pedro paramo

 I liked reading this book. And I can completely see why some consider it the precursor to magical realism. Juan Rulfo's Pedro Paramo is largely about the balance between hope and misery, and the way that people  have such strong hopes that their wishes will come true, while having to cope with the misery of realising it'll never happen. That's a bit depressing but I think it's an important part of life. The way that people cope with not getting what they want can determine their strength in getting past adversities and this novel is a good reminder of that.

Pedro Paramo is a complicated character, being both a protagonist and antagonist at the same time. I definitely can't defend him as being a good person, him straight-up letting everyone die and all, but I kinda get it within the context of his character. Basically the only thing he wants in the world is for Susana to love him and be his, and so when she dies without his only wish being fulfilled, it's sort of understandable that he'd be fuming at the rest of the town's disrespect. I know I'd be annoyed. This scene made me think about traditions and norms surrounding death. Obviously the exact process of mourning a death (or not!) varies across the world, but of course going against the tradition that surrounds you will be seen as disrespectful no matter where you are.

I find Father Renteria an interesting character too, because (a la Wikipedia) he has all the makings of a main character without actually being one. Like while Pedro Paramo is the reason why everyone's dead, Father Renteria is the reason why so many of them are ghosts; he never did the last rites to allow everyone to go off into the afterlife. I definitely think this story would be good to read from his perspective too. 

I enjoy the fact that Susana is associated with the rain. Having grown up in the UK, and now obviously living in Vancouver, I feel like everyone around me associates rain with gloominess and it's considered "bad weather". But in Iran, where my family is from and the climate is very dry, rain is seen as a very positive thing. I've had this conversation with my parents before about how in English, you might associate someone you love with the sun; think Shakespeare and "shall I compare thee to a summer's day". Whereas in Persian poetry, a lover may be described as a refreshing rainfall. I imagine it may well be a similar situation in Mexico, where the story is set; where there is harsh sun every day, what better compliment than to be compared to a cooling shower of rain, the substance that's the basis of life on this planet?

A question for you all! If you could read this story from another character's perspective, who? and why?

Comments

  1. Daniel OrizagaFebruary 13, 2023 at 11:11 AM

    Deeba, you did a careful reading of the text, thanks for putting your effort into it. It is true, Father Rentería is the one who closes the door of eternal rest to the murmurs that continue to wander in Comala. It is interesting to think about this also for those who, like Juan Preciado, come to town. What is the curse he carries to become one of these voices?

    ReplyDelete
  2. kara qstFebruary 13, 2023 at 2:22 PM

    Hi! good question. I think it would be really interesting to read the story from on of the women's perspective due to the culture of sexual assault that seems to permeate the town. Of course, this is quite complex because religion and the time at which the story takes place have to be taken into account here. It would also be very interesting to read about lust from the women's perspective rather than purely the men's.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

the next 50 years of solitude

Finishing this book was like a whirlwind (though not as dramatic as the literal whirlwind at the end of the story of course.) I still find it an impressive feat that Garcia Marquez managed to fit 7 generations in a single novel without it being a Tolstoy-length monstrosity. This half of the story was a bit easier to wrap my head around, having got through the first half. However, a lot of my initial thoughts carried through. In my last blog post, I mentioned nominative determinism being the idea that your name somewhat dictates your character, and I could definitely see that in Aureliano and Amaranta Ursula's son - the one who was born with a pig's tail. They briefly considered giving him a name that hadn't been used before in the family, but decided against it, calling him Aureliano all over again and oh look he's got a tail and the family curse prevails. If they could "simply" untether themselves from the family curse and the seemingly neverending cycles the...
Read more

i got stuck in the labyrinth

 Truth be told, this was not the book for me. I disliked this one as much as I enjoyed the previous one. I definitely see the playful aspect of the book, and I can see why other people have enjoyed it - having read some of the blogs that are already up - but I think this style of play just isn't very compatible with my reading. The title of the book definitely makes sense to me though; reading it felt like going round and round a maze, momentarily feeling like I understand what's going on before turning the corner and seeing that I was going in the wrong direction the whole time. Perhaps if I were to read some of the stories a second time I would be able to better digest the themes and the happenings, but for the most part I felt like I was trying to grasp at straws to understand what was being said. All that aside, the two stories that were marginally easier for me to follow were Funes the Memorious and The Shape of the Sword. Perhaps it was to do with my mindset at the time o...
Read more

I, Rigoberta Menchu

 I, Rigoberta Menchu is probably one of my favourites of the term so far. I believe it's the first (and only?) non-fictional text of the term - although this is partially debated a la Jon's lecture - because it's not a novel, but a testimonial about life as an Indigenous K'iche' Maya woman and her family in Guatemala during the civil war. The subject matter of this book was not completely foreign to me; having read and studied some of the impacts of colonialism and its impacts on Indigenous people, past and present, I think I came in to reading the story with a fairly good sense of what to expect. That said, I'd never read anything specifically about the case in Guatemala, so there was definitely much to be learned there. I can't say that I was completely surprised by what I read in the book, because I was already primed to expect absolutely horrible brutality. Nonetheless, I found the reading experience tough and sometimes found myself skimming over the mos...
Read more