Author Archives: laura halcrow

I, Rigoberta Menchu

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The reading for this week, I, Rigoberta Menchu, was not difficult in the sense that it confused me, but difficult in the sense that I found it extremely hard to get through, as the reading was filled with discrimination, injustice, and inequality that was faced by Rigoberta Menchu and her family. It is a tough thing to stomach thinking about the fact that this was the reality for not only the person we are reading about, but countless others who are not able to express their story in the same way.

However difficult it was to absorb the material covered in this testimonio, it is undeniably important to read works like this one, especially while we are going through school. I think sometimes we can get away from realizing the privilege many of us experience in our day to day lives. I know I can especially, as I have been fortunate enough to face minimal discrimination in my life, if any at all. Growing up, I was lucky to be able to embrace my childhood to the fullest, and even now as an adult I still have many luxuries that enable me to embrace the playful side of life whenever I wish. As discussed in the reading, the beautiful thing of childhood was not experienced by Rigoberta Menchu. I think we often can forget how different life and growing up is experienced by those in other parts of the world. This reading was a reminder of how life like this is not far behind us, and in some parts of the world is not gone at all. If someone had told me this reading came from the beginning of the 1900’s instead of towards the end of the decade, I would have believed them, simply because it is hard to wrap my head around the fact people who are alive today faced troubles like this.

Another thing that I took away from this week was the concept of a testimonio, which I had never heard of before this reading. After doing some research into it, I think it is really important to teach testimonios in school. So much of the learning we do and literature we read does not focus on oppression from the view of those who have been oppressed but reading from this perspective really paints a clear picture of not only what has occurred, but how it impacted those who experienced it.

My question for this week is, was this your first time reading a testimonio from this time period/region? If not, how did I, Rigoberta Menchu, compare to what you have read in the past?

Captain Pantoja and the Special Service

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This week’s novel by Vargas Llosa, Captain Pantoja and the Special Service, was a really fun read! I will say, even though Jon informed us it was a comedy, the book was not at all what I was expecting – but in a good way! The idea of having a “special service” comprised of prostitutes being developed and regulated is comical within itself. As Jon mentioned in the lecture, it takes something that is meant to be so casual and spontaneous and free and makes it so structured and serious. Furthermore, I found it interesting that the main plot of this novel revolved around sex, and that it was released during the sexual revolution, it made me wonder if the rise of sex in popular culture had anything to do with the success of this novel, or if perhaps the political climate in Latin American countries contributed to its success, because as Jon said, sometimes dark humour can bring comfort to people in times of dishevel.

One thing that crossed my mind while reading was the idea of “progress traps” which I learned about in a geography class. A progress trap is defined on Wikipedia as “the condition human societies experience when, in pursuing progress through human ingenuity, they inadvertently introduce problems that they do not have the resources or the political will to solve for fear of short-term losses in status, stability or quality of life.” Although progress traps are generally larger scale, I did find that Pantoja’s special service somewhat felt like a progress trap to me. The fact that this mission, so to say, was developed with the intention of having positive outcomes by simply just satisfying the sexual needs of soldiers ended up having negative results and even leading to some death. Although the idea of progress traps did not gain attention until the mid 2000’s, I wonder if Vargas Llosa had an idea like this in mind while writing this novel. It felt to me as though an underlying theme of Captain Pantoja and the Special Service was the consequences of indulging in our desires. Captain Pantoja ended up becoming so obsessed with his mission, although he was so against it at first, that it ended up being his downfall. At the end of the novel, we see Captain Pantoja in a no better position than he started off in, despite devoting much time and effort to his special service.

My question for the reading this week is do you think that there would have been a way for the military to regulate sexual interactions besides the special service? Or do you think that the idea of regulating desires, especially in isolated (jungle) conditions will always be set up to fail from the start?

One Hundred Years of Solitude – Part 2

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After finishing One Hundred Years of Solitude, I was left amazed at how much Garcia Marquez was able to fit into the novel.  Not only where there seven generations packed into this book, but each generation had meaning and characterization, and there was plot points surrounding all the characters we meant. Of course, the importance of characters varied, but never before have I read something that covered so many members of a family across a timeline like this.

One thing that stuck out to me while reading the second part of the novel was the number of parallels and call backs we got the events in the first half. One thing I noticed was the idea of newcomers arriving in Macondo bringing trouble upon the Buendia family. At the start of the novel, the gypsies arrive with what is considered “new technologies” and during the second half of the novel we see the arrival of the train marking the start of the downfall of Macondo overall. The idea that outsiders bring trouble can be seen throughout the novel in other examples too, such as the revolutionaries.

Another call back that caught my eye, and perhaps was meant to be quite obvious, was when Aureliano and Amaranta Ursula had a child together born with the tail of a pig, which was exactly what Ursula’s fear was at the start of the novel with her husband Jose Arcadio Buendia. These call backs speak to themes of chance and destiny, as it seems that it was always meant to be that Macondo would have a downfall, and that an incest relationship would result to a child with deformities.

There is also themes surrounding the advancement of technology and the negative impacts this can have on society. In the case of One Hundred Years of Solitude, the arrival of technology is the downfall of society. Once Macondo is opened to the outside world, it appears as though it was doomed from that moment on. Looking at the novel as a whole, it almost would seem that the Buendia family was destined from the start to tragedy and downfall, and that their peaceful home of Macondo was never meant to last.

My question for this week is similar to my one last week, which was do you believe the Buendia family is cursed due to Ursula and Jose Arcadio Buendia’s relationship? Working off that, what do you think the turning point for the Buendia’s was, when everything truly started to fall apart for the family? Do you think one incident played into isolation and tragedy that ended up plaguing members of the family?

100 Years of Solitude – Part 1

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Wow! Even after only reading the first part of this book, I must say it has for sure been my favourite of the term. I have enjoyed every page, which is wonderful considering as Jon said the book benefits from reading as much as you can in one go, and I found myself not wanting to put the book down at any point in my reading. The world building by Marquez captured me right away, but the main thing that had me hooked was how well developed all the characters in the novel are, especially considering how many of them there are. Although at times it did get confusing who was who, and I found myself flipping back to the family tree fairly often, I had a good sense of characterization as it felt as though everyone in the story had distinct personalities and motivations for their actions, and this made it easier to accurately guess who was being talked about before getting confirmation from the tree.

One character who particularly resonated with me was Ursula. She reminds me a lot of my grandmother. From the beginning you can tell she has a big heart, and this continues to be shown throughout the book as she continuously is opening her home and heart to people, taking them in as her own. Even when Pietro Crespi was no longer marrying into the family, Ursula still cared for him as though he was one of her own, which I think showed a lot of who she is and what she stood for. Family clearly meant more than anything else to her. This also somewhat reminds me of Kris Jenner (lol) as she continuously stands by her family and those who have been important to her family, with perhaps the exception of Rebeca and Jose Arcadio after their announcement of what is essentially incest.

In the lecture video, Jon posed the question of whether confusion in a novel is enjoyable or frustrating, and I find that with 100 years of solitude, the confusion was enjoyable and part of the fun, it kept me turning the pages and wanting to piece together everything as quickly as possible. That being said, this book did not confuse me as much as I expected it to, which was a very pleasant surprise.

At the beginning of the book, Ursula expressed her concerns about consummating her marriage with Jose Arcadio Buendia due to the fact they were related, and her worry that their children would come out deformed, and although this did not happen, the family seems to be doomed to consistent bad luck. My question for this week is, do you think the bad luck upon the family is some sort of “curse” that Ursula is suffering due to consummating her marriage?

Labyrinths by Jorge Luis Borges

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The reading this week, Labyrinths by Jorge Luis Borges was a collection made up of short stories and essays. I found there to be pros and cons to this type of reading. One on hand, I enjoyed that it could be read easily in pieces. Due to how short each writing was, you could easily pick the book up and do a bit of reading then put it down and not worry about it. On another hand, I found it made it a bit hard to stay invested in reading as there were not any long character arcs or long-term conflict to be resolved. Even though the stories were not all connected, there was underlying themes that could tie everything together.

Prior to this reading, I had not heard of Jorge Luis Borges, but after reading many of the blogposts I noticed it seemed many people had. Also, this was the only book I was able to borrow off of someone I knew. I can see why he is so well known. His work is well written, and even if I did not always understand what the stories were trying to give off, most of the works in the collection were entertaining enough to read. Many of the stories were thought provoking and different than something I had read before.

One of the writings I found especially interesting was the parable “Borges and I.” Although it was short, I found it though provoking. It felt as though “I” was feeling as though he was slowly losing himself to who he calls “Borges.” It is interesting because people will often say you can lose yourself with success, but you do not assume there would be self-awareness to go along with this. I am not sure if Borges actually felt this way about himself in real life, but it seemed as though “I” feared he would eventually have nothing self of his old self. It makes me wonder if the different sides were only meant to be noticed by “I” or if the author changed who he was based off the group he was surrounded with. It somewhat reminded me of the story of Jekyll and Hyde but obviously less extreme.

The word labyrinth seems to be used as a sort of metaphor throughout the book, I would be curious to know if it was and if so what for. Borges touches on many themes relating to infinity, life, fate, and destiny. Overall, I enjoyed the collection of stories and found them enjoyable to read. The stories provided many different emotions throughout and due to the nature of the book, what was coming next was always a surprise, which made it fun to read.

My question for this week is was this your first experience with reading a book of short stories? Did you enjoy it or not? Would you continue to do it after reading this or no?

The Underdogs by Mariano Azuela

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This week I chose to read “The Underdogs” which is a story of the Mexican revolution. For the reading this week, I purchased a hard copy of the book from the bookstore, and this was actually my first time reading a handheld version of something for school in a long time, and it made such a difference to the experience. I felt much more immersed in this novel than I have with things in the past. Although I do believe this is partially due to having the physical copy of the book, I also thoroughly enjoyed this story. I found it easy to follow and the story intriguing, being pulled in right away.

Another thing I liked about this story was how the characters were fleshed out well. It was easy to understand peoples emotions and motives for the most part. I sympathized with Camila a lot, being in a position of loving one man while being somewhat expected to be with another. It helped paint an idea of what life could have been like for a woman in this era. I also found it interesting to see the arcs of characters throughout the story, and looking at how they begun and where they finished. What causes they started fighting for and what they ended up standing for in the end. I found the ending to be somewhat upsetting, seeing how people can become so encapsulated with whatever they are currently doing that they forget why they began doing it in the first place, such as happened to Demetrio.

One line that stuck out to me was “I do not think that think that it is wrong to kill, because when you kill, it is always out of anger. But stealing?” and the fact that everyone taking part in the conversation agreed. I think this paints a clear picture of morals surrounding the revolution and tells you about their motives behind fighting. It is interesting to see how they justified their actions by saying that they are just doing it out of anger and it somehow makes it forgivable and almost understandable.  Although this line was a bit shocking to me, it also got me thinking how war still occurs all the time today, and death in battle is still not uncommon and can be rationalized with this same logic in many parts of the world.

My question for this week is: Why do you think Demetrio was unable to step away from fighting, despite having a family at home?

Mama Blanca’s Memoirs

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I enjoyed reading “Mama Blanca’s Memoirs” this week. I truly love when something you are reading is descriptive and uses strong imagery, and I found Mama Blanca’s Memoirs was full of good imagery to help me envision the stories in my head. The way the memoirs are written, to me, came across as halfway between a diary and story. The descriptions of everything were so powerful it felt like more than just reading someone’s diary, however it was also personal to the point that made it clear it was not just fabricated tales.

The forward by Teresa da la Parra to the memoirs was a great way to set the tone for what was to come. I thought it was nice to see Mama Blanca through de la Parra’s eyes. Additionally, the context it provides for the relationship between the two made the reading more meaningful to me. Knowing the maternal relationship that took place between Mama Blanca and de la Parra made reading about Mama Blanca’s family dynamics much more interesting. It also helped to paint different perspectives of Mama Blanca, not just hearing everything from only her point of view but being able to hear about her from someone else’s.

A quote that really stood out to me was from the forward by Teresa da la Parra. It read “life’s splendor comes not from what it gives but what it promises.” I feel like this stood out to me as it was something that as soon as I read, I felt I completely understood and agreed with, yet the actual thought itself had not crossed my mind until that moment. I think this quote is entirely true, much of life’s joy comes from anticipation towards things. The excitement leading up to the holidays is often much more exciting than the holiday itself. The same can be said for other major celebrations, milestones in life, or even just a movie. Much of the joy we feel in our daily lives is from the excitement of what’s to come, and not fully knowing how it will play out.

My question for this week is: “that what extent do you think Mama Blanca’s Memoirs by Teresa de la Parra differs from the original memoirs by Mama Blanca?” How do you think having a memoir be edited in this way impacts the experience of reading it? Do you think most memoirs being published today follow this same editing style, or do you think it is different?

Introductory Blog Post

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Hi everyone 🙂

My name is Laura and I am a third year psychology student. I was born and raised in Vancouver. In my spare time I like to snowboard and cook. I look forward to getting to know you all through out the term!

I am taking this course for a few different reasons. One is that I find that since I began university, I do not read as much as I used to, and the times I do read tend to be textbooks or academic papers. By having to read literature for this course, I hope it will help me feel more as though I am reading for pleasure while also being productive with school. I also look a class done in a similar format with Jon last year, and really enjoyed the class and wanted to have an experience like that again. I also enjoy learning about history and culture in different areas of the world, so I think many of the themes and topics we discuss will be interesting.

I do not have much experience with Latin American literature, but I am excited to have the opportunity to read and then discuss it with my peers, especially when everything can be interpenetrated so differently, it is always interesting to hear different perspectives. I also am excited to learn about the authors lives and things that influenced the creation of these pieces. I find it fun to read something somewhat blindly, then learn about what influenced it, and have your opinions reshaped.

My question for discussion is: What is your favourite thing you’ve ever read? It could be a book, article, comic, etc, anything goes

Concluding Blog Post

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When I first signed up for this course, like others in the class, I was taking it as a literature requirement that sounded somewhat interesting. It ended up being my favourite course I was in this semester. Firstly, I really enjoyed the format of this course. It made me feel like everything I was doing was because I had wanted to / chose to do it (with regards to getting to mostly pick what we read) and I appreciated the expectations being so clearly laid out at the start of the term. This course also showed me that reading can be enjoyable! Prior to this class, every time I read it was for school, and it was always something I didn’t enjoy that much. During this course, I read many different novellas that showed me there is much more out there that can be enjoyable. I even went and bought myself books to read in my down time now. I think the turning point for me was reading Agostino. I highly enjoyed that story and it began to make me fall in love with literature again.

I also enjoyed how interactive this course was. Normally I do not speak much in courses or share my thoughts, but the environment created by Jon, our TA’s Patricio and Jennifer, and the other students in the course made for such a fun and different dynamic where ideas flowed and bounced off each other which made coming to class fun and exciting and had me wanting to be involved.

Overall, this course taught me much more than I could have expected, and I am extremely glad I took and it was able to experience it all with everyone this semester!

Bolano’s “Amulet” – Week 10

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Amulet, to me, was a simple read. It did not feel as though the story was as hard to follow as some others we have read this term. Just like many other novellas we’ve read, the story focused a lot on the past and reflection of important moments of the narrators life, primary being locked in the women’s room at university. When the story begins, it states that it is a story of horror. Like many other’s have said in their blog posts, I assumed it would be a violent and graphic horror story, but instead it was much more psychological. I am not afraid of much in life, but I am extremely claustrophobic. The thought of being trapped somewhere is something that always makes my heart beat a bit faster and my palms sweat, so I was able to understand the horror that would have been felt during the raid at the university.

As the narrator is trapped, they reflect on their life and relationships with others. I think this is one of the most natural responses to being in a situation like this. When there is no end in sight, and all you have to keep you occupied is your thoughts and books.

I appreciated the way Bolano described everything in great detail. It made it much easier to immerse myself into this world and sympathize with the characters and the narrator. In the first few sentences, the narrator says the story will not seem like a horror story when told by her, and at first I took that with a grain of salt, but after finishing the novella it was very true. The story was told in an almost peaceful way. The situation playing out was obviously stressful, but the narrators tone made the violence seem far less serious than it truly was.

I also really enjoyed the way the novella ended. I thought it was a beautiful way to wrap everything up together. Taking something that has meaning of the war and viewing it as something beautiful without taking away from the importance of it. It provided a feeling of unity and peace, and referring to the song as an amulet I think was a really nice way to show that even in times of extreme hardship and terror there can be beauty found in group solidarity and “love, desire, and pleasure” that comes from sharing something like this.