You live without choice and you die without choice, according to an old Hebrew idiom. It seems that anything I can say about death would be a cliché. I believe I chose death or several aspects of death as a topic this week because it creates instant drama and can open up a range of possibilities for representation and morals. In La Muerte de Artemio Cruz (The Death of Artemio Cruz) by Carlos Fuentes, the death has some sort of a surplus. This is not only because its hero is larger than life like Kane in Citizen Kane – and there are many points of similarity between the two protagonists – but also because, like Perry commented about the book, it’s “several alternative books” – the story is told in three voices that are all connected to the protagonist. Like Falkner’s style of writing, this book doesn’t give details too soon and forces you to read it again and again, and every time you find new sides to the story. The thing that I like the most is the way that it tells the history of modern Mexico through the life of this one person, which is an idea that one can adopt and use, as was famously executed on screen in films like Forest Gump.
Wan can’t really hate the protagonist of the book, but you can’t like him either. The ambivalence is all over this book and this is its true force. The fundamental question for me in this book is about the freedom of choice and what seemed free is actually decided in advance. This book has also a refreshing point of view towards Americans by showing that they are not the smart and sharp businessmen they would like to consider themselves, as they are easily fooled by Cruz. I wish I could have quoted several lines here so you could see the beauty of the language of the book but I couldn’t find an English translation. No wonder it was an international bestseller in the 20th century and, in my opinion, is well worth discovering.