Summary

In “The Sound,” Uxbal recounted the Gospel tale of Jesus in the desert, when Jesus was tempted by the devil with food, water, and power and, in turn, repudiated his advances. Uxbal used the tale to explain God’s contradictions, elaborating that the devil represented humans—he and his daughter and the other daughters—because “[the devil] reminds Christ that he is God” (117). In this act, according to Uxbal, Jesus learned the smallness and insignificance of the human body, and, as God, how he could transcend it. If they compared themselves to Christ in this story, it would diminish their suffering; and suffering for their cause, by birthing more rebel saviors, was looming.

At the start of “The Land” the idea that fate had drawn Ulises back to Cuba did not bother him as it had at the start of “The Sea” and...