how intentional his method and style of writing is. Having read his other works allowed me to realize that the narration and writing style of Garcia Marquez isn’t exactly fixed, and much of the magic encapsulated in “One Hundred Years of Solitude” is actually restricted, and thus intention to this novel solely. This is to say that its design choices were much more conscious than I would imagine. I think this book has a very solid place in being one of the best books I have read so far not just in this course but in life general, although I would hesitate to describe it as one of my personal favourites, just based on the contents and extravagancy of the book but would rather call it a must read. To some degree, reading the words on the page is almost like reading the title to news articles- you anticipate it and no doubt value its significance but you wouldn’t really say that you love reading the news.

To pick up on last post regarding characters, I have stated that the one that stood out to me the most is Ursula. I think her significance to me is almost the concentrated essence of female characters and the overarching role of women in the show. In some sense the role of women may be established in this book due to the repetitions in circumstance that characters find themselves in, thus maybe the role says less about the idea of women, as much as it is another symptom of repetition. But regardless, a new character has taken place over Ursula as the one that stood out to me most- Remedios the beauty. Because what even was that. I guess the fate of those named Remedios is broadly described as being “taken away” whether from mysterious illness, a mental hospital or the heavens themselves. But either way, I think her existence is an outlier.

As a hilarious side note, I have been describing the plot  spottily to my boyfriend, and he is vaguely aware of the general themes of this book. So to clarify the characters to him, I decidedly showed him the family tree, to which he responded with “I expected the family tree to be drawn in a circle”. I think that is a worthwhile note that the editors and translators of the book can take into account.

To finish, a question to you all: What do you all think about Remedios the beauty and everything that happened to her?

Posted in Garcia Marquez

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13Feb / 2023

Pedro Paramo: Life Among the Dead

Pedro Paramo has been my favourite read out of the entire course so far, unsurprisingly, as it did come with the recommendation that it may be “the best Mexican novel ever written?” by Jon himself.  This book has been filled with narration spanning from multiple different perspectives, each with a unique link to the village or Pedro Paramo himself. The way the story jumps perspectives and is told in a non-chronological order comes with a unique charm that honestly enhances the story itself in my eyes, as thankfully each instance the setting of time or character changed in each paragraph, it was easy enough to follow along. I think it was really effective in garnering my curiosity to figure out more about the Media Luna and Pedro Paramo himself.

Reflecting back on the lecture video, I can easily see how Gabriel Garcia Marquez found inspiration from this novel, as I personally liked this book more than his own creation Chronicles of a Death Foretold, which is the one I had read before. I think because it was told more simply and less flowery, that the stylistic choices that the author did use show through more clearly.

Within the book, the gap between life and death seemed completely unique, in people dead or alive, being able to hear or see the dead in some way or another, without the book making it completely certain if they themselves are dead or alive. Much of the book also reflects on the ideas of salvation, and the concept of sin and forgiveness, that push this constant tension between life and death forward. I think in some sense, Pedro Paramo and everything around him is tied to life, while Susana and the things that surround her ties to death. With her first husband dying, the shadow of death haunts her, and she is constantly tortured by visions and voices much like ghosts, then her father dies, then herself, then the entire village grows dead and deserted as Pedro takes his revenge. On Pedro’s side, much of everyone’s life is tied to him, with the Father constantly hearing about everyone’s confessions that tie back to his son, or others sorrowful dependency on him, or his capacity to take the lives of others away from them when he desires. In some sense, He took the life of Juan Preciado, the character that visits the village in the first place because of his mothers desire to “make him pay for the way he forgot us”, as the way he learns of Pedro’s life is the way his life is taken away by the voices. But these two things, life and death, are not polar opposites, but rather things that feed back into each other, and might be the same thing depending on how you look at it.

A question to all is, What are your thoughts on the Father? Did you like him or not and why? What kind of a character was he to you?

Posted in Rulfo

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