Cosmopolitanism in the Provinces: Time, Space and Character in Intramuros

Abstract

gies. His first novel, Violeta-Perui (1979), is set in Mexico City, the focus of Mexican life economic, cultural and political -for the past twenty-five years, and correspondingly, the predominant scene for Mexican fictions in the period. The protagonist, a proletarian Walter Mitty, extends the brief narrative time by daydreaming about what might be or might have been. His narration, rendered unreliable by frustration, fear and alcohol, and the spatial and temporal fragmentation which juxtaposes reality, fantasy and episodes which blend elements of both, combine to provide a variety of possible readings. The resolution, however, definitively casts the protagonist's increasingly violent reaction to his personal and social limitations as imaginary and futile. Two collections of short stories indicate the trajectory of the author's development. The early stories of Del tiempo y otros lugares (1979), express preoccupations of the early 1970's and, together, represent a rejection of literary realism. Finding their inspiration in literature, they create oppressive, uneasy atmospheres in which the dynamic of the imagination has priority over a detached perception of reality. In the flow between the real and the fantastic, at the margins of the rationally described world, indetermination prevails. Los viejos asesinos (1983), his second collection of short stories, refines some of the earlier preoccupations and recasts them in a firmly realistic frame: the setting and the linguistic codes are distinctly Mexican. The stories focus on the relativity of values and the individual perspective on reality. The focalization through a solitary character who frequently becomes a victim of his own obsessions and the considered use of innovative narrative techniques elaborate texts which are disquieting and subversive to the generally perceived order of things. Intramuros (1984) differs from the earlier novel in three important ways. It is set in Veracruz rather than in Mexico City, it looks back upon an important phenomenon in the history of the Republic and it tells a story that is more readily accessible than many modern narratives. These qualities are examples of three characteristics of the Mexican novel identified by John S. Brushwood in his recent study of the genre: a renewal of interest in the provinces, an expression of nostalgia in different forms, and straightforward narration.