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324 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1953
鈥 asked myself whether, in bygone days, men had longed for bygone days as I, this summer morning, longed for certain ways of life that man had lost forever.
With its cargo of bellowing bulls, coops of chickens, pigs running about the deck under the hammock of the Capuchin and getting tangled up in his rosary of seeds, the song of the Negress cooks, the laughter of the Greek diamond-hunter, the prostitute in her mourning nightgown bathing in the prow, the guitar-players making music for the sailors to dance, this ship of ours made me think of Bosch鈥檚 Ship of Fools.
But dates were still losing figures. In headlong flight the years emptied, ran backward, were erased, restoring calendars, moons, changing centuries numbered in three figures to those of single numbers. The gleam of the Grail has disappeared, the nails have fallen from the Cross, the moneychangers have returned to the temple, the Star of Bethlehem has faded, and it is the year 0, when the Angel of the Annunciation returned to heaven.
鈥淟a a帽eja prosa sigue v谩lida.鈥�Y tanto sigue v谩lida que, a pesar de algunas cositas con las que el autor y yo hemos tenido nuestros m谩s y nuestros menos, y que sin su innegable genio quiz谩 me habr铆a molestado un poquito, la novela me ha gustado entre bastante y mucho. El texto, barroco, culto y hermos铆simo, puede leerse gozosamente como si de una novela de aventuras se tratara, en el sentido que puede serlo 鈥淓l coraz贸n de las tinieblas鈥�, novela a la que sin duda esta debe mucho. Pero, al igual que la novela de Conrad, la de Carpentier es mucho m谩s que eso.
鈥淟o sorprendente es que -ahora que nunca me preocupa la hora- percibo a mi vez los distintos valores de los lapsos, la dilataci贸n de algunas ma帽anas, la parsimoniosa elaboraci贸n de un crep煤sculo, at贸nito ante todo lo que cabe en ciertos tiempos de esta sinfon铆a que estamos leyendo al rev茅s, de derecha a izquierda, contra la clave de sol, retrocediendo hacia los compases del G茅nesis.鈥�En este viaje se ir谩n contraponiendo los valores de la llamada civilizaci贸n 鈥攄ecadente鈥� frente a los de la vida primitiva 鈥攕imple y aut茅ntica鈥� en lo que me pareci贸 una visi贸n excesivamente id铆lica y algo condescendiente del hombre salvaje y de los modos y maneras primitivos, tanto m谩s cuanto m谩s se alejaba de la periferia y 鈥渟uperficialidad鈥� que supone el hombre civilizado y se acercaba al centro del 鈥渉ombre verdadero鈥�.
鈥溾€� una humanidad sensible y cultivada -sin hacer caso del humo abyecto de ciertas chimeneas, por las que hab铆an brotado, un poco antes, plegarias aulladas en yiddish- segu铆a coleccionando sellos, estudiando las glorias de la raza, tocando peque帽as m煤sicas nocturnas de Mozart, leyendo La Sirenita de Andersen a los ni帽os.鈥�Nada que reprochar a los ataques a esas gentes, hoy mayor铆a, que han trocado su alma por el 煤ltimo dispositivo autom谩tico (realmente curiosa la leyenda de los mayas guatemaltecos en la que se cuenta c贸mo 鈥渓os objetos y enseres inventados por el hombre, y usados con ayuda del fuego, se rebelan contra 茅l y le dan muerte鈥�), que han perdido la perspectiva de lo que importa, que mantienen ritos por la simple costumbre que legitima o condena actitudes, acciones y personas, que viven sometidas a las 鈥渧oluntades ajenas鈥�, que consideran graves problemas circunstancias que nada suponen, etc., etc., etc. (鈥渓os hacedores de Apocalipsis鈥�).
鈥淯n d铆a, los hombres descubrir谩n un alfabeto en los ojos de las calcedonias, en los pardos terciopelos de la falena, y entonces se sabr谩 con asombro que cada caracol manchado era, desde siempre, un poema.鈥�Nada me inclina a pensar que el ser humano no sea ahora tan bueno y tan malo como lo ha sido siempre. Bien es verdad que las duras condiciones naturales de aquellos tiempos primitivos, la necesidad y la amenaza siempre presente obliga a preocuparse 煤nicamente de lo esencial, a disfrutar de los gozos m谩s simples y gratuitos, a un mayor respeto por mitos y ritos que se viven m谩s profundamente, a la solidaridad con los otros. Pero tambi茅n es cierto que ese apego y preocupaci贸n por los dem谩s con mucha frecuencia se acaba abruptamente poco m谩s all谩 de la propia familia y puede convertirse en una atroz brutalidad con la tribu distante un mero d铆a de camino.
鈥淗e tratado de enderezar un destino torcido por mi propia debilidad y de m铆 ha brotado un canto -ahora trunco- que me devolvi贸 al viejo camino, con el cuerpo lleno de cenizas, incapaz de ser otra vez el que fui.鈥�
These were the days for the accumulation of humus, the rotting and decay of the fallen leaves, in keeping with the law decreeing that all generation shall take place in the neighborhood of excretion, that organs of generation shall be intertwined with those of urination, and that all that is born shall come into the world enveloped in mucus, serum, and blood--just as out of manure comes the purity of the asparagus and the green of mint. p. 229This was my first exposure to Carpentier and I was immediately struck by the quality of his sentences. He writes a dense sentence, almost wild in its serpentine way, easy to get lost in. It feels a bit like you're in a jungle and the words are vines climbing up your leg. This became especially effective in chapter four, when our protagonist actually enters the jungle... the prose achieved a sort of ultimate mirroring of its content.
One felt the presence of rampant fauna, of the primeval slime, of the green fermentation beneath the dark waters, which gave off a sour reek like a mud of vinegar and carrion, over whose oily surface moved insects made to walk on the water: chinch-bugs, white fleas, high-jointed flies, tiny mosquitoes that were hardly more than shimmering dots in the green light, for the green, shot through by an occasional ray of sun, was so intense that the light as it filtered through the leaves had the color of moss dyed the hue of the swamp-bottoms as it sought the roots of the plants. p. 161Though his prose was thrilling, it was also a little exhausting because it never lets up. At times, when I was really tuned in to what he was saying, it was like crawling into the dense undergrowth and feeling completely at home. But other times, when my attention was flagging after a long day, I could hardly concentrate on the complex workings of what he was saying. I had to read sentences over and over, as if grasping for a downed limb.
Because here, amidst the multitude that surrounded me and rushed madly and submissively, I saw many faces and few destinies. And this was because, behind these faces, every deep desire, every act of revolt, every impulse was hobbled by fear. Fear of rebuke, of time, of the news of the collectivity that multiplied its forms of slavery. There was fear of one's own body, of the sanctions and pointing fingers of publicity; there was fear of the womb that opens to the seed, fear of the fruits and of the water; fear of the calendar, fear of the law, fear of slogans, fear of mistakes, fear of the sealed envelope, fear of what might happen.The adventure story itself was exciting, but as you probably know by now, plot alone doesn't do it for me. So what else interested me? First: the narrator, aside from the immense prose he writes, is also psychologically a very interesting dude. To me, he lies somewhere in between the unreliable narrator and the reliable one. You can see his pitfalls miles before they come, and perhaps he can too, but he is so good at convincing himself and you, piling illusion atop illusion. But these aren't crazy illusions, they are common ones, about civilization, nature, modernity vs. primitivity, art etc.
The thought invariably struck me that the only difference between my previous birthday and this one was the extra candle on the cake, which tasted like the last one... But to evade this, in the world that was my lot, was as impossible as trying to revive today certain epics of heroes or saints. We had fallen upon the era of the Wasp-Man, the No-Man, when souls were no longer sold to the Devil, but to the Bookkeeper or the Galley Master. p. 9The second thing about this story is that, even though it's straight forward, it is full of asides, tangents, and opportunities for our narrator to muse about this topic or that. These I found highly entertaining and often insightful, and always perfectly phrased. I wouldn't have enjoyed the direct route as much as the one provided here, with all the views and vistas of his mind.
Overhead, into the thinning mist, rose the peaks of the city: the patinaless spires of the Christian churches, the dome of the Green Orthodox church, the large hospital where White Eminences officiated beneath classical entablatures designed by those architects who, early in the century, sought to lose their way in an increase of verticality. p. 10