Memory and the Past

The author subverts conventional notions of the linear narrative plot line throughout the novel in order to enact his thematic explorations concerning memory and the past. Indeed, from the moment that the narrator comes “to the Palace” to see Juan, the characters’ sense of “time and space and distance” begins to deform (188, 189). Juan’s sense of linear time is distorted because he is “near death” (7). Because the narrator is desperate to rekindle his relationship with Juan and to learn from him, he adopts Juan’s slippery psychology and version of reality. Indeed, in Chapter I, “The Palace,” the narrator admits that Juan “knew just how to get me to talk, despite myself; the words pulled forth as if through hypnotic force” (14). Therefore, even when the narrator is resistant to delving into his past or to recollecting and sharing his memories with Juan, Juan...