A Manual for Manuel: Analysis of Major Characters
"A Manual for Manuel: Analysis of Major Characters" explores a diverse cast of characters intertwined within a politically charged narrative set against the backdrop of Latin American activism in Paris. The central figure, Andrés Fava, serves as the primary narrator and an Argentine intellectual, navigating his connections to the revolutionary group known as the Screwery. He grapples with a desire for action and personal awakening, which culminates in his commitment to support the group's radical activities, including a kidnapping operation.
Key characters include Marcos, the passionate leader of the Screwery, and Ludmilla, an actress who evolves from Andrés' lover to Marcos' partner, embodying intuitive and imaginative qualities. The narrative also introduces Susana and Patricio, a couple who balance domestic life with revolutionary ideals, and their son, Manuel, who becomes the focal point for a collective political scrapbook meant to educate him. Other members like Lonstein and Gómez bring varied perspectives to the political discourse, with Lonstein remaining apolitical and introspective while Gómez embodies a more conventional Marxist viewpoint.
The interplay of these characters highlights the tensions between personal relationships and political commitments, culminating in pivotal events that shape their fates amidst revolutionary fervor. The narrative intricately weaves together themes of identity, activism, and the complexities of human connections, inviting readers to reflect on the repercussions of political engagement and personal choices.
A Manual for Manuel: Analysis of Major Characters
Author: Julio Cortázar
First published: Libro de Manuel, 1973 (English translation, 1978)
Genre: Novel
Locale: Paris and Buenos Aires
Plot: Social morality
Time: The early 1970's
Andrés Fava (ahn-DREHS FAH-vah), the main narrator, an Argentine intellectual living in Paris. He is connected to the members, though not much to the activities, of a principally Latin American activist group, the Screwery, that operates there. Andrés tenaciously clings to his world of ideas and aesthetics, erotic freedom, and phonograph records but also harbors an underlying urge to be a man of action. This urge is expressed in a dream he has had, in which an unknown Cuban gives him a message. Andrés cannot remember the dream message until he makes a kind of personal commitment to activism by going to join the members of the Screwery at Verrières, the suburb where they are holding a kidnapped Latin American police official. The message proves to be simple: “Wake up.” Andrés does so more through this show of solidarity than through his intense erotic experiences with Ludmilla and Francine, in which he also was seeking illumination.
The one I told you, always designated by this expression, never by name, an Argentine writer who is quietly chronicling the activities of the Screwery, with which he is peripherally involved. His narrative, together with the clippings and other documentary materials collected by Susana for her son Manuel, seems to correspond to the novel, so the one I told you can be seen as a surrogate author. Throughout, he worries about the disjunct quality of his narrative and its multiple perspectives—aspects of A Manual for Manuel itself. The one I told you is present at the Verrières shootout and appears to die there—many plot details are left hanging—because subsequently Andrés is organizing the writer's somewhat chaotic notes and jottings.
Marcos, the Argentine head of the Screwery, a curly-haired, dedicated revolutionary who is also something of an intellectual. Under Marcos' direction, the members of the Screwery create small provocations in Parisian public places, aimed at raising consciousness among ordinary citizens. They also undertake a complex international operation, the kidnapping of a police official. Marcos is resolute, and he can be tender with someone he loves, such as Ludmilla. He apparently dies at the Verrières shootout.
Ludmilla, an actress of Polish descent who has been Andrés' lover and who begins a relationship with Marcos shortly before the kidnapping. Both men call her Polonette, or little Polish girl. She is more intuitive and less structured and conceptual than these men; her imagination inspires them both. Aware of Andrés' parallel relationship with Francine, Ludmilla is quicker than he to recognize that their own relationship is at an end. She moves on naturally and unresentfully to Marcos and to involvement in the Screwery. Ludmilla wishes to learn about Latin American politics and activism, and Marcos patiently begins to teach her. She is a survivor of the events at Verrières.
Susana, an Argentine member of the Screwery, married to Patricio. They are the parents of the infant Manuel. Susana is putting together a scrapbook of political clippings that is to serve as a kind of primer for Manuel. A translator for UNESCO, Susana often translates the French clippings for the benefit of Fernando, who has recently arrived in France.
Patricio (pah-TREE-syoh), Manuel's father and Susana's husband, an active member of the Screwery, which often gathers at his and Susana's apartment. Susana and Patricio's relative domesticity contrasts somewhat with the more bohemian lifestyle of Andrés and some of the others. He and Susana survive Verrières.
Manuel, the son of Susana and Patricio, an energetic infant who keeps his parents and the members of the Screwery busy attending to his needs and steering him away from household hazards. Manuel is to be the recipient of the documentary collage that his mother and other Screwery members are assembling, and to which Andrés adds all the narrative fragments written by the one I told you.
Lonstein, an Argentine who works at the morgue but cultivates intellectual interests and occasionally writes a poem. His friends call him the little rabbi. He practices solitude, celibacy, and onanism and expounds his theory and practice of the latter in a conversation with the one I told you. Lonstein speaks in a unique patois featuring portmanteau words, Argentine slang, and hispanicized French expressions. Apolitical and removed from the activities of the Screwery, he has reservations about the authoritarian tendency of revolutionaries. At the end of the novel, Lonstein is at the morgue cleaning the corpse of an unspecified friend—whether it is Marcos, the one I told you, or Andrés is unclear.
Francine, Andrés' French lover, a well-organized, university-trained woman who owns a bookshop and lives in a well-appointed apartment. Despite her Gallic rationality and her awareness of his attachment to Ludmilla, she is patient with Andrés' search for himself, perhaps even after he has in effect raped her at a hotel where they spend the night of the kidnapping alone together.
Gómez, a Panamanian member of the Screwery who is considered to be a conventional, unimaginative Marxist militant by intellectuals in the group. He is the lover of Monique, a French member of the group. Gómez is an avid stamp collector. He is last seen in jail after the Verrières incident, undaunted and pleased with the relative success of the operation.
Oscar Lemos, an Argentine who flies from Buenos Aires to Paris with counterfeit money to be used for the expenses of the kidnapping. With the kind of subversive humor typical of the Screwery, Oscar poses as a veterinarian and brings a live turquoise-colored penguin and several armadillos, purportedly for donation to a French zoo but really to distract attention from the containers of falsified bills.
Gladis, an Argentine flight attendant who accompanies her lover Oscar to Paris on one of her Aerolineas Argentinas flights. Gladis is forced to abandon her job because of her complicity in Oscar's elaborate ruse. She and Oscar appear to escape from Verrières and are last seen on their flight home to Buenos Aires.
Heredia (eh-REH-dyah), a witty Brazilian member of the Screwery who has spent time in London and returns for the kidnapping, then is imprisoned with Gómez after the events at Verrières.
Lucien Verneuil, a French member of the Screwery. He participates in both the group's antic disruptions of Parisian street life and the kidnapping. He volunteers his mother's country home for the sequestering of the police official at a time when she is traveling. Despite his association with the Screwery, Verneuil has something of the conventional French attitude toward Latin American volatility, and he is more authoritarian in outlook than some of his companions. He is wounded at Verrières.
Roland, a French member of the Screwery, similar in characteristics to Lucien Verneuil.
Fernando, a Chilean who has just arrived in Paris and is a friend of Patricio and Susana. He is not a member of the Screwery. Fernando has a slight speech impediment that causes him to pronounce the sound of w as that of v.
The Vip (beep), the Screwery's name for the portly Latin American police official in charge of international antiterrorist operations whom they kidnap and hold in exchange for a number of political prisoners to be freed from Latin American jails. He is called Beto (BAY-toh) by his wife and Don Gualberto (gwahl-BAYR-toh) by his subordinates. The Vip is freed at Verrières by the secret and regular police.
The Vipess, the Vip's conventional, foolish, loquacious wife.
Higinio (ee-HEE-nyoh), a Latin American secret police official entrusted with protecting the Vip. Higinio is called the Gi-ant by the Screwery, whose code name for the secret police is the ants. He is ruthless: At Verrières, he is prepared to have the Vip shot to ensure that the kidnappers will be charged with the maximum offense.