Memory and the Past

Antonio Yammara’s obsession with Ricardo Laverde launches the novel’s explorations of memory and the past.

Years after Antonio knew Ricardo, he finds himself reflecting on the man’s life and his involvement in his death. He begins his narrative in Chapter 1 by “stubbornly [thinking] about the day Ricardo Laverde died, and even [forcing] [him]self to remember the precise details” (5). Without much effort, the words he spoke and heard, the things he saw and experienced, and the pain he suffered and overcame come rushing back to him (5). Although Antonio remarks that remembering is in fact a “damaging exercise” that “after all brings nothing good and serves only to hinder our normal functioning,” he cannot avoid the habit himself (5). His fraught relationship with remembering conveys his fraught relationship with the past, and thus his fear of reliving the experiences he suffered. At...