Tag Archives: narrative/narration

04/10/23

Adios to All That ! (My Conclusion)

    It is difficult to look back on our thirteen weeks together and discern a common line between the readings, if any, despite their residence under the umbrella term of “literature from Latin America.” In an increasingly global world offering the potential for travel between a manifold of countries and adoption of new identities, authors are no longer constrained by ethnicity or nationality, religion or antitheism, class or gender, and in the breaking down of these established characteristics, perhaps are emblematic of the increased “muddying” of the literary categories as a whole. 

    Despite this uncertainty, I found the works for this course to be engaging, thought-provoking and offering a variety which would customarily not be studied by a major in English Literature. As much as I can appreciate such canon works of Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude and Neruda’s Twenty Love Poems—both of which stand as my favourite course readings this semester!—there is something to be said for minutely obscure works, at least outside the boundaries of their own countries, found in Carpentier’s The Kingdom of This World or Azuela’s The Underdogs. I think I enjoyed these two readings for the ways they enlightened me on events I might have previously heard about in history, but knew only scant details involving them. I would have never read these texts had I not taken this course; it is owing to my knowledge from this course that I can contend the Haitian slave revolts and the Mexican revolution, despite the differences between them, are united in the shared dramatic upheaval of established rules—and this sudden cultural change originating from a moment in time is a concept which intrigues me about any historical revolution. 

    As we have learned in this course, revolutions were not restricted to violent change, but instead also remained ever-present in the Latin literary world. The term “magical realism” which would come to describe Marquez’s works would amount to little more a marketable gimmick—a key descriptor which, in its dogged attempts to box the author into one specific category, often fell short in its inherent misunderstanding that Latin America, or any continent, can be defined in platitudes. It is true that all the course readings we have studied share a few common themes: namely, the desire of the authors to speak from experiences informed by political, cultural and personal phenomena; crises arising from South American authoritarianism and class difference; colonialism and its effects on modernity; and many more which I’m sure to forget in the broad nature which accompanies a summary. Regardless, these are only shared characteristics and do not represent the whole of the Latin American experience—I contend that what this is in the personal life, as well as in the literary autobiography of such authors, remains entirely to interpretation. 

    In conclusion, this blog post will mark not only the end of the course, but also my chapter at UBC before my two-semester exchange to Australia beginning in July. I look forward to the tropical sun and friends I’m sure to meet along the way, and in this fashion, the charting of an experience not unlike visiting many Latin American countries. My thanks to Professor Jon Beasley-Murray for another great year of classes in the Romantic/Latin world. Further compliments are in order to Daniel and the class for great discussions. 

UNTIL WE MEET AGAIN!

S

03/13/23

Week 9: The Question of Gender and the Self in The Hour of the Star

    Clarice Lispector is an author who is famous for her capricious dance between the actual and the abstraction. Through her story The Hour of the Star providing the semblance of a plot, she is able to cover the meaning of existence, or in her least complex, simply dive into the everyday meanderings of a disillusioned boy in his contemplation of the mundane. The title page, with its various alternate titles, suggests anxiety and flightiness on the part of the narrator who is made the author. Additionally, the gender swap of the author from girl to boy suggests a yearning to break free from established gender roles, and in fact “bend” them in a similar fashion to the established rules surrounding narrative plot, structure and content. “I’ll  try  contrary  to  my  normal  habits to write a story with a beginning, middle and ‘grand finale’ followed by silence and falling rain,” the narrator states, revealing his breaking away from convention. At another point, he expresses his preference for “a male writer…because a woman would make it [the story] all weepy and maudlin.” It is a thinly veiled critique of how females are viewed in literary society which is offered from, of all voices, a male constructed to espouse the sentiment. In this direct communication of intent to the reader, Lispector breaks the fourth wall and the illusion of story, and can therefore be viewed as postmodern in her approach. 

    Another layer to the onion is added when you consider that the author creates the man for the express purpose of having him write into existence the story of a “northeastern girl.” Regardless, with the rest of the text revolving around the man, the Marshall-McLuhan medium represents him as trapped by the world around him and its manifold of bombarding messages. It is in this sense the protagonist is not completely caricaturised, instead being painted as a victim of society. “Happiness? I never saw a dumber word, invented by all those northeastern girls out there” is a sentiment which best represents the narrator’s misogyny, yet also displays his sadness which draws from the reader some degree of sympathy. “I write because I have nothing else to do in the world: I was left over and there is no place for me in the world of men,” he states once more, further showcasing an age-old desire for writing as a form of escapism. The story is postmodern in the sense that the stand-in for the author—another author—is creating the story for the same purpose. Ironically, he only cures his writer’s block on writing the girl when adding in male side characters of the young and old men—I take this to reflect Lispector’s belief that writing is a transmission of the self onto the page, rather than a complete fabrication. 

    My question for the class is: What do you believe Lispector hopes to capture in her decision to shift perspective on the opposite gender? Do you believe Clarice Lispector values honesty in her writing above all—the reason for her rebuking of established norms—or does she still enjoy the trickery and fooling readers a la Jorge Luis Borges? S

03/7/23

Week 8: The Ambiguity of Time in One Hundred Years of Solitude (Part II)

    It was only on reading the second half of One Hundred Years of Solitude I began to view time as the central protagonist of the novel beyond its characters. Through the vignettes offered of Macondo and its residents, chronological events are shown to lead into future happenings. This is shown in one example through two characters who are mistaken for another, Jose Arcadio Segundo and Aureliano Segundo: “They were so much alike and so mischievous during childhood that not even Santa Sofía de la Piedad could tell them apart” the author states (Márquez 174). In my view, this mirrors the reader as the confused historian studying a fictitious family tree charted from the beginning of the book, as several names are repeated with the only difference being, as it is stated, “[w]hile the Aurelianos were withdrawn, but with lucid minds, the Jose Arcadios were impulsive and enterprising, but they were marked with a tragic sign” (174). This also reflects the cyclical nature of time in the sense that their traits, positive or negative, can be inherited by the offspring of the original characters which helps to comprise the hundred years of solitude of the estranged family.

At one point this is further reflected through Aureliano Segundo opening the door to his great-great grandfather’s study to find that “a familiar light entered that seemed accustomed to lighting the room every day and there was not the slightest trace of dust or cobwebs, with everything swept and clean, better swept and cleaner than on the day of the burial” (Márquez 175). At first glance, this is a suitably “magical” phenomenon for a room which has been left alone for quite some time. But greater, I think, is the sense that time has left the study of Melquíades and Jose Arcadoio untouched in a symbolic recognition by the author that, so long as the generations live on, time does not ruin what has already been wrought by previous—as well as future—generations; and this adds to the perspective that the story remains in a constant state of unfolding.

Time, the narrative shows time and time again, is just as enigmatic as it is cruel. At one point Rebeca, a former inhabitant of Macondo, is revealed after years of being forgotten by her fellow residents. “The squalid woman”—as she is described—“[had] two large eyes, still beautiful, in which the last stars of hope had gone out, and the skin of her face was wrinkled by the aridity of solitude” (Márquez 206). Being one of many mentions of solitude in the novel, I believe it is fitting as Rebeca is a prime example of one who is ruined by the passage of time  where others thrive. By the end of the narrative, she is used as a casualty in showcasing the ambivalent nature of time just as much as the changes in Buendia’s political views to be unaffected by what he once hated throughout the years up until believing, in the present day, “‘[t]he only difference today between Liberals and Conservatives is that the Liberal go to mass at five o’ clock and the Conservatives at eight’” (Márquez 228). Through both extremes, time is shown to be the disillusionment and the death of beloved characters and their ideologies, adding to the depth of the novel’s ambiguity.

My question for the class is how do you view time in the novel as a whole, and do you believe the author presents it as favourable or an obstacle for his characters? S

02/27/23

Week 7: The Enchantment of Márquez’s Vignettes in One Hundred Years of Solitude (Part I)

    Reading One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Márquez, I found myself enchanted by his narrative resembling something not unlike a fairy tale. In the confluence of fantastical elements and on-the-ground actualities, Marquez is able to communicate to the reader their familiar hopes and dreams, as well as experienced anguish. It is in this way it can be viewed as a fairy tale for adults — or an otherworldly tale whose morals inform our known reality. 

    Time and time again, the narrative grounds the dreamlike events which surround the day-to-day lives of his characters with human struggles including philosophy, spirituality and, at its most basic, human pitfalls. Take one of the characters in the book, the founder of Macondo José Arcadio. Through the pursuit of passionate love with his mistress—described as something like an “earthquake” (Márquez 37) —Arcadio is left with the result that he is to become a father sooner than anticipated. Such situations are commonplace throughout the book and illustrative of the follies which make us human even among a spectacular world. Not long after, when Arcadio and his eccentric friend Melquíades meet a fellow nomadic gypsy later on, a more abstract struggle is presented in the form of mortality and belonging: “He really had been through death, but [the Gypsy] had returned because he could not bear the solitude” (Márquez 55). Although the circumstances of the man being exiled from his tribe might not be relatable for all, human emotions surrounding loneliness and belonging are ubiquitous. 

    Throughout its pages, the narrative refutes the assumption of the reader that it is an escapist fairy tale; in this sense One Hundred Years of Solitude is more honest than one, as the story chooses not to shy away from the dark side of humanity. In its rendition of how women are abused in the real world, the character Aureliano crosses paths with a girl who is forced into prostitution by her grandmother. “He felt an irresistible need to love her and protect her,” Aureliano soon finds; and his overpowering desire for the girl drives him into wishing to “marry her in order to free her from the despotism of her grandmother” (Márquez 58). It is only after reaching this conclusion, and coming back the next day, that he finds the girl has left town and is subject to the same tragic fate. 

    By the end of reading Part I of One Hundred Years of Solitude, I found the tales of Márquez as highlighting the author’s belief in universal humanity. In keeping with this idea, my question for the class would be if you found any of the vignettes speak to your own human struggles or experiences, or if they remained more magical than real. S

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