Review of "The Salt of the Earth"

 
                                                              "What can you do?"
                                                              "I can weld."
                                                              "I'm sorry, but all we have for Mexicans is labor."

                                                                     (Dialogue between Juan Chacon and personnel man at  
                                                                      Kennecott Copper Mining Co., reproduced in The Revenge of
                                                                      the Saguaro, p. 121)

I’m ashamed to say that I hadn’t seen the film The Salt of the Earth until recently. It is a classic film that details an episode of labor strife in the Southwest in the early 50s, that of the strike by the overwhelmingly Mexican-American members of Local 890 against Empire Zinc. It furthermore expands its scope to treat other struggles for emancipation, including racial and gender equality as well as the labor struggle. It was a film that was produced under difficult circumstances, as described by the writer Tom Miller in a chapter devoted to classic Southwestern films incorporated in his book Revenge of the Saguaro, and it is filled with charismatic performances, by professionals and amateurs alike, and by a poetic reflection of what emancipation means.  

 

After my confession about this film, I would have to add that I was no stranger to labor fights. My father was a union man, and he worked for over three decades for a company that manufactured industrial clay pipes to be used for construction projects. It was a labor-intensive occupation, and almost all the laborers were Mexican immigrants (like my father) or Mexican-Americans, with the supervisory and managerial staff consisting overwhelmingly of people of Anglo descent. As a child I always wondered about this disparity, and why it was that the company seemed not to want to recruit workers of other ethnic groups. Perhaps they thought that it made for a much more subservient labor force, one that as I grew older I came to realize was easier to exploit.

When I was an adolescent, I remember that my father’s union found it necessary to engage in a strike action. It was a calamitous affair, and as a family we were hard put to make ends meet. There was a strike fund, of course, but it wasn’t nearly enough, and we had to rely on donations from the food pantry run by our local church. I was taken to the strike line by my father from time to time, and it was a shock to me to see these middle-aged Mexican men, the overwhelming majority of whom spoke little English and had received little formal education, who were hard pressed to define the term “proletariat” but who knew, deep down inside, that they were the “trabajadores”, the workers who made the company run. It was winter, and they stood awkwardly in a line, holding firm with their picket signs, ones that I would venture to say they couldn’t understand because they were written in English.

The surrounding landscape then as now, as one traverses south on the 15 freeway and leaves the Inland Empire to enter San Diego county, is ringed with bare and rocky hills, features that have a certain majesty to them.  There is little vegetation, and these bare and stark hills that were slowly being gouged out by quarries and other industrial enterprises served as a bleak background to a strike that was similarly facing long odds. Unfortunately the pressure became too much, more so than could be endured even by the clay pipes that these workers molded and fired in immense furnaces, to be subsequently attached and shipped to construction sites, and the workers gave up. Their resolve broke, and they were forced to settle, because quite simply they could not budge the management which proved harder than the surrounding rocky hills. I think my father actually compared the workers to the landscape, that was forced to slough off layers, that was being graded for future development projects and that was little able to resist the earth movers brought to bear by company owners and the apparatus of industrial capitalism. I suspect, also, that the strike failed because they were unable to rally public support to their side. There were numerous fissures in play, here, and one of these involved the fact that this ethnic workforce of Mexican immigrant laborers was little able to garner the attention, much less the sympathy, of the surrounding Anglo-American community, one which felt little affinity for their situation, and was more likely to see them return to being an invisible community.

As indicated before, we struggled during the course of this strike, and it became quickly evident to me when my father lost his resolve. In the beginning it must all have been novel to him, my father, who had moved up from being an agricultural laborer who traveled up and down the length of California in the decade of the 60s, and who bragged about having met César Chávez. I was taken to the picket lines by my father to catch a glimpse of the reality of working class struggle, and perhaps, so that I would learn to appreciate his struggles and overcome our mutual estrangement. He communicated to me his stark vision of Capitalism, and spoke to me of supervisors who treated them contemptuously, of haughty executives who arrived in luxury cars and refused to speak to workers, and of owners who from time to time condescended to visit the plant, descending as if from the stars. They, the workers, labored in unsafe conditions, with gauze masks that little protected them from the fumes and the clay residue that filled the air when they cut into these massive pipes, and in my father’s case, labored in furnace-like temperatures as they clay was tempered, barely earning above minimum wage. They lost this strike, and had to return in all humility to accept a token grant of consideration of their issues, and he never forgot his bitterness, especially at the taunts of management who relayed to him that had the workers maintained union solidarity for just a few more weeks, they would have won.

I was prompted to remember this episode while viewing The Salt of the Earth, an independent film from 1954. It was produced, filmed and directed by a group of blacklisted Hollywood professionals, those who, during the climate of the times, had come under suspicion of harboring Communist sympathies. It detailed the struggle of Mill and Mine Workers Union Local 890, which had engaged in a bitter strike against Empire Zinc. This was a long struggle that lasted approximately 15 months, notable for the intransigence of company management, for the collusion of the local New Mexico authorities who tried to suppress this mine action, and for the ideological awakening of an entire community, the Mexican and Mexican-American working classes of the region.

 

 

The film used a combination of professionals as well as amateurs to write, produce and act in the film.  This arrangement arose not only from practical considerations for a film that was being prepared on location, but also because few professionals could be attracted to participate in the project, it being subject to sanction by the official Hollywood Labor Unions who were still reeling from the scrutiny of the McCarthy era.  It was also a quite conscious decision that revealed the ideological underpinnings of the producers. It was to be a work that was to serve as a social document, one that would chronicle a social struggle in a sensitive as well as authentic way, although it was to be revealed later that the screenplay that was written by Paul Jarrico was altered to delete scenes that members of the working community, almost all Mexican and Mexican-American as state before, felt would have reflected poorly on their (our) culture. This doesn’t change the fact that this was a film that brought attention to issues that had escaped consideration, especially that of gender inequality.

The film initially seems like an exercise in socialist realism. By this I am referring to the approved genre of filmmaking that was common in the Eastern bloc, as well as in the work of western authors and directors who wished to focus on the plight of the working classes (think of the work of the Italian Vittorio De Sica). It was filmed in black and white, and the barren landscape of New Mexican llanos figured prominently as a reflection of an almost metaphysical condition of isolation for this community. The working classes have always faced long odds, and in this case, we have a one-company mining town with all that this implies about their dominance over the local institutional framework. The judicial apparatus, the law enforcement apparatus, the economic infrastructure, and even the cultural values all were subservient to the interests of the company, one that looms like an “octopus”, if we can refer to the title of the famous Frank Norris novel of the 19^th century that detailed the machinations of the railroad barons.

We are introduced to a Mexican-American couple, Ramón and Esperanza Quintero, and we immediately become aware of the bleakness of their situation. Because this situation is presented in such stark fashion, and one suspects, is magnified and exaggerated to accentuate this dramatic aspect, we can well view this approach as one that is thesis-driven. It is meant to illustrate an argument in clear and stark terms, wishing to advance the argument that the strike action was justified because the conditions were quite manifestly exploitative and unjust. We see this exaggerated quality (which is not to say that they were false, but only that they are accentuated by the film) in the intensity of the conflicts presented, in the confrontations both with the mine executives as well as among the mine workers themselves. And this dramatic quality is evident in the quiet but also at times desperate voiceover narration of the character of Esperanza Quintero, who was played by the Mexican actress Rosaura Revueltas.

 

This family lives in dire poverty, and the workers are forced to labor in unsafe conditions. They feel discriminated against, for it is claimed over and over that the Anglo mine workers not only receive better pay, but also, have running water in their company housing and better conditions in general. It is a classic strategy used by the executive and managerial classes to foment workers disunity, pitting one group of workers against another, and in this case, resisting the demands of the Anglo workers by asserting that they are better off than the “Mexicans”. We see in this film a process whereby the prototypical worker comes to an class awakening and slowly sees the “larger picture” (a phrase that is repeatedly bandied about in the film by the characters as it is amplified to encompass different struggles). The protagonist was played by an actual miner who participated in the real-life strike, Juan Chacón, who was not the first choice of the director. He proved a revelation in the film, managing as he did to convey the honesty and emotional struggle of a man who had reached the limits of what he could endure, and yet chose to struggle with quiet and uncompromising dignity. He was also pushed, we might add, by the character of his wife, who brings to the front her own issues.

We are fighting a multi-pronged fight, and because of the fact that the screenplay chose to acknowledge these enduring concerns we have a film that has aged gracefully, and continues to engross current audiences. It illustrates the drama of a company town and the fight waged by ethnic working-class miners who wish to assert their right to equal treatment, “No more, No less”, according to the placards they carry. But it also illustrates the struggle wage on the domestic front, bringing to attention the oppression of women within these same households.

We have the situation presented by Esperanza Quintero, who in her demeanor in the beginning of the film seems to be shell-shocked by a barren life that has been stripped of all hope, but who slowly comes awake as she comes to believe in her own dignity. This is portrayed quite convincingly by the actress, whose face slowly comes to life as the struggle progresses, and whose first awakening occurs when she is serenaded by her husband who has to be reminded by his son that it is her saint’s day. Esperanza slowly becomes politicized and finds the language to express the grievances and concerns that characterize her situation. She becomes an “organic intellectual” for her own class of oppressed women, to use Gramscian terminology, and she is able to elaborate her own arguments with an eloquence that becomes one of the hallmarks of this film.

As relayed by the real-life striker Juan Chacón in subsequent interviews concerning the real-life strike, this company housing was very sparse. It consisted of only two rooms, a kitchen and a bedroom, and these families had little in the way of consumer luxuries. In the film the character of Esperanza feels anguish over the threat of impoundment of the radio that was bought on credit, and we come to realize that the radio represents more than just an idle luxury. It symbolizes more, an aspirational goal, the idea that people of their class can aspire to dreams and to recreation, to living a more complete existence, and not settling for one that is circumscribed by the struggle to acquire the bare necessities. The radio is important to her, Esperanza asserts, and in one memorable scene, it serves as the excuse to invade the space that has been carved out by the men who have gathered to play poker. The women barge out of the bedroom, turn on the radio, and force the men to dance, with festive scenes as always representing a space of community engagement.

In the midst of their struggles, we are also witness to moments of drama. The workers hold firm in their picket line, even as they are intimidated and insulted by the town authorities, who do their best to break this line. There are racial slurs, beatings, imprisonment and the grating paternalism of company executives, especially the president and chief executive officer who is almost a caricature of the evil Capitalist owner. Thus the contrasts are set, and we see once again that the film is, perhaps, too ideological and programmatic at times, and perhaps did settle into using common stereotypes (the men seem much too noble at times also). But there is honesty to these portrayals, as well, and while the workers may frequently express themselves with a certain lapidary quality, with diction that is far too eloquent and too poetic to seem spontaneous and authentic, we see that the film nonetheless condenses many of the feelings so that they may be expressed in a memorable way. The script, one must remember, did have input from the workers, an action that was deemed necessary by the producers to accord with the ideological purity of this film. It is certainly not the way that I remember my father and the other striking men of a later age and struggle expressing themselves, with all the bitterness, ethnic slurs, and rough humor of the working classes. (Quite honestly, I don’t think that many of them ever saw the “big” picture as it related to gender equality.)

The dialogue is engaging and poetic, nonetheless, and lingers in our minds. In moments of emotional excitement, the characters speak in Spanish, and there are no subtitles, although the audience can well determine the gist of what is being said because it is usually subsequently elaborated in English. And, we have the narration of the female character of Esperanza who puts things into perspective as she narrates how she herself has changed as a consequence of this struggle. After the men are served with a court order to desist picketing (workers are prohibited to continue forming a picket line), the women’s auxiliary decides to step in, and they take the place of their husbands, forming a picket line that draws the incorporation of other women from the town many of whom had no direct involvement with the company. It is an issue that has expanded, and has become an assertion of a right to gender equality, for the struggle is being undertaken on many fronts.

Esperanza has a hard time convincing her husband, nonetheless. As with many men who come from a working-class background, Ramón has difficulty accepting this struggle that his wife advocates. Their marriage becomes troubled because he refuses to see her as a partner, and in one harrowing scene, we have him attempting to reassert his authority over her in a way which echoes the way in which the mine owners and executives attempt to repress workers’ demands. She exclaims, “Whose neck shall I step on to make me feel superior? I don’t want anyone lower than I am. I am low enough already”, a bitter recrimination and appeal to his better senses, as well as a searing statement of her own condition. It is this dialogue that condenses so many of these concerns in poetic fashion and it proves irresistible to the viewer, forming part of the staying power of this film among contemporary audiences.

The strike was eventually won, after numerous other dramatic episodes. It leads to a lasting change in the protagonists, in Ramón and Esperanza, whose consciousness has been expanded as a result of this struggle. It is an optimistic film, and it harks back to a period when the labor movement was stronger even if it was as ever embattled. There was a certain paternalism even within the unions, and it took some time for them to open up to address the concerns of other groups, for it was the case that many unions of the period were not sympathetic and were, furthermore, hostile to the incorporation of, for example, African Americans. As it was being filmed it was subject to derogatory characterization and hostile press, and was derided as a “racial issue propaganda movie” by The Hollywood Reporter, while labor columnist Victor Reisel asserted that the film constituted a dangerous precedent because it “brought two carloads of Negroes into the mining town” for a scene in which the film was, one gathered, to condemn an incident of mob violence against African-Americans (p. 128). It was a difficult time, and of course, it was filmed in a period during which the Civil Rights movement was gestating, to bloom subsequently in the 60s and 70s.

It is, indeed, an ideological film, and it does have a thesis, which strives to equate the emancipation struggles being waged on several fronts. It is possible to appreciate the movie for what it is, which is a social document of an era (one which rings close to home for me, because the issues were much the same as nowadays, because I witnessed this oppressive family dynamics in my own case, and because we continue to deal with an economic structure that is as divisive as it ever was, and has furthermore become more and more alienating as power has accrued to vast corporations), but it also offers an inspirational view that seeks to counter the deep-seated cynicism that has infected so many of us. It reminds me, of course, of other films, such as Norma Rae and Bread and Roses, among others, but in this case, the honesty of the workers and the earnestness of their characters combine to invest them with a timeless quality.

The issues are much the same, yes, and we can only hope that the epic of these latter day struggles, whether it be the gender, ethnic and labor movements, will soon have a successful conclusion. It may perhaps always be the case that these increased rights are won on a piecemeal basis, but it is necessary nonetheless to draw attention to them, and to have the courage to promote artistic works that highlight these issues, rather than the eternal tsunami of apolitical and anti-ideological films (read, all the action adventure big budget sequels and facile comic adolescent films a la Judd Apatow that seem to have little relation to current issues) that have been all the rage in recent decades.

 

Copyrighted OGRomero (C) 2013

Copyrighted by Oscar G. Romero 2013

El interior (2nd version)

This is the story of the little one who was thrown into the bowels of a proud and ornery mountain and lived to tell about it.

Although times have changed, and the land has similarly been changed beyond all recognition, some forms remain the same, like stories that survive because they speak about things that have been and always will be. The land may assume different appearances and may be transmuted into different forms, but the relationships persist, because the forms are connected and because they work out of similar logic. This land, like everything else, was born and grew and matured, facing its own set of eternal challenges, before it declined and changed and gave way to new forms. The ocean speaks to the clouds, which in turn weep on the land that receives these tears and in turn crumbles seeps away, flowing eventually back to the ocean. And the rhythm of these processes has its own patterns and music, punctuated by the cracks of lightning and icebergs that fall away during the summer, or percussive like the throbbing of hail on the vast drums of the plains, or soft and shimmering like the fall winds and gentle breezes that, like the caresses of a nurturing mother, lull the land to sleep as night advances. It is never completely quiet for those who know how to listen, nor are the mountains and valleys, lakes and deserts and clouds and oceans ever truly alone.

This land has seen the arrival of new peoples and new ways that have swept away what came before. There is an ebb and flow to these movements, an eternal retreat and advance. Can we compare the wonders of a windswept valley that is surrounded by peaks and dry air, burning in its time in accord with the seasons and yet ever renewing itself in a new profusion of growth, with the pale and ultimately ephemeral vistas of towers and bridges and vast and teeming anthills that are crisscrossed by asphalt rivers and that are visited by innumerable and ponderous winged creatures that constitute our modern-day urban agglomerations? If one were to stop and consider but only for a moment, one would see that the likeness of forms persists eternally, and that the ghost of the past are ever-present. The air might have been cleaner in the past, less permeated with sulfur and carbon and the residue of eternal combustion, but the fact is that combustion was ever-present, and had its seasons and its purpose. The exuberant forests that once stretched as far as the eye could see have now been receded into disconnected parcels, lingering like refuges after the rise of the storm waters, and the metallic flood of the present with all the fury of destruction will be but a moment in time as well. And the land will persist, and the Rumbling One will wake from its dream and take stock of what has changed, and will proclaim things much as they always were.

Long ago, before the arrival of the steel buttresses and the shimmering lights of dotted the urban anthills of modern times, there was a mountain that occupied a range of land that was seeded with many others of its type. It had a wide base, and it rose to dominate the terrain, being taller and older than its sisters and brothers that dotted the landscape in a string of family that stretched to the west. It was a simpler time back then, for as the mountains grew taller, there were always distractions, and the cold at their cusp somehow dulled their senses. Back then the air was more transparent, and the mountains talked to each other, answering in the language of their kind, which was a mix of deep grumblings, sustained grating sounds punctuated from time to time by fiery outbursts. The noise of the one could be felt on the other side of the Earth, for the roots of the mountains lay deep, and they were all ultimately connected, like family.

There was little use for empty and showy language, with formulas of courtesy or with the vivid and creative snap of invective. The land communicated in a straightforward way, and because it had all the time in the world, it merely repeated the same stories, filling them in with details that were revealed in innumerable hues and traces and sensations, of colors, sounds, and mineral dispersal, among the other languages that were spoken. The clouds wept, but not always, and the wind chilled and refreshed, but could at times be deathly quiet, and the minerals and metals and ores underneath the mountain flowed and dispersed and imparted their own taste to the mountain that was ever digesting them, engaged as it was in an eternal repast. But the mountain also communicated with the little ones who inhabited its slopes, and who were like a shimmer at the edge of its vision.

The mountain had need of communication, and while its senses were multifaceted, and glacial in scope, it had taken note of the companionship offered by the little ones. These communities of overgrown and upright ants had gathered on its sides, having come thousands of years ago from the north, and had settled on the mountain, tending to it in their own way. The mountain felt them as they scraped their plots of land on its side, created terraced fields, and as they cleared away groves of upland pine and other trees, and channeled the streams of water so that they were used to soothe away the itching of the skin that was poked by these little ones. It took note of their activity, and of the way in which these communities shaped the mountain in their own modest way, grooming it after their fashion. And for the most part, it tolerated them, for it had little orientation towards malice.

The people who lived on the mountain were a hardy sort, patient and tolerant and hardworking. They lived according to rhythms that had not changed substantially over thousands of years, ever since their first ancestors had arrived to this land, finding it to be suitable to their needs. They tried their best to treat the mountain with respect, for they were naturally appreciative of any sign of hospitality, and because they viewed it as an elder, one who was not remote but instead took an active part in their lives. These people called the mountain the Rumbling One, and offered it companionship, talking to it often, offering their service and treating it with honor. Most of the time the mountain was quiet, although many said that that it was never fully silent, for they could feel the pulse of its heartbeat under their feet, and they were well aware of its red heart that swirled deep inside, deep in the caldera. They proclaimed their intent to help beautify their mountain, to stabilize it when parts crumbled or were swept away during occasional storms, and when it had need trees and bushes to provide cover for those areas that must surely have grown otherwise sunburnt and calloused under the weight of the sun’s rays.

Despite the care that was given by these people, the soothing of its side with the flow of water that was collected and used for irrigation, and the chipping away at the callouses of its skin as the years flowed, the Rumbling One had always had difficulty breathing. It was one of the great afflictions of its kind, and it was due perhaps in large measure to the fact that its heart was too fiery. From time to time it had need to catch its breath, for it was in danger of suffocating, and while it appreciated the clear and chill air of the uplands, the pure and crystalline essence of the sky, this air was thin, and it did little to fill cool its heart.

So the mountain would from time to time catch its breath, clear its throat, cough and, from time to time, sneeze violently. It had little knowledge of what this meant for the people who lived on its sides, and who would wail at the first warning signs of an impending fit. The Rumbling One needed to breath, and it needed to cool itself off, and these were natural functions that could no more be repressed than the emanation of gases that emerged from its depths, and that bubbled forth out of vents and caves as well as bubbling out of the creeks that emerged from its sides. The mountain had a great wide gaping mouth, but it also had many nostrils, and these breathing passages from time to time grew clogged, and the air of its summit became too still, and its heart grew hotter, and maybe, just maybe, it simply felt like calling out mischievously to its sister hundreds of miles away, who was babbling in her sleep and who would jump if the brother coughed, it taking great pleasure in reminding itself that it had its own family. And because of these and other reasons, the Rumbling One would release part of its pent-up energy.

The people did their best to anticipate these events. They were ever attentive to the signs, for their lives depended on it, and because they knew that the mountain at time took little stock of its power and of how it could affect the lives of the community. They had prepared places of refuge, and paths that made any possible evacuation much easier. They knew of the many caves that dotted the mountain, and did their best to keep them clear, for they furthermore knew that noxious gases could accumulate within them, and for those who ventured too deep into these caves, they risked being overcome by the fumes and falling asleep, never to awaken again. The fumes, oddly, dried out organic matter, and they had found it useful to store part of their harvest of crops in some of these caves, to preserve them through the seasons, but they took care not to stockpile their inventories too deeply, for these were the passageways the Rumbling One needed to breathe. And, if the mountain were quiet, the tunnels could be useful during the winter, for they were always dry and warm, but only if the mountain were sleeping, for otherwise, the deadly fumes that normally lingered deep inside the cave might be pushed to the opening, and then the danger was all the greater of being overcome was all the greater for those who might wish to seek shelter there. So, it was best to evacuate and flee down the mountain, and for that purpose, it was best to maintain good relations with the people of the lowlands as well.

For the most part the people lived peacefully. There were other groups that lived on the mountain, for it was a very big and expansive area, and these people were shaped by their experiences so that they came to share similar beliefs. The people of the other half were also faithful in their attentions to the mountain, and they referred to each other as brothers. They came together for certain shared rituals and they traded stories that were very much alike, but that delighted for the difference in details. Their hospitality was somewhat more limited when it came to the people of the lowlands, who didn’t share many of the same affinities as those that resided on the mountain. Those who lived in the valleys and the flat areas where the water gathered in vast pools and the forests teemed with wild and exotic fruits and screeching animals such monkeys and macaws were of a different temperament. They seemed somehow busier, and were more forward, and also, most notably, louder. It was nonetheless necessary to maintain good relations with them, for they had useful products they could trade to the people of the mountain, and because one never knew if they might need to seek out refuge in their midst when the Rumbling One awoke.

The need for refuge was one that extended as well to the people of the valleys, for from time to time they were beset by their own troubles. It wasn’t only that they depended on the water that came from the mountain ranges and that flowed into their lakes, but also, that they were exposed to invasion by other groups from the north and east. There were aggressive communities that periodically made incursions into the valley, driven by the impetus of imperial ambition or, perhaps, by drought and pestilence or other factors, and they would attack the lowlanders. The signs were always clear to those of the mountains, and even before the first wave of refugees reached their highest slopes, they could often distinguish burning fires in the lowland settlements, and from time to time, catch the faint echo of cries, and the urgent warning of the drums that announced the call the arms.

For the most part the lowlanders were able to repulse the attack of these invaders. They gathered their armies, and proceeded to their battlements, waiting to withstand the inevitable sieges while their mobile forces rallied and struck at the flanks of their enemy. But it was also the case that at times the invading armies were too large and too desperate to be easily repulsed, and the lowlanders would send their armies to the mountain to gather strength, received as they were by the mountain dwellers, who helped them to restock and rest their forces to venture back down and resume the fight. The mountain was the ultimate battlement, and with the deep and intimate knowledge of the terrain, as well as with the use of obsidian knives that were mined in the upper reaches and attached to poles, as well as control of all routes of ascent, it was almost always the case that the lowlanders emerged to retake their valleys, renewing thus their bonds of friendship and obligation with the mountain dwellers as a sign of gratitude. But this didn’t change the fact that the lowlanders had a different temperament that was not entirely to the liking of the mountain dwellers. For one thing, they seemed to feel no similar reverence for the Rumbling One, and they instead expressed their devotion to the sun, and to the thunderclouds, and to the Deep One that they insisted swam contentedly at the bottom of their lake.

The matter of this lack of devotion to the Rumbling One was troubling to the mountain dwellers. They had little knowledge of the Deep One, and thought it at best a comical invention to terrify the simple-minded among them, for after all, did this Deep One ever make its presence felt the way the mountain did? And it was troubling as well to them that the valley dwellers spoke of so many entities, of the Dark One in the forests, and of the bears and snakes and their assorted menagerie. It sounded somewhat sacrilegious to the mountain dwellers who nonetheless stilled their tongues when in the company of valley dwellers, for they perceived this system as one that was unnecessarily complex and diverse, with little of the clarity they had come to value. Which is not to say that the mountain dwellers didn’t have a varied cosmology of their own, one that furthermore incorporated different entities and that was configured as a family of sorts.

There was the moon, of course, and the stars, and the eagles that soared majestically above it all. There were the winds which were given different names, and which were thought to be alive in their own right, embodiments of spirit that could wish one ill or good, and were quite treacherous at times, for they could arise suddenly and blow a person off a cliff and into the rocks below. There were the clouds, and the shadows that traversed the landscape, and which at times took their own volition and seemed to control their counterpart. There were the beetles and snakes and the insects, and of course, there were the plants that congregated in certain places, not in the way that the potatoes and chilies did when planted, but instead in huddled at the base of trees, or near streams, or even the fields of poppies and leaves that satisfied no appetite but instead increased it, dulling the senses and leaving the people in a dazed condition from which it was difficult to awake them. (These leaves were much prized in the commerce that was held with the people of the lowlands and valleys.) But there was never any doubt that the main source of power was the Rumbling One and his family, because he grew from the ground on which they and all the others including the valley people stood, and because he (for it was perceived as a “he”) was held to be the ultimate source in their cosmology for the sun, it being a tenet of their world view that this sun had been spit out by one such as the Rumbling One long ago, and that it had learned to fly out of envy for the eagles, who were also held to be sacred. The mountain gave signs of its awareness at every juncture, and while it could at times be forgetful, it wasn’t necessarily filled with malice, and it shared much the same temperament as their own elderly ones, but on a vaster scale. It could be called upon in times of need, but for the most part, it was best to groom and cultivate it quietly, and to do their part to insure that it sleep peacefully.

 

To be continued


Copyright OGRomero (c) 2013
Copyrighted by Oscar G. Romero 2013

A Summer Potboiler: A Review of "The Darwin Elevator"

One of the pleasures of the summer has always been having the time and disposition to be able to read widely and deeply. There is something about the bright sunlight and the vista of expanded time that invites us to enter a recreational mode.  Some people bicycle, others hike, some people work on their cars in their garages, others just settle down with a beer and watch a baseball game. There was always the illusion that we have more time than we can dispose of, that we have a surplus, so to speak, and so we are less harried than we normally are. For those with a more practical bent, they might plan to undertake home improvement projects, for this is undoubtedly the time, and the sunlight is enervating. I’ve always been on the opposite scale, and have preferred to read, a taste that is shared by others, since we have institutionalized what has come to be known as the summer reading list.

There is more than we can possibly read, and during the year, I accumulate far too many books. I stare at them guiltily, and try to at least open up them and read a few pages before putting them down again, because during the other seasons, I have far too much to do. Summer is different. This is when many of us feel that we actually have the time and, indeed, almost obligation to make a dent in the pile of projects we have been accumulating, and our inventory of books certainly qualifies as a project. We can’t watch television all the time, can we?

Whether it be mystery or crime novels, spy novels, the latest Stephen King or Tom Clancy or Robert Ludlum thrillers, or more conventional fare that we would rather not confess to reading otherwise, there is plenty from which to choose. I would like to think that this would be a good time to read those earnest historical treatises we have always told ourselves we would read, the biographies of Lyndon Baines Johnson, or maybe a more polemical tract, such as Barbara Ehrenreich’s Nickel and Dimed, Christopher Hitchens’ god is not Great, or Jorge Castañeda’s Mañana Forever?, a provocative title that hits a nerve for Latin Americans and those of Latin American descent such as myself. But somehow, it isn’t the season for it, and we settle into more well-worn tracks, which usually involve escapist fare.

Rather than read the turgid prose of an Edward Gibbon narrating the end of the Roman Empire, who wouldn’t want to put themselves into the mindset of a hardboiled detective, or of a hallowed explorer such as Earnest Shackleton? Of all the ways to while away the time, I return to favorite characters and genres, and in this instance happen to prefer novels by Martin Cruz Smith, whose stolid investigator, Arkady Renko, has been a favorite ever since I read Gorky Park as a teenager. There are other characters that I can return to again and again, even if they aren’t part of a series, but the essence of them is that they are always perhaps a little perplexed, never truly happy, and can be considered outsiders in the true sense of the word.

Others prefer romance novels, those with the colorful book covers and even more evocative titles, suggesting a perpetual dreamlike stoking of erotic energies. There is twilight, there are dark and mysterious characters, there are exotic locales, there are vines and lush tropical verdure, and all of it seems to contour itself around the parameters of what we can term “literary masturbation”. Am I being dismissive of this genre? I don’t wish to be, because even if I don’t read romance novels, I recognize their equivalent in other genre fiction I have read, most notably, the “Gor” novels of John Norman, or recognize similarly how these elements (titillation, fantasies of rescue and/or seduction, and rivalries and contests in which sexual gratification in the form of a queen or princess or seductive other) is evident in genre writers dating back to H. Rider Haggard and others. There is an element of passivity in the object of sexual conquest, whether it take place in a colonial realm (colonial eroticism) or in an imagined future scenario that serves as the spice for action, without any need for a lurid Frank Frazetta cover (he of the impossibly muscled warriors and the similarly exaggerated female sex objects).

I have long come to understand that it is precisely the formulaic aspect of these works that affords such pleasure to the reader. They want familiar characters, memorable characters and familiar settings, a contest, a quest, a romantic triangle, a puzzle waiting to be solved. They appeal to the need for engagement that we all feel as readers, and as with all genre fiction, it is we readers who project our own fantasies and desires and mold them so that they are contained within the distinct form that is assumed by this literature.  We collaborate with the author by faithfully anticipating the plot twists and the complications that will arise, and by feeling satisfied that the correct sequences (the complication, the climax, the denoument) are followed, as well as the devices, for example, in the mystery or crime novel, take the form of the obligatory summation of the parameters of the case that has just been solved. The characters emerge as they always do, not much changed, and there is a certain cognitive comfort in this as well, for we recognize a pattern that has once again been upheld. When we speak of escapism, we do it on familiar grounds, ironically.

In my case, I have always enjoyed reading science fiction. This genre affords many familiar pleasures to me, ever since I was a boy and picked up my first volume of Ray Bradbury short stories, R is for Rocket, S is for Space. I could always lose myself in those stories, me being a kid from a working class immigrant background, and who didn’t quite fit in with the other kids on my block. It always felt like familiar territory to me, this feeling of instability that took place on familiar ground, this feeling that there was a puzzle that had to be cracked, as if it were the analogue to my own social situation. As I grew older, I always reflected on the points of similarity between comic books, science fiction, crime novels (especially Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot novels) and other genre fiction that I always read, and could even recognize points of similarity with works that explored the experiences of ethnic communities, from Jewish to African-American or Mexican-American authors.  The idea was that we had a set of circumstances and we were carrying out, so to speak, a thought experiment, with a familiar catalogue of crisis and conflict scenarios that we saw over and over again. It was perhaps also comforting to see that there was always a point of resolution, because literature relied on the grammar of storytelling, and there was always a resolution, even if in life this tended to escape us, or at least, me.

Science fiction is in reality a compendium of genres, and it can conform or at least incorporate aspects of travel literature, potboilers, crime fiction, Modernist analysis, psychological thriller, and other genres. When I was young I remember reading the somewhat caustic travel narratives of Paul Theroux, especially his The Old Patagonia Express, and feeling as if the old colonialist view of Latin America was still very much at play in his work. Fortunately, I was later able to read a more sympathetic and enchanting book that detailed a sojourn to Ecuador, Tom Miller’s The Panama Hat Trail, and found myself entranced by the incorporation of folk lore and the ability of the author to describe his encounters with people of all socioeconomic backgrounds, whether or not these encounters were accurate and not romantic cuadros de costumbres (quaint character sketches). There was also the lyrical account by a writer such as Bruce Chatwin of the psychic landscape of Australia, The Songlines, or Alex Shoumatoff’s evocation of Brasilia and the eternal frontier, The Capital of Hope. These books were powerful hallucinatives for a young man such as myself, and perhaps, they could also be classified as a form of escapist literature.

This being the summer, I was desperate to read a good science fiction novel, and after hearing a positive review on NPR, I decided to pick up Jason Hough’s debut work, The Darwin Elevator. This book presents another dystopian scenario, one set approximately two hundred years in the future, in which humanity has been struck by a plague, one that is somehow connected to the arrival of unseen aliens who have built a giant structure (an elevator) that reaches into the sky. We know little of the motives of these aliens, since there is no contact with them, but in their wake we have a plague that arises and devastates humanity, converting the majority into sub humans (or in the modern parlance so popular nowadays, “zombies”). Humanity teeters on the brink of extinction as a consequence. It is a shameless potboiler, a page-turner in the classic tradition of summer reading, with a first time author who nonetheless manages to capture a sense of wonder.

This seemed like a promising scenario, and it couldn’t help but bring back memories of so many other works I have read. While I tend to prefer quieter and more introspective science fiction novels, especially those of Ursula K. Le Guin, I was intrigued by the way in which this work promised to incorporate several elements (and formulas) that are so common in science fiction. One of these involves the idea of first contact, a trope that has figured prominently from the very beginning, havng been used to satirical effect in Voltaire’s Micromegas, and which was explored by H.G. Wells in his early The War of the Worlds as a critique of imperialism. Another involved the idea of dystopia, one that in this case may simply have been catalyzed by alien intervention, for the underlying circumstances of a humanity that was ever in crisis were ever present (overpopulation, intractable political conflict, opposing cultural spheres that seemed to echo the ideas of Samuel Huntington who had written in past decades of a coming “clash of civilizations” where cultural blocks emerged to subsume and replace nationalism, ecological devastation, etc.) The world is ever coming to an end, and we as a culture are obsessed with these scenarios of coming apocalypses, for don’t they tie in to the idea of human history as a story, with a much needed conclusion about to be revealed?

Also, I find myself asking, what is this obsession that popular culture seems to have with zombies? I don’t think it is entirely new, and in the past, we used to express it in terms of becoming as it were automatons, clogs in a vast and anonymous institutional apparatus. It was also transmuted into ideas of transformation and the blurring of differences, in ideologies that one can’t help but perceive as being based on racial differences, a fear that I can’t help but see expressed in the fear that many conservative sectors in this country have of a “One-World” scenario in which everyone has blended in, and in the cry of the Tea Partiers that they look around and they “can’t recognize this country anymore”. It is a fear, of course, directed against people like me, mestizos to begin with, who have yet oppose this ideology with visions that details a more optimistic and, quite frankly, realistic outlook. (Tracts such as José Vasconcelos’ La raza cósmica are early works in this vein, utopian but not grounded in real-life considerations the way, for example, Héctor Tobar’s much more recent Translation Nation is.) And is it not possible that there is another element at play as well, one that has to do with the way our economic system has morphed to assume a much more predatory and expansionistic guise, the Super-Capitalism of the 21^st century that it is said is elevating many from a life of poverty, but which seems to have stumbled badly in the industrialized world, with the watchword being that consumption is necessary to fuel our economies. Is that all we are? Mindless consumers, stuck in a system that demands that we never have enough, that we consume more and more in a compulsive fantasy that is quite frankly ultimately unsustainable for the instabilities it implies? I can’t help but think that these are part of the underlying elements that underscore the fascination that zombies hold in our popular culture at this point.

In this novel we also have a mystery, for the have the encounter with an alien culture. It isn’t first contact, not yet, for the aliens don’t reveal themselves, but we have instead contact with their artifacts, those that are stunning to behold and evoke the feeling of wonder.  I couldn’t help but hark back to the classic science fiction novel of the 1970s that I read as a child, Ringworld, written by Larry Niven, and which details the exploration of a massive engineering artifact left behind by an advanced civilization. When it comes to these narratives, I can’t help but view them also as imperialist fantasies, for they allude to imperialism in all its facets, whether it be in the way one culture is reduced to the status of scavengers who try to glean what they can from the objects, or to the darker scenarios that involve conquest, the seeding, for example, of blankets with smallpox and other germs, to be distributed to Native American tribes in order to devastate them and make them easier to displace. In this scenario, after all, we have the arrival of a plague that devastates humanity, after all, even if it isn’t thoroughly established yet if this plague was brought by the aliens who constructed the mysterious elevator.

I am reminded of Jared Diamond’s book Guns, Steels and Germs, which attempts to offer an explanation for the destructive nature of these contacts, signaling mechanisms and ideological foundations that help to explain why one culture so dramatically changed and impacted another one. These are, one would imagine, mechanisms that are in play on a grander scale, and that is part of the fascination that I think we derive from these types of works, the idea that powerful civilizations decline and, as with our current obsession with zombies and our anxieties about the rise of China, that the world order (or in this case, American predominance) is being challenged, while another hidden order is yet to be established.

It was with these ideas in mind that I began to read The Darwin Elevator, hoping that these issues would be explored. But perhaps I was expecting too much from this novel. It is a classic summer read, in the fact that it is characterized by nonstop action, and by somewhat one-dimensional characters who react in clumsy ways that may be familiar, but that are nonetheless clumsy and lacking in the magic of writers of more considerable literary skill, such as Robert Charles Wilson or Olaf Stapledon. We have the pilot, Skylar Leukin, who gathers together a crew of like-minded adventurers who are immunes, that is, part of the minority of people who for some reason are immune to the plague and thus have more leeway for movement in the wreck of a world that has been left behind. We have also the eccentric but also visionary entrepreneur, Neil Platz, who has taken charge of the space stations that are constructed as a last refuge for humanity, and that gather together the remnants of the technological and scientific elite of this culture. And we have villains, which it pains me to say, are portrayed in heavy-handed fashion, almost in cartoon fashion, as is the case with the governor of the last human outpost of Darwin, Australia, a character named Russell Bleilock, who is singularly bloodthirsty.

The action is nonstop, and one is pressed to decide if the sub humans who have taken control of the rest of the planet and who, amazingly, are able to survive even as they are reduced to animal state, or if the manipulative directors and actors in this drama pose the greater threat. I am struck, over and over, by the mechanisms whereby these symbols of accentuated appetite (call them “subs” as they are called in this novel, or “zombies”) are able to survive in such numbers. To continue with the speculations above, are they just symbols for the projections of the fears of a bourgeois culture that sees in them the working classes of the present age, those that are supposedly destined to be the unproductive “takers”, to use the jargon of presidential candidate Mitt Romney? I wonder over and over about the layers of this obsession we seem to have with zombies, and even if they do revert to the background as dangerous “natives” that recall the nastier colonial narratives of our own past (they are anonymous, they are incoherent, they have immense appetites, they are singular physical specimens with little culture), they serve as a layer to the novel that all-too-briefly offers a limited measure of social commentary. They are an ideological construct that is used, over and over, to illustrate fears we share as a culture, at least bourgeois fears, for I can’t help but see in them familiar markers in the way ethnic and racial minorities are portrayed in this culture.

There is not enough exploration of these complexities in this novel. Instead, we have a thriller that relies on action sequences, in which the pilot Skyler always gains the upper hand, and we have a political situation that become more and more unstable as the novel progresses. The haves in the space station are in conflict with the have-nots on the ground, who are increasingly besieged by the sub humans who are pressing in and who threaten to overwhelm them. And, it turns out, the aura which the elevator had emitted, and which seemed to confer protection from contamination, is failing, and now there are outbreaks of the plague both within the city of Darwin as well as in the space station, a situation which was unimaginable.

While this novel was an undeniable page turner, I found myself ultimately unsatisfied with this novel. The dialogue was choppy, and the interaction between the characters was rendered in a way that seemed clumsy. Perhaps it was foolish to hope for anything like the lyricism of Ursula K. Le Guin or Gene Wolfe, and it is certainly the case that the author did not capture the psychological intensity of characters who seem too one-dimensional. It is hard, in other words, to distinguish at times between the subs (the zombies) and the normal humans, for what we have are characters who all seem to be driven by basic impulses, by fear, by jealousy, by anger, by ambition, and by the recourse to violence.

I look for more in the books that I read, but yet I was seduced at certain moments by this novel. I found this in the evocation of the gritty world of Darwin, the last human city, where an increasingly desperate human population, shielded by the aura of the elevator, struggles to survive. It is an underworld that reminds me in many ways of the movie Bladerunner. And, I found it in the twists and turns of the characters, who form alliances as well as betray each other, in ways that seem too melodramatic, but then, melodrama is a pleasure that I’m not prepared to renounce yet. And ultimately, I found it in the evocation of the aliens and their astounding technology. We may not actually see an alien yet in this novel, but there is something of a lurking presence that colors this novel. We may yet turn out to have merely another War of the World scenario where these aliens are yet another example of a culture bent on imperial expansion, but it may also be the case that the aliens are indeed benevolent, or at least, not as easy to characterize.

I hope that is it the latter. Aliens as angels or demons, yet another topic that I would like to explore in future posts concerning science fiction, for ultimately they must be seen as mirrors for our deepest anxieties as well as hopes. While Jason Hough doesn’t yet have the chops of the best science fiction writers, and this novel isn’t Solaris (the classic by Stanislaw Lem), he draws on the rich catalogue offered by this genre.

 

OGRomero © 2013
(Copyrighted by OGRomero, 2013)

El interior (1st version)

Long, long ago, there was a small child who was thrown into a mountain, and who lived to tell of this.

She belonged to a community who lived on the side of a mountain. There were many such communities in the area, and it took a special skill and much accumulated knowledge to eke out a living in such a location, but it had been done for many years.

Her community was small but hardy, and their mountain was special. It was a living mountain, one that nurtured them like a father, but was also apt to punish them if they didn’t observe the necessary customs and rituals. The mountain, you see, was a hardy entity, and it frequently grumbled and coughed but, for the most part, it slept, like all the other old men of the community.

The soil on the side of the mountain was very fertile. It was suited for the crops that the child’s community had been cultivating from time immemorial, the various types of potatoes, the beans, and the vegetables that were grown in the area. It also harbored many trees, cousins in the minds of her community, for they also protected the people from the ravages of the weather. They provided fuel for their fires, as well as the material needed for the roofs of their houses, single room structures that were constructed out of rocks that were cut and carefully fitted together.

Most other mountains were rather cold and inhospitable, but their mountain was special. While others were silent, and cold, and were altogether less beautiful, their mountain boasted a rich black soil that was replenished at frequent intervals. Their mountain, known as Jurimayac, the old one, had an opening on the top, and from that opening there was usually a plume of steam that arose and drifted up into the sky. From time to time, but mountain rumbled, and the fire within was heard to roar, and scalding mud was thrown out, to coat the sides of the mountain. When it did this, it was best to scramble as quickly as possible to the safe zone, halfway down the mountain, and to wait for several days until the old one had finished replenishing the side of the hill. This soil was much prized, and would quickly cool, after which it could be gathered and put to use on their terraced plots.

The girl was born into a family of six, and was the youngest. She was plump, a quality that was considered beautiful among her community, and was furthermore very cheery and obedient. She was much fond of her oldest sister, who she considered almost like her second mom, as indeed she had been, for the oldest had been entrusted with the mission of raising her younger siblings.

Her appearance was unusual, and was the cause of admiration. She was small, but had pleasing features, and her forehead was broad and naturally slanted. Her smile touched everyone, as did her pleasing and modest laugh.

The family worked hard, and was much respected within the community. They had a plot of land, and they also had a herd of small native sheep that were much prized as much for their milk as for their wool. From time to time, a sheep was slaughtered during special occasions, but it wasn’t often, and instead, the sheep were considered a form of currency, to be traded with communities who lived in the valleys, and who would provide dried fruits and herbs that that traded with the highland communities. The sheep also served to cement the peace, for within historical memory there had been threats of invasion by uncouth and fierce tribes to the south who prized the sheep and the other products of the region, and as such, they had become part of a tribute that was paid to ensure the peace.

There would ordinarily have seemed to be little time for play, but the little girl was fortunate for her family indulged her. She had modest chores, such as helping her mother start the fire, or gathering wild nuts or herbs, or carrying water from the natural cisterns that her community had built to gather the rain when it fell, but often she was seen to be running along the paths that led to the upper reaches of the mountain, disturbing the nests of birds, and also, overturning rocks and collecting the small beetles that she found scrambling underneath. The beetles came in different hues, and they along with other insects were considered delicacies among her people, having a crunch and a texture that was quite pleasing. There were also subtle differences in flavor; the brown beetles were a little saltier, while the dark ones had a peculiar spice and aroma that reminded her of the mint that grew in damp places.

The little girl often called out to her oldest sister to join her in play. Long ago, this sister had taken her along a lonely path to a cave where her people had set aside to house the remains of their ancestors. When they passed away, they were bound in cloth, and they were soaked in a special oil that came from the valleys down below, and which was meant to discourage the rodents who might otherwise have been tempted to feed on the remains of their departed ones. The dead ones were stacked in different areas, where they could rest with loved ones, and as they dried out and grew withered, turning very dark, they were allotted a special period of twenty years in which their spirits could become accustomed to the idea of being dead, for it was deemed too cruel to administer the final rites too abruptly. After the passage of accustomed period of time, they were gathered together and removed from the cave and taken up to the top of the mountain, where the appropriate rituals were performed and they were entrusted into the care of the old one. They were dropped from the precipice, and special days that were determined by their wise ones, and their spirits were finally laid to rest.

During that journey with her elder sister, the young girl had felt not the slightest amount of fear when they opened the wooden gate and ventured in. It seems that the sister had been entrusted with the task of delivering a prized pendant to a cousin who had passed away a few years ago. The pendant had been considered lost until it turned up buried next to the side of the house, and it was deemed prudent to leave it with the departed cousin, who still had quite a while to wait until her final rites were performed, and must surely have been missing her pendant. The two sisters walked quietly into the cave, and they searched for the indicated area, and they had no difficulty recognizing the departed cousin, who was addressed with respect by the older sister, who placed the pendant under the cloth that covered her chest, and who stayed to tell her the news of the ones who were still alive, and of her mother and father, who were growing older now, but who remained in good cheer, and of her brother, who had welcomed a new member to his growing family, and was considered one of the more prosperous citizens of their community. She also told her of the fate of her promised one, who had mourned the death of the cousin, and who still loved to stand outside on summer afternoons watching the sky and the eagles who flew to their nests, but who had fortunately found happiness with another girl. Such a one would have made a wonderful husband for her had she not been taken by illness.

The little girl enjoyed hearing the voice of her older sister, and took comfort by the familiar and playful manner in which she expressed herself. Her older sister was a good storyteller, and always found the most entertaining way to describe the events that took place, the story of the brother who tried to ride a sheep and was thrown off repeatedly, or the friend who was as windy as the old one and could be heard far off on the paths that dotted the mountain, or the story of the old lady who professed to be blind, but who was apt nonetheless to unfailingly reach out to grab the private area of all the handsome young men, but never of the women, to the point that the men had taken to cupping their hands around their genitals when they approached her. She was old and her husband had lived for almost as long as she had, but it was joked that she had evidently not had her fill, and was thirsty still.

It was a memorable time for the young girl, and soon, in accordance with the customs of her people, when she had completed ten summers, she would be promised to her future husband, after which she would be entrusted to learn the ways of women, and to leave her playful nature behind. Her old sister had already been entrusted, and her ritual of marriage was soon to be celebrated when she completed one more summer, after which she would move in with her husband (who she already addressed as husband), and of whom she was very fond, having a romantic spirit as she did. The little girl wished to be betrothed as well, but to tell the truth, she also was very fond of the company of her mother and her other sibling, and could well afford to wait.

Now, it had been said that the old one, the mountain, was a living presence in the lives of this community, a presence that both nurtured as well as punished. It had been seen that to all old ones, especially to the oldest one, much respect was due, for this was the way of the world, and the source of their continuity. The old one could nurture, but at times, he could grow angry, and could shake and grumble, and could grow loud at times. In the past the old one had been seen to burst in anger, shouting so loud that he caused the top of the rim to blow away, causing landslides that terrified the people. It had also been seen at times that the old one would fall sick from anger, and would bleed molten drops that flowed down the mountain and set the trees and bushes they encountered ablaze. These tears could last for weeks and even months, for the old one was not easily appeased once offended, and while the people quaked in fear, they found it difficult to perform the ceremonies of appeasement.

The tears would flow down, and it was all they could do to gather their sheep and a few food stocks, as well as the members of the family, and scramble down to the valley. If the old one were particularly angry, it would also emit a sharp smell, one that was more powerful than they had ever noticed, and a gas that furthermore was poisonous to them, and might make them fall asleep. This anger was slow to awaken, and was slow to dissipate, so the community members trusted to the wisdom and experience of the wise ones, and were ever attentive to signs of anger. And they kept to the rituals, to the need to respect the sacred places of the old one, in particular, to respect the tunnels that were narrow and that located in middle latitudes, for these were surely the nostrils of the old one, and if the he could not breathe, would he surely not awaken in anger?

But there were other rituals as well. It had been the custom to choose a young girl to offer to the old one every five years, to have the old one have his fill as well, for the old one also had need of companionship. And thus, it was the custom for the wise ones of the community, the elders, to hold a special gathering every five years to choose the young girl who would be betrothed to the old one and given to him. The girl needed to be of the appropriate age, but much attention was paid signs that were the object of debate within the council.

Tariksa, the toothless one, insisted that the young one be upright and cheerful, and have no special fear of snakes. She herself had always despised them, and dreaded in particular the yellow ones with beaded patterns, who were like the sick excrescences of the mountain that was forced to eliminate its poisons, and when snakes abounded, she insisted, the mountain was bound to be afflicted with illness, and would surely grow hotter. Zumbatac, the elderly one of the large ears, insisted that the little girls who was able to attract beetles was one who had the same nature as the mountain, and rather than pine in loneliness or despair as a result of a marriage that she found unsatisfying, would be able to derive comfort from the material provisions of a mountain that surely abounded in beetles and insects. And Lortanac, the blind one, insisted that the true sign would be found in the sky, and that the eagles would surely indicate which was destined to be the chosen bride, for the eagles were acute in judgment, and prudent, and would surely recognize the same in the chosen candidate.

There were fifteen young girls who were to be betrothed that summer, and that summer coincided with the five year period that had been allotted for the selection of the new bride to be offered to the mountain. Now, it might be though that the parents of the young girls might have been alarmed over the possibility that their young girl might be chose, but this was such an honored and accepted custom among the people that they would never give thought to expressing their fears. Instead, it was said that the family of the chosen one would be especially honorable, for would they not have a close bond with the mountain, who would now become a formal member of their family? Was it not the case that they would assume honored status, and be accorded positions of leadership? Was it not wise to be dutiful and respectful, for didn’t their values depend on these qualities?

At the same time, however, it was also noticed that the families of the candidates became unusually officious during this period. They would be especially dutiful in their care of the old ones in the period leading up to the special gathering, and the wags would allege that some of the more devious families would resort to trickery. A few of the girls were coached to scream especially loudly when they chanced on a snake, one that would emerge under suspicious circumstances when many people were present to witness the reaction of the child. Indeed, girls who were born during these five year interval periods were known to be more afraid of snakes than usual, out of some mysterious mechanism that had to do with the knowledge of one of the selection criteria used by the conclave of elders.

In other instances, baskets of beetles were left near the sides of other household by mysterious visitors, and their presence was viewed as a sign of affinity between the candidate who resided in that household and the insects. Indeed, the young girl had always been told by her mother that she should not be so given to overturning rocks and seeking these beetles out, but nothing she had said would register in the young girl, who had always had a fondness for beetles, and while she was careful not to engage them in her mother’s presence, took no similar care when out by herself.

And, the families of the candidates were known to encourage their young daughters to spit at eagles, and to disrupt their nests, and to throw rocks at them, more so than the daughters of other families who were not candidates. The eagle was prized by the community, and it was observed that the girls who managed somehow not to be chosen reverted to the naturally respectful behavior of their other family members, but only when it was safe, and when the summer of their tenth year had passed. Otherwise, it was deemed unwise for them to express admiration for the eagles, or to talk to them, and while this was considered rude by community standards, it was nonetheless considered an understandable necessity on the part of the families who were as risk of suffering such a notable honor as having their young daughter chosen in the ceremony.

It was perhaps unfortunate that it was this affinity for eagles that cemented her selection. The young girl had been carefully coached in private by her parents as to how to behave, and had learned to scream at the sight of snakes, and to express disgust at the prospect of eating beetles, and to furthermore apply  oil to her skin that was meant to ask as a repellant should one venture in her vicinity. And she was permitted and, indeed, encouraged to climb up the side of the mountain, and the story was told about how the many eagles that kept nests up there were quick to flee her presence, and to screech in anger, although to tell the truth, the young girl never did venture too close, and the eagles never did fly away when they saw her approaching, but instead watched her calmly, and would eagerly consume the small bits of meat that she left for them and that she carried hidden in her pocket, as an offering she felt she was obliged to make in return for the eagles’ feathers that she loved to pick up.

And it was the discovery of the eagle’s feathers that did her in, for when she was climbing down during one of her forays to the top that observed to pull out a bundle from her pocket let them loose in the wind. The feathers were much prized by ordinary members of her community, but any affinity for them among the candidates was bound to be considered a particularly fortunate omen for the work of the conclave, who received notice of the news, at the same time as the parents of the young girl, who were quite understandably overcome with pride and happiness, to the extent that the mother cried out loudly and commences pulling out her hair, and the father beat his other children mercilessly for not keeping watch over their sister, and then ran out of their house, where he was seen picking up and throwing stones over the side of the terrace, and running back and forth in what was supposed to be interpreted as a peculiar form of exaltation, but one that left him trembling and shaken at his unexpected good fortune.

It was forthwith decided that the young girl would the chosen bride, and the announcement was made that night.

To be continued


OGRomero © 2013
(Copyrighted by OGRomero, 2013)

Summer as Quest (Labor Day 2013)

This is the time of the year when I would normally start panicking. It being late August, we find ourselves once again cresting on a rising tide of suffocating heat that traditionally engulfs the entire Southwest during the Labor Day holiday, sapping our strength and leaving us cowering inside our air-conditioned buildings. What had seemed until a few short weeks ago a mild summer has proven to be yet another deceptive promise, and sooner or later accounts were bound to be settled. The heat, after all, is an unavoidable mainstay of this region, smothering everything in its wake and signaling once again a fiery end to the summer. Of course it was silly to believe otherwise, for don’t we live in a topographical salad bowl of natural high pressure, bounded by mountains as we are and located in a southern latitude? I speak of the weather as if it were the cause of the anxiety mentioned in the opening, but as usual it is necessary to search below the surface to come to an understand of a period of the year that I have now come to associate with latent and nervous expectancy.

By now, school has been in session for several weeks, earlier than ever. This early start is a recent change, and it wasn’t always so. I remember that the reprieve for public school students lasted until after the Labor Day holiday, but nowadays, school calendars have been adjusted, one suspects, in order to accommodate budgetary concerns, although claims are made that earlier starts are necessary to extend the school year and offset other breaks that are now allotted. It is early August and we now see the uncharacteristic sight of school buses disgorging crowds of students, and long lines of cars around our many public schools during periods of drop-off and pick-up. I see the students from my old high school slouching slowly down the streets in the early afternoon, heading towards Bethlehem and waiting to be born, if I may paraphrase the famous poem by Yeats. I wonder about the cycles of life, and can’t help but reflect on my own journey.

The start of the school year must come like a shock to everyone involved. It is certainly the case for the teachers, faced with the prospect once again of new groups of students who must seem as unruly and untamed as ever, irritated all the more so by the fact that the hot weather outside leaves them feeling cheated, bound as they are to their desks. The old adage proclaims that school is a waste of good health, and I suppose young people must feel it much more than older people do.

I remember the pain of having to return to school, and in particular, the transition between junior high and high school. It was hotter than we could bear outside, and I was more nervous than I could confess when I received my appointment to register for the academic term. I remember my first impressions, seeing young men who sported beards and openly smoked in designated areas, and young women who liked just as glamorous as the icons we saw on television, in shows such as Charley’s Angels. They were much more confident that I could ever imagine being, and when they weren’t mocking us freshmen and sophomores, they took no notice of us. We were beneath contempt, in other words, and I felt that many of my teachers treated me the same way.

As if the start of each academic term wasn’t nerve-wracking enough, we had to deal with the intense heat, made worse by frequently airless classrooms. We were soaked in sweat, sitting next to the attractive girls who we imagined had the olfactory sense of bloodhounds, and were bound to denounce us for the foibles of biology and the weather. It didn’t help that some of our teacher found it necessary to snap at us as well as we fell under the soporific influence of the heat.  These conditions made everyone irritable, something that was evident inside and outside of school, as much in the past as in the present as well.

For one thing, drivers were more irritable, and I remember the glares if I dawdled too long at a light, or drove too slowly.  My first car accident took place during an August long ago, after I had graduated from UCLA and begun my career as an engineer. I was having difficulty adjusting, and was reporting to a lab facility where I felt I was being hazed in subtle as well as obvious ways, making the prospect of reporting to work very unpleasant. I made a left turn into the path of an oncoming car that I was sure should have started stopping because the light had turned orange, but instead accelerated and barreled straight into the side of my car. I did a half spin, and I remember the feeling of disorientation and shock that seemed to encapsulate when I associated with this conjunction of August, the heat, and a job that wasn’t for me. Blame it on the season and on eternal human foibles.

There is no telling if the heat, in the same way that alcohol does, doesn’t peel away inhibitions. Besides all the instances of irritability I perceived in others, and which I would also have to acknowledge myself, I couldn’t help but think of it as the missing element, the catalyst that brought existing unstable chemical (read personal as well as social) conflicts to a boil. It was during one summer long ago that still shimmers in my memory that we heard a knock on our front door late at night, after we had all gone to bed. It turned out to be our neighbor, a middle-aged woman who looked like an apparition out of a ghost story, with a swollen face, a black eye and blood that was trickling down from the corner of her mouth. She was crying softly, and we kids forgot our manners as our parents spoke to this neighbor, the mother of our friends, and asked them for their help driving her to her parents’ home. I remember the same feeling of disorientation, a dreamlike quality that accompanies seeing something that your mind is not quite prepared to accept, rationalize it as we may, and all the while, our neighbor’s husband was yelling drunkenly from his front yard, threatening my parents if they intervened in what he said was a private matter.

My car crash was one such episode, and this memory of seeing a battered woman pleading for help was another that helped to cement the thought I had that summer was when misfortune and a pulling back of the veils was most apt to occur. It was as if the sunlight was a merciless goad that accentuated existing conflicts, the feeling of not fitting in, the fears that we all had, in the same way that we shed perspiration.  Was this not once again the effect of the heat, of those long stretches of unbearable days in which our misfortunes seem more unbearable than ever before, when the underlying dynamics of an unstable situation were revealed? And could we not extend this as well to other scales, to the social element and to that we associated with social movement, to the epoch that seems so long ago but that in reality was of recent vintage, the era of the Civil Rights movement?

There were, of course, idyllic moments as well. As stressful as it might have been for our parents to have us alone in our house while they were forced to attend to their jobs, or as stressful as it was to make the adjustment to a new school, there were still quiet moments of contemplation when I could reflect on my past. For one thing, the heat makes us lethargic, and the long breaks (for those of us who were lucky not to have to work) left us with long afternoons when time seemed endless and we eagerly awaited the cool breezes of the afternoon. Maybe we might be lucky enough to see vast storm clouds in the sky, which might or might not offer a moment of relief. We could play with the radio on our parents’ stereo set, and listen to the stations that were forbidden to hear otherwise, those that played top ten hits in English, and that our parents would never let us listen to otherwise because they were afraid we were acculturating too quickly. There were the adventures with friends while riding on our bikes, when I hesitate to admit that, yes, I would leave my younger sister and brother alone at home watching television while I would take a quick ride up the street to see who could better imitate Evel Knevel, me or my friend. And there were the long hours watching reruns on television, the game shows that we barely understood, the ribald remarks, the spectacle of untrammeled consumerism and materialist glee, the episodes of the Three Stooges or Gilligan’s Island or, of course, my favorite, the episodes of Star Trek, where I could project my own desires.

Miraculously I managed to avoid being struck by drivers when I rode my bike recklessly, drivers who nonetheless cursed me liberally and creatively, throwing in a few offensive ethnic remarks, and giving me the perverse pleasure of thinking that they deserved it.  And there were the hours spent at the library, browsing in the science fiction section and trying to be strategic about how I would tackle the task of reading the entire collection maintained by the library. Start with the serializations of Star Trek, especially those published by the noted British science fiction writer James Blish, then proceed to the Hugo and Nebula award winners, then to those that had rave reviews on their covers by other authors I admired, then to those that had interesting covers, then to those that mentioned the presence of space ships in their blurbs, etc.

The library was always a special haunt for me, and I found it easy to imagine that I was indeed on a space ship, for the library had big windows and, on particularly hot days, there were few pedestrians outside, contributing to the illusion that we were traveling through an empty landscape, maybe on one of those multi-generational ships that would take thousands of years to reach the nearest star, and maybe, just maybe, my generation was the one that would live to see the promise fulfilled of arrival. More than a few times I must have been caught napping, to the annoyance of the librarians, but how could I explain that it was just an instance of cryogenic suspension?

The intensity of the heat would build slowly during the summer. As the days grew longer, the long stretches of time dizzied us. We needed a break from all that time, a way to make it less onerous, and perhaps it is this impulse that makes us reserve our summers for ambitious projects, for trips, for home improvement projects, for picking up a new skill, for practicing an old one, and just for trying to find a way to lighten the load. Older teenagers live for the nightlife, what exists in such a backwards corner of California as Corona was, an outlying suburb of Los Angeles where people could make their salaries stretch a little more, even if we were more prone to fires. I remember that as we hit August the heat would crest, and we would be bombarded then as now by the same breathless reports on the news about heat waves, about crowded freeways, and about gang shootings in Los Angeles.

Living in Los Angeles at the time, little did we know about the underlying conflicts that were slowly coming to a boil. I remember the report of the slaying of an African-American teenager, Latasha Harkins by a Korean market owner, way back in March of 1991, an event that took place shortly after the beating of motorist Rodney King, and which presaged an explosion that was sure to come. There had always been long-simmering tensions not only in East Los Angeles but also in south central districts, and the stories of drive-by shootings dramatically punctuated our newscasts. Things were not going well in our city, and yet we continued going through the motions, with most of the residents in the West Los Angeles area where I lived shaking their heads sadly when I broached the topic. The celebratory glow of Los Angeles in the wake of the 1984 Olympics was slowly being snuffed out, and there was a sense of unease, of that nervous expectancy that I spoke of and that I associated with the summers. Hadn’t the Watts riots taking place during the summer, during a fateful weak in August of 1965?

There was a special edge to the reporting of crimes during the summer months, and a feeling of menace that accrued to statistics that showed an increase in crimes. Gangs were much in the news, and it was perhaps inevitable that there would be a sensationalistic response on the part of Hollywood. We had witnessed the release of the movie “Colors”, movies that tied in with the popular theme of social breakdown, in this case, attributed not to overpopulation or to ecological despoliation, but to certain social phenomena that were associated with ethnic communities, a sort of threat to the “Western” values that was so breathlessly denounced by conservative figures in their critique of academe and the “liberal” press. It was all coming to a boil, the inevitable reaction.

Well, the Rodney King riots arrived with an inevitable fatality in April 1992. I remember the evening when the results of the first trial acquitting the officers were read, for I was at UCLA, attending an evening poetry class that was offered through their evening extension program. We heard reports about window being broken in Westwood, and we briefly considered whether or now we should cancel the class before we decided to continue.  Although they took place in April, and they gave rise to several long and dreary days of rioting, with the smell of despair and anger in the afternoon reaching us all the way in west Los Angeles, these memories have a summer edge to them in my mind. They were tied, once again, to the conception I had that sunlight was capable as much of deceiving us as of releasing our innermost fears (and hopes), and the light of those Korean storefronts were like the fires that blazed through the deserts, canyons and hills during the summer, a fire that was meant to cleanse, even if it left us with the sordid aftertaste of footage we will never forget, such as the beating of the white truck driver, Reginald Denny.

There had always been fires during the summer, reported breathlessly on local news coverage. There occurred in outlying areas, in canyons, in the mountains around Santa Monica, in Angeles National Forest, and even in what I imagined were the few remaining wild places in Orange County. Was it possible to assign these events a social dimension as well? We were certainly captivated by the footage that was transmitted to us by the news choppers, and sometimes, when traveling to visit family members in Riverside County, I might happen to see the smoke plumes that transmitted what seemed to me to be messages waiting to be deciphered. Once, the fires reached the southern hills on the outskirts of Corona, and they blazed live lava flows, with residents being urged to stay inside and avoid breathing the air. As if it were that easy to separate ourselves, in the same way that the flames in South Central Los Angeles engulfed the whole psychic imaginary of the nation in 1992.

If ghosts can be interpreted as symbolic representations of unresolved conflicts, then the fires that we say in a way served a parallel function, for just as they indicated a social breakdown in Los Angeles during the Watts and the Rodney King riots, they indicated a pattern of unsustainable an unrealistic land development that pointed to social divisions that were widening in California. New settlements are built on outlying areas that are meant to be protected by a cushion of separation from our urban areas, for these settlements are typically reserved for higher income households, and they are evidence of how urban flight is impinging on our few remaining wildlife areas, where brush and trees prove just as combustible as the tortured and conflictive social dynamics in other areas. Many of these fires are set by arsonists, we must add, and while no social agenda is proclaimed, one can’t help but think they are motivated by instances of socially marginalized individuals who are expressing a message of rebellion, even if they don’t recognize it as such. And in the meantime, Nero continues to fiddle while Rome burns.

The nervous expectancy of summers was also evoked by moments of transition. I remember, for example, my first teaching post in Kansas. I arrived in mid-August, flying into Kansas City during my birthday and thinking that it couldn’t possibly be as hot as Riverside County which I had just left behind. I was chagrined to find out that the heat was probably more intense and uncomfortable than any I had experience before, and I kept on thinking of the Portuguese word, “abafado”, that always had sounded to me like a stew. The difference, of course, was attributable to the qualitative difference in the heat, specifically, to the humidity, but it might also have had to do with the anxiety I felt.

It was unnerving to fly into a new region so far away (I am speaking of cultural distance, principally) with only two suitcases and the crushing pressure of having to deal with what in all likelihood would be skepticism. For one thing, it felt as if I were submerged underwater, unable to dry out as I quickly drenched my clothing by simply waiting outside for the shuttle bus to the rental car agency. But my first impression of the skies in the Midwest was that they were, quite simply, amazing, and I felt as times as if it was only the weight of that sweat that soaked my clothing that prevented me from flying up and losing myself in their azure clarity. I still treasure the sight of those wide open landscapes, even as I looked around and found myself isolated, missing as I did the omnipresence of Latinos such as myself that I take for granted in California. The prairies were wide open, and I left Missouri to drive west into the Sunflower state.

The blue of the sky seemed to me to be more intense than any I had seen before, with vast and lonely clouds that loomed up majestically, these floating balloons of water that served as projections for my soul. The sky was clearer out here, with none of the haze that we associate with southern California, and it was hypnotic to look up and to see these clouds coalesce into a landscape in the sky, an aerial topography that left me with visions of Greek islands, and with heroes sailing out among them, in pursuit of their own individual quests. I couldn’t help but compare myself with Odysseus, though less hardy, for the heat was thoroughly oppressive as I settled myself for the lonely drive on the two lane highway (one of the narrowest highways I had ever experienced), following Apollo as he drove his chariot into the west.

I arrived in that city in the early evening and immediately noticed the buzz of the cicadas. I didn’t know quite how to characterize it in the beginning, and I am ashamed to admit it now, but thought for some time that it might have been noise produced by the power grid. It would throb over and over, even as it got darker and darker, and it was louder where we found trees. The noise was insistent and reminded me of a B-grade science fiction movie so popular in the 50s, with scientists in medieval castles and arcs of electricity jumping from one node to the next, to be wielded no doubt to give life to another Frankenstein. Of course I quickly realized that it was due to the cicadas, but still, it felt a little eerie, with that feeling that we were in late summer and something was bound to happen. Some cataclysm, perhaps, but also, maybe, some spectacle of wonder. Truth be told, my imagination had already been molded by the science fiction novels and movies I had always enjoyed, and it was quite natural to think of Ursula K. Le Guin novels, of Star Trek episodes, and of Ray Bradbury’s poetic homage to summers, Dandelion Wine.

It is a truism that summers have a certain idyllic quality to them, despite the nervous energy and the air of expectancy that I have described. If we associate winter with decline and conclusion, summers suggest plenitude, the bright moment when action can and should be taken, when we are at the peak of our creative powers, facing with the tantalizing prospect of actualizing possibilities. It is nonetheless a moment, and it does draws inexorably towards its own conclusion, in that final frenetic holiday that is signaled by Labor Day, a holiday that in the United States is putatively associated with a tribute to the working individual, but is denuded of any real political essence and is thoroughly unlike the May Day celebrations held throughout the rest of the world. Labor Day is the last fling of the summer before we settle down and behave like adults, as our parents admonished it was necessary to do.

By the end of August, then, the lazy succession of bright and hot days filled with barbeques and summer projects that we have been undertaking, with books we have been reading and lawns and vegetable gardens we have been cultivating (my summer tomatoes turned out nicely, I might add), and with articles and reviews we have proposed to complete because this is the time that is set aside for academics to pursue their investigations without the interruptions represented by department service, all come to a frenetic conclusion as we come to the realization that, yes, this period is drawing to a close, and the tyranny of the clock will resume. Can we rebel against the end of the summer?

I contemplate once again the need to buy clothes, and the prospect of setting aside the T-shirts and shorts I had been wearing up to this point and striking instead a different sartorial note. This can’t help but remind me of the last futile (but in my mind desperately ennobling) gesture of one of my English professors at UCLA, Lynn Batten, who was a bit of a ham and who arrived at the first lecture of the fall term about twenty years ago looking decidedly unprofessorial in his Bermuda shorts, T-shirt and sneakers, challenging us as he stood in front of the class. “What?!” he exclaimed, “Is the summer over yet? I say NO!”, and we all laughed, we students settling into another evening extension course, and in my case, an engineer who had left behind his job and was planning a career change to pursue the literature degree I had always wanted. His need to proclaim his faith in an eternal summer mirrored my own to justify what I was doing, and to pursue once again another transition, to pick up the elements of a past that I hadn’t been able to fashion correctly, and to proclaim a faith in infinite possibilities. I was a rebel too.

So we gear up for the final swan song for the summer 2013, recognizing as well the symbolic import of this period, and the historical moments we associate with August. Summers have been associated with many personal moments of transition in my life, and there is also the added social dimension that is present in the celebration of the 50^th anniversary (today, August. 30^th), of the speech given by the Reverend Martin Luther King at the Washington Memorial Monument back in 1963. Summer back then had the promise of change, the way it did decades later in Los Angeles during the riots, the way it did on a more personal note when I landed in Kansas City. We sing to the idyllic nature of a season that is grounded in dreams, in vast cloudscapes in the sky, but also in dark moments, in the anger and tension that broods underneath, in the fires that blaze because we need to believe that we can change things, even if it is more difficult that we can imagine to change an institutional framework, an economic system or a cultural outlook (they are all connected, of course). We sing the praises of those idyllic moments, the wafting barbeque smells, the sound of children laughing by the pool, the Mexican immigrant paletero who pushes his cart through the barrios selling Mexican icicle pops, and yes, the cicadas buzzing insistently as the raccoons sort through our trash. And yes, maybe somewhere in the streets of major cities where hope is more muted, in the urban wastelands of Chicago or Oakland or South Central Los Angeles, a bullet also zings its way with a crack in an arc of futility.

We are formed by our social institutions, and by the calendars that define our rituals and routines. We are creatures of habit, after all. But is it also true that we respond to nature, and that this need not be considered an imposition but, instead, an acknowledgement of the cycle of youth, maturity and what I will call senescence, for it is an elegant euphemism. I tell myself that as a society, we still have a ways to go, and that urgency is building once again, especially given the climate of futility that prevails in Washington.  As we prepare to enter the Labor Day weekend, and as our president maneuvers to involve as in yet another Middle East conflict, and as immigration reform stalls in the House of Representatives where any legislation with the slightest progressive edge is sent to die, and when we settle down in a tepid economic recovery that will most likely stall once again due to the machinations of extremists political movements, I can still lose myself to the idyllic pleasure of looking up at the skies during a hot August afternoon, contemplating the beautiful  vista of storm clouds during this time of the year. Summer is, after all, a part of the eternal pageant of giving oneself over to the mythical quest of discovery. Like driving west on Highway 70 in the middle of the vast prairie once again.  

OGRomero © 2013
(Copyrighted by OGRomero, 2013)