Structure and Restructuration in "Al filo del agua"

Abstract

Agust?n Y??ez's Al filo de agua (M?xico: Porr?a, 1947) could be classified as a novel of the Mexican Revolution, yet it is unlike any of its predecessors. Y??ez does not attempt to recreate a given aspect of that turbulent period of Mexico's past. Rather, he presents an intense study of the human interrelationships that make up the collective personality of a rural village in Jalisco, illuminated by lightning flashes from an impending deluge. Through modern techniques the reader senses the emotional climate of the village in Y??ez's introductory Acto Preparatorio, whose motifs and Baroque style establish the hermetic, stifling ambient of a Mexican village during the latter days of the Porfirian regime. An aura of death pervades the novel from the beginning with the dominant image of the village women in mourning. Death, as The Enemy (Satan), is the unseen but oppressive force that tends to reduce the villagers to passive, stoical nothingness. Although there is an oscillation between individual and group scenes throughout the novel, the true protagonist is the collective whole of the village; the individuals are, with few exceptions, presented as a relationship to that whole.