09/23/21

Here is Paratext

The paratext used in Here Was Paradise, by Humberto Ak’abal, help the reader to understand the deeper meaning behind the poems.

The 500 Years introductory image supports the idea that the section is about Spanish colonization of the Mayans. The image depicts a leopard jumping across the page, surrounded by various animals and a string of beads. However, only the leopard and the snake are wrapped by these beads while the other animals remain free. The poem Paradise, which is Ak’abal’s rendition on the story of Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden, where sin was introduced to the world through Satan appearing as a serpent, also commentates on the influence of Catholicism in modern Mayan culture.  With the knowledge from the poem, the image takes on a new meaning; the beads become a rosary, and the snake is now the conquistadors who have tied the leopard to them through the rosary. This depicts the connection between Catholicism and indigenous religions, which formed when Spanish conquistadors forcefully converted indigenous peoples after taking their land, forever changing how people practiced spirituality and religion. The words and the image work together to sell the main idea to the reader. 

The use of paratext not only reinforces a main idea, but also allows the main idea to be applied to every poem, even when it is not as obvious. The poem “Pain” is not explicitly about colonialism, but within the context of the section title and illustration, it becomes clear that the poem is not just about any suffering; rather, suffering because of colonialism.

In conclusion, the paratext, including the section headings and introductory images, surrounding Here Was Paradise help the reader to make sense of the poems, and reinforce the main ideas.

09/23/21

Symbolism and Allegory in “And We Sold The Rain”

The short story, “And We Sold The Rain” by Carmen Naranjo is a work of Contemporary fiction which contains the literary conventions, Allegory and Symbolism.

An allegory is a symbolic narrative in Contemporary Fiction that implies a second meaning. The whole idea of selling rain to other countries is an allegory. This story is a critique of the modern, industrialized society.

While the country in this short story is made-up, the author, Carmen Naranjo, takes inspiration from her home country of Costa Rica. The book was originally published in 1988, but Carmen Naranjo seems to be referencing ISI (Import Substitution Industrialization) and the agro-export expansion from the early 1970’s as well as the debt crisis which took place in 1981. The fictional, nameless country in this book is implied to be a rather poor country with the government selling one of the country’s most basic and important natural resources, rain.

Symbolism is the use of items, events or signs to signify ideas. In the case of this short story, rain is thought by many to be symbolic of change. It means good things such as new life and renewal. The government selling the rain in the nameless, fictional country for the good of the country is quite ironic as it symbolizes that they are basically selling away something that can bring the country new life. With the government of the nameless country selling away their rain, they end up making the country uninhabitable, causing its citizens to flee to other countries.

09/23/21

Us vs Them

We never discussed in class the effect of the change from third-person narration to the first-person plural narration at the end of “And We Sold the Rain” by Carmen Naranjo. This is something that I have been thinking about and I would like to share my thoughts on its effect.

The use of “And” in the title suggests a sense of desperation since it sounds like the end of an extensive list of goods that the country had to sell to get itself out of debt. The “And” adds to the satirical and hyperbolic tone of the story in which Naranjo is critiquing the international organizations that economically destroyed this nation forcing them to sell their natural resource of rain to stay afloat. The “We” in the title however adds a sense of collectivity in this mass economic struggle.

After numerous failed attempts by this nation’s leadership to dig themselves out of debt, the citizens were forced to finally escape this unsustainable country. Once the citizens fled from their economic oppression, the narration turns to the first-person plural, with the line “In that country, we were second class citizens, something we were already accustomed to.” (pg 156). There is a sense of awakening and hope for the citizens of this unnamed nation, that perhaps this new country will be better. This line also acts as a critique of the unjust distribution of wealth. However, the line “the emir asked for a loan, then another, then many” (pg 156) indicates that while there may have been a moment of hope, the never-ending vicious cycle of a loan and debt repayment catches up to them again. The cyclical nature of this story is representative of the dependency that the international organizations forced upon Latin American countries resulting in economic crises during the 1970s and 1980s.

Naranjo never names the nation at focus in this story, but critiques explicitly the multinational organizations at fault for the crisis. The anonymity of the nation in contrast with the explicit naming of the international organizations acts as a powerful attack from Naranjo, there is no doubt who the villain is in this story. The impact of the change from third-person narration to first-person plural narration is that it reminds the reader that there are real victims of these irresponsible financial decisions of those in power and brings the story to a personal level.

09/23/21
"Old Feedsack Rag Balls" by 'Playingwithbrushes' is licensed under CC BY 2.0

The Will of Rags

"Old Feedsack Rag Balls" by 'Playingwithbrushes' is licensed under CC BY 2.0

“Old Feedsack Rag Balls” by ‘Playingwithbrushes’ is licensed under CC BY 2.0

In Ak’abal’s poems, each line is worth a thousand words. There is often a metric ton of subtext/context that is contained within these poems, especially if you can recognize his history both as a poet and the history of his people. To achieve this, Ak’abal uses a substantial amount of literary and rhetorical devices to help him convey his messages. For example, “they hurt, / they hurt” is a form of repetition in Pain, while  “weight of poverty, / of indifference, / of injustice” in 500 Years is an example of Anaphora – where a poem repeats the same phrase at the beginning of each line (Ak’abal Pain, lines 3-4 | Ak’abal 500 Years, lines 3-6 ). Pain is a masterful poem, it conveys many words with very few; the repetition in Pain emphasizes and exaggerates how much pain the people are suffering due to “misery / [and] poverty” (Ak’abal Pain, lines 1-2). The pain that is caused by being abandoned by the colonists and the government. These two words, misery and poverty, by itself, can cause a startling image to form in ones mind. This is further illustrated in the next lines of Pain, where the Mayan and Indigenous people were so demoralized that they would rather be “a piece of rag” – an inanimate object (Ak’abal Pain, lines 5-6)! Thus, this demonstrates what they were going through – their wills were reduced to nothing more than the tattered cloth of a peasant or slave. However, even with their battered and withered wills, they still want to “be useful [like a patch]” to other people (Ak’abal Pain, lines 7-8). A patch that could mend wounds, correct errors, or even hastily repair what has been lost. Ak’abal is establishing that THIS IS THE WILL OF THE INDIGENOUS PEOPLE! They want to prove that even on death’s door, they were willing to forgive – to make amends with those that have wronged them. Ak’abal and the Indigenous were not looking for something as petty or hateful as vengeance – they were the better men – men that were willing to forgive and to mend…

 

09/23/21

Marquez and Naranjo

Magical realism is a powerful tool within Latin American literature as it challenges our conceptions of life and culture. In Naranjo’s “And We Sold the Rain” the seemingly impossible within regular life highlights the strain of the economic crisis in the collective conscious. In our class discussion, we briefly touched on Naranjo’s use of intertextuality and reference to Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s work. While there is a direct reference with the mention of “Macondo,” there seem to be stylistic similarities between “And We Sold the Rain” and “100 Years of Solitude” (pg. 151). Marquez begins “100 years of solitude” stating “Many years later as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía” would remember the first time his father showed him ice (pg. 1). Naranjo begins her piece quite similarly, focusing on one man of power, a climactic moment, and a distorted sense of time. Naranjo’s narrator is omniscient, narrating what the treasury minister said “a few days ago” similarly to how Marquez begins his story in both the future and the past (pg. 151). Both Marquez and Naranjo play with time as a concept at the start of their stories as if to suggest that the nature of the problems that face both men are cyclical.  This technique also drops the reader immediately into the meat of the story and gives them a view of the potential conflict. Additionally, the cyclical nature of time points to a trend in magical realism that focuses on generational stories and struggles. I found the introductions of both stories to feel quite similar in style and am interested to see if others feel similarly.

09/22/21

Blame The Bank

The story criticizes the world bank and the international monetary fund for their policies on providing funding to latin american countries. A common complaint against these organizations is that the rich countries who run them use the power of funding to make countries do what is best for the countries funding the bank rather than the countries receiving the funding. The wellbeing of the country at hand is of lesser importance  than balancing the books.As seen in the story, the government employees have the means to travel and buy expensive cars, and this is a common complaint about the world bank and the IMF, that it expands the wealth of the bureaucracy but does not help the people.The policies of the World Bank would force countries to slash social funding. During the 1980s, when this story was written, many saw these policies as making the problems worse and not helping the people of the countries, as inflation was causing food prices to rise dramatically. The way the loans were given out did not take into account the culture and needs of the people in each country separately, causing the policies to be ineffectual in reaching the people who really needed the aid. These impacts are seen in “And We Sold the Rain”, when the cost of food rose steeply and the cost of luxury goods,such as caviar fell due to the measures implemented by the IMF and World Bank. 

09/22/21

Wear it proudly

After reading the four poems of “Here was paradise” by Humberto Ak’abal, knowing that he is from Guatemala we can infer that the historical background at that time influenced his writing.

I found it so fascinating that even when he was living in one of the most segregated countries filled with racism, violence and discrimination towards indigenous people, he self-identified with the mayan culture and he was proud and honored of his roots, the most relevant example is that he knows how to write in mayan language and his writing process involved first doing it in          K´iche´ and then translating them to Spanish. 

Quotes that the most stood out for me were in the poem: “When I woke up”; “and pull out a rib” (Line 7) and “made of mud and corn,”(Line 12) are allusion to both mayan culture (Popol Vuh) and christian religion, In the mayan culture it said that the woman was made from mud and corn grains but here he mixes it with the Bible that states that Eva was made from Adam´rib, it shows how he identifies as a mestizo, he doesn’t have anger towards his older generations or how the spanish stole their initial and real culture beliefs, he accepts both equally.

I believe the initial theme in “When I woke up” is solitude but eventually it had a “solution”, a light, that at the end everything will be alright. Humberto’s writing is filled with optimism even after his death; it still gives the hope that at some point things in his country could improve.

 

09/21/21

The Perpetual Cycle of Underdevelopment

The Global South lives in a perpetual state of being promised development. Western nations have laid out paths that resemble pyramid schemes, claiming that if we follow a number of simple steps, we too can achieve our own developed nation! Yet, there is a cyclical nature to our development or lack thereof. We go through peaks and troughs, booms and recessions, never achieving the riches and freedom Western states enjoy. With more than 70 years into the official beginning of development projects, it is clear we have been set up to be in a perpetual cycle of underdevelopment.

“And We Sold the Rain” by Carmen Naranjo clearly depicts this condition the Global South is confined in. The country in her piece, which we assume is Costa Rica, does not enjoy economic, social, or political freedoms. To the extent which when they find temporary wealth in selling the rain, the president believes they “will regain our [their] independence” (154). Yet, this is not true. Despite colonialism being technically over, neo-imperialism is thriving. Through it, ideas of development and economic dependencies are instilled to serve Western interests while the Global South lives in a fragile state of uncertainty, where they have no idea whether the products they have built their economy around will continue to be marketable. The Global South is in a constant limbo, where they depend on outside economies to eat and access primary resources like water, as shown in pages 149-150. Despite Costa Rica being a resource-abundant nation, with the perfect climate for all types of crops, they can not even eat beans, and abundant precolonial food, because of their need for imports they can not afford due to bankruptcy. The development project forged dependency, as nations were encouraged to specialize in selling a resource, while Western nations returned it manufactured at double or triple the price. Through this extractive method, cycles of underdevelopment are enforced, leading the Global South to blindly fight for a seat at a table that was never built for their inclusion.

 

09/21/21

Cycle of Crisis

Despite having a strong allusion to Costa Rica in the 1900’s, the story “And We Sold the Rain” by Carman Naranjo and its critiques can also represent a wider theme in Latin American literature and history of this era.

The Magical Realist tone of this story uses imagery of a poor nation full of inequality and corruption to critique the fictional government in the story. The use of anonymity however intrigues me as it enables the reader to interpret the story as a wider critique of an economic and political cycle that Latin American countries seemed to have been trapped in at this time.

Based on our understanding of Costa Rica (as a base line) we observe a country that was corrupt, poor and underdeveloped due to poor leadership and political/economic institutions. Following WW2, we see the country begin to adopt increasingly capitalist policy. Along with this export businesses were thriving, and economic conditions were relatively stable. Here is where it seems things turn, and governments begin to nationalize enterprise, while people begin to demand social policies and welfare, slipping towards a socialist regime.

As the history we have so far been presented suggests, as these nations first turn towards capitalism, they begin to borrow at unsustainable levels, and more of this debt is being used to fund such social programs demanded by the people. At this point all it takes is one economic shock for this house of cards to topple.

This is where it seems we start off in the story “And We Sold The Rain”. A nation insolvent, and an economy unable to generate capital to meet its debt obligations. Here is where the cycle begins. As we see in the story, the government must enact strict austerity measures, symbolized sarcastically when the president suggests that the nation begin to tax the air, yet meanwhile social programs were cut, food was being rationed, and the currency was being devalued and incredible rates.

After embracing what is coined as economic “Shock Therapy” we see an economy that begins to restabilize. This concept has been coined by the works of economist Jeffery Sachs, who has advised governments transitioning out of communist era, and into democratic capitalism, and had done so with great success in countries such as Bolivia.

However as we can see today this cycle, in Costa Rica, has repeated. Where governments eager to appease to citizens, continue to borrow to fund socialist policies and social welfare programs, a substantial amount of debt has been accrued to the point that 42% of the nations GDP in 2021 will go towards interest and amortization of federal debt.

This, similarly to the period before this story is alluded to unfold, comes at a time of a global economic shock. Where in 1980 we saw an energy crisis, today we see a global pandemic.

Due to all of this, I read and interpret this story more so as a warning of this cycle. Rather than critique on capitalism, it seems as if socialism is the issue, although nice in theory, it is practically inefficient, leading to corruption and inequality rather than a world of prosperity and equals.

09/21/21

and we sold all of nature

In “And We Sold the Rain,” Carmen Naranjo emphasizes water as a source that causes contempt, happiness, and lastly, exile; through this, the people’s relationship with water comes to symbolize a fraught relationship people have with nature under capitalism. The first mention of rain happens when the people complain that “they raise our water bills but don’t give us any water even though it rains everyday” (Naranjo 149). Rain has yet to become exploited, and (while incredibly sardonically) rain is considered separate from water as a commodity. At this stage, rain (as a representation of nature) is an obstacle, a cause for frustration when “poor people without umbrellas, without a change of clothes, they get drenched” (Naranjo 151). This sentiment is further emphasized when Naranjo writes “[t]he sea of poverty” — the sea, a large water mass, is chosen to represent poverty. However, this soon changes when they sell the rain, and the rain becomes a commodity. For a moment, it seems that they have conquered this cause of annoyance, and “[t]he people smiled. A little less rain would be agreeable to everyone” (Naranjo 154). Furthermore, they are able to profit off their triumph over nature. It is almost smart, until it becomes unsustainable. 

Finally, water becomes the ultimate cause, and aid, of their exile. The rain stops forever, and people are forced to flee — a situation that the real world will perhaps come to sooner than later due to the climate crisis. By their triumph over nature, and the commodification of natural resources, the people have made their home uninhabitable. Like The Lorax, this short story’s hyperbolic situation mirrors one of the real world’s rapid and insatiable consumption of nature that can only lead to exile.