\u201cNada\u201d is currently my favorite novel so far. The novel takes place after the Spanish Civil War and the narrator is an orphan named Andrea, who was ecstatic to be able to study literature in Barcelona to the point she carried her luggage by herself as she had enough strength due to \u201c[her] youth and eager anticipation\u201d (3). Not even the fact that \u201cnobody was waiting for [her]\u201d (3) dimmed her excitement. However, the minute she arrives at her relative\u2019s house, her excitement seems to be replaced with horror that \u201cit all seemed like a nightmare\u201d (5).<\/p>\n
The novel seems to have a sense of nostalgia, as the way the grandmother talks about Juan and Roman who were \u201cangels\u201d (31). Especially when she mentions \u201cback then, my child, Roman was a good man\u201d (32), as if she doesn\u2019t truly want to admit that Roman has changed and has become a terrible man. It seemed like she still wants to believe that there\u2019s still some good in Roman, that he\u2019s still the angel she loved when he was a child. Gloria also agrees with the grandmother and mentions that he used to comfort her when she was afraid. However, she also mentions that \u201cRoman\u2019s very nice when he wants to be, but at heart he\u2019s bad.\u201d (36), which was a line I found memorable, as it implies that one can never truly know another individual.<\/p>\n
Ena\u2019s situation surprised me the most, where she had a boyfriend that she loves, as she claims, \u201c[she] couldn\u2019t bear it if [her] life were separate from his\u201d (218) but she broke up with him to be involved with Roman. However, it was later revealed Ena was with Roman for the purpose of getting revenge for her mother. As Ena was aware of the love her mother had for Roman, \u201cnobody loved Roman the way [her mother] did\u201d (193) but was mistreated by him. Juan\u2019s grief for his brother\u2019s death also surprised me, as it seemed their relationship became complex as both brothers loved Gloria. Earlier in the novel, Roman mentioned that \u201cJuan belonged to him\u201d (232), and I didn\u2019t really believe that statement due to their tense interactions. However, when Roman died, \u201cJuan\u2019s grief was unashamed, maddening, like that of a woman for her lover\u2026 [or] a young mother at the death of her first child.\u201d (232). Andrea had clearly witnessed many unpleasant situations in the house, however, she believed Juan\u2019s cries for his brother was the worst situation. On the outside, it seemed as if Juan disliked Roman. However, in the end, it turns out he loved him the most (besides their mother).<\/p>\n
A question I have for my classmates is do you agree with the other aunts that the grandmother\u2019s unconditional love, spoiling Juan and Roman as much as she could, caused Roman\u2019s ending in a way?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u201cNada\u201d is currently my favorite novel so far. The novel takes place after the Spanish Civil War and the narrator is an orphan named Andrea, who was ecstatic to be able to study literature in Barcelona to the point she carried her luggage by herself as she had enough strength due to \u201c[her] youth and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":89870,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,17,18],"tags":[13,19,15,20,21],"class_list":["post-14","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog","category-laforet","category-nada","tag-love","tag-nostalgia","tag-romance","tag-siblings","tag-war"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tzrmst202\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tzrmst202\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tzrmst202\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tzrmst202\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/89870"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tzrmst202\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tzrmst202\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tzrmst202\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14\/revisions\/33"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tzrmst202\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tzrmst202\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/tzrmst202\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}