Book Review
May. 12th, 2020 12:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kenjariPedro Páramo
by Juan Rulfo
This short novel is moody, brooding, and atmospheric. It starts with a man named Juan Preciado fulfilling his mother's dying wish to return to her home village of Comala and see the father he has never met, Pedro Paramo. Upon arrival, Juan finds Comala all but deserted, a literal ghost town populated mainly by the specters of the former residents. Juan's encounters with these ghosts tells the story of Pedro Paramo and the town he lorded over.
Rulfo tells the story of Comala in a fractured fashion, shifting between ghostly narrators and time periods, but it's always pretty clear what's going on. The narrative is more concerned with conveying a sense of place and atmosphere than with telling a dynamic story. It's more about what seeps through across time and space and what secrets and truths are yielded up by the march of time and the release of death.
by Juan Rulfo
This short novel is moody, brooding, and atmospheric. It starts with a man named Juan Preciado fulfilling his mother's dying wish to return to her home village of Comala and see the father he has never met, Pedro Paramo. Upon arrival, Juan finds Comala all but deserted, a literal ghost town populated mainly by the specters of the former residents. Juan's encounters with these ghosts tells the story of Pedro Paramo and the town he lorded over.
Rulfo tells the story of Comala in a fractured fashion, shifting between ghostly narrators and time periods, but it's always pretty clear what's going on. The narrative is more concerned with conveying a sense of place and atmosphere than with telling a dynamic story. It's more about what seeps through across time and space and what secrets and truths are yielded up by the march of time and the release of death.
