Reading I, Rigoberta Menchú was an experience. There’s a lot I want to talk about in regards to the first half of this novel, from the way community is organized, to daily life, to relationships to work, family, and others, and of course the ways in which social hierarchies intersect all of these.
I was shocked by the simultaneous tenderness and anger with which Rigoberta describes her early life. I’m not sure if that is a mischaracterization of her feelings or not. There was a palpable frustration in many parts, especially when she talks about working on the finca and interactions she had with those in positions of power. However, there was also a deep recognition that what she was doing, what her parents were doing, was in service of something larger. Responsibility is something she talks about a lot- and I think this feeling of being responsible to other people is captured nicely when she describes how she felt after her work began to contribute to her family’s income: “I remember very well never wasting a single moment, mainly out of love for my parents so that they could save a little of their money […]” (pg. 40) Of course, this feeling of responsibility translates across the rest of her life as well. When she describes the role of the community, there is a deep sense of shared responsibility, of communal connectedness, towards each other. This exists from even before you are born.
The weight of this responsibility is also felt in death. Rigoberta explains that death was not uncommon- especially in the case of children dying from malnutrition. The loss of community (or, the absence of it) during her youngest brother, Nicolás’s, death is felt strongly as well. Any death is heartbreaking, but I really felt bad when Rigoberta explains that they couldn’t even communicate with others except sometimes through signs and gestures. What an isolating experience, coupled with what I’m sure is immense grief. This only became worse when the caporal of the finca says that they will have to pay to bury Nicolás’ body (and to keep him buried there). The entire finca system seemed incredibly unjust but this was truly an act of cruelty. This part also illuminated the dehumanization that Indigenous people underwent simply in order to survive, as well as showed some very serious tensions and intersections between class and ethnicity. The workers are treated with (less than) no respect, yet the entire system is reliant on them coming and selling their lives for months at a time, often with their children in tow, and a great personal cost. The contrast between life in Rigoberta’s village and the strong communal ties and the isolating, violent experience at the finca (and in the city of Antigua, actually) was unsettling.
Personally, I don’t see it. It’s probably just me, I’m having a hard time reading into this and seeing any emotion from the text because so much of it is just recounting events for me that I feel the author is almost disconnected from it all aside from moments like when her brother died and she confronts the reality of what would happen to her in the future.
Interesting!
I do feel as though she is detached in some parts as well actually. Maybe I am reading into it too much in other parts. I wonder if this is an effect of reading a translation, or if it’s the way the story was edited.
The heart wrenching and isolating account of her younger brothers death and the frustrating language barriers, and of course the devil incarnates: the finca officers, that extended their grief and a proper burial for her brother. The placing together of Indigenous communities who could not communicate to mitigate any rumblings of resistance, is a dehumanizing subliminal tactic which further ensures the normalization of these types of endeavours and tries to subordinate the conscious of the Indigenous to that of animals.