Here's a little taste

For those of you who will not be able to enjoy my project here's a little sample.

I compared photographs taken by the author, Juan Rulfo, of a book, Pedro Paramo, that I read...here are some observations

“Madre e hijo” (63)

 

“Mother and Child”

 

 

“My illusions made me live longer than I should have. And that was the price I paid to find my son, who in a manner of speaking was just one more illusion. Because I never had a son. Now that I’m dead I’ve had time to think and understand. God never gave me so much as a nest to shelter my baby in. Only an endless lifetime dragging myself from pillar to post, sad eyes casting sidelong glances, always looking past people, suspicious that this one or that one had hidden my baby from me.” (60)

 

            Dorotea is a lost soul who lives like the wife of her brother.  She is buried with Juan Preciado and shares the stories of Comala with him.  One piece of her life that she tells Preciado about is her non-existent son.  First Dorotea has a good dream where she has a child; “[she] could feel him in [her] arms, [her] sweet baby, with his little mouth and eyes and hands. For a long time, [she] could feel his eyelids, and the beating of his heart, on [her] fingertips.” (60) This dream was as life-like as could be for her; she had no reason to think that she did not have a baby boy.  But then she has her bad dream and loses the boy, goes to heaven and is told by God that she was given “a mother’s heart but the womb of a whore.”(60)  Back in reality, Dorotea has no babe to care for and love.  Without a husband (before her brother) and baby boy, Dorotea is in a complete seclusion, similar to many of the characters of the novel.  She feels that she doesn’t even “steal space on this earth.” (61)

When viewers who have read Pedro Páramo gaze upon “Madre e hijo,” they cannot help but to see Dorotea as that mother looking down at the baby.  There is a look of skepticism, not affection, in the mother’s eye.  She is carrying the baby, wrapped in her rebozo, yet the baby is not even looking her mother in the eyes.  The picture itself is not a cheery one despite the fact that it is a picture of a mother holding her babe.  The mother’s face and neck are covered in shadows.  Rulfo shooting this photo demonstrates to the viewers that happiness in Mexico cannot even be found between a mother and child.  Although one cannot see the mouth of the child, the truth is in its eyes.  The baby looks frightened or intimidated by its mother.  From this picture, the viewers only know that the mother at that moment was not even happy to be looking down at her own creation that she is supposed to love with infinite passion.  This picture is a reflection of the hard times in Mexico. Even within families, the easiest source of happiness, happiness cannot be found.