Where the Air Is Clear by Carlos Fuentes
"Where the Air Is Clear" is a novel by Carlos Fuentes that explores themes of class conflict, ethnic relations, and the complexities of identity in post-revolutionary Mexico. The story centers on Federico Robles, a man of peasant origins who builds a financial empire in Mexico City, symbolizing the pursuit of a bourgeois lifestyle. However, his marriage to the materialistic Norma Laragoiti leads to personal turmoil and tragedy, notably when Norma accidentally perishes in a fire amid their domestic strife. Robles ultimately loses his wealth and returns to his roots, finding solace and genuine love with his mistress, Hortensia Chacón.
The novel also introduces Rodrigo Pola, a contrasting character who experiences success as a screenwriter while grappling with his own artistic decline. A mystical figure, Ixca Cienfuegos, serves to connect the lives of these characters and embodies the spiritual essence of the city, influenced by his mother's Aztec heritage. The narrative weaves together various smaller stories, highlighting the struggles and sacrifices of marginalized individuals within the urban landscape. Through its intricate character interactions and cultural references, "Where the Air Is Clear" offers a poignant reflection on Mexican identity and societal issues.
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Where the Air Is Clear by Carlos Fuentes
First published:La región más transparente, 1958 (English translation, 1960)
Type of work: Novel
Type of plot: Mythic
Time of plot: Early to mid-1950’s
Locale: Mexico City
Principal characters
Federico Robles , a bankerNorma Laragoiti , his wifeHortensia Chacón , Robles’s mistressRodrigo Pola , Norma’s loverIxca Cienfuegos , shadowy character symbolizing the spirit of Mexico CityManuel Zamacona , poet and friend of Ixca
The Story:
Rising from his peasant origins, Federico Robles subscribes to the myth of bourgeois stability and eventually makes his way to the top of a powerful financial empire in Mexico City. He creates this empire in the years immediately following the Mexican revolution. In an act of rebellion against his mestizo heritage, Robles marries a green-eyed woman named Norma Laragoiti, a self-absorbed materialist. During his marriage to Norma, Robles takes as his mistress the blind mestizo woman Hortensia Chacón, who abandons her petty functionary husband. With Hortensia, Robles is able to find true love and happiness.
During one of the many intensely emotional battles between Norma and Robles, Norma accidentally burns to death in the Robles mansion. The fire begins when Robles rushes downstairs from his wife’s bedroom after she refuses to give him her jewels to sell. He needs the money because his financial empire is crumbling. Robles loses all his money and worldly possessions and returns to his peasant origins. He moves to a farm in the north of Mexico, where he lives with Hortensia and their son.
The writer Rodrigo Pola is on the opposite side of the social spectrum from Robles. Their sharing of Norma (whom Pola loved) underscores their parallel and contrasting movements in the novel. Pola is transformed from an aspiring poet to a successful screenwriter. Artistically, Pola experiences a rise in terms of worldly success that is a fall in terms of artistic accomplishment. Federico, in turn, experiences a financial fall that is a spiritual rise.
Moving among these lives, serving as a kind of adhesive, is Ixca Cienfuegos. Often described as a misty, insubstantial presence, he represents the spirit of the city. His mother, Teódula Moctezuma, is a genuine Aztec sorceress. Teódula keeps dead family members under her floorboards and believes that for her ancestors to remain contented and for her life to continue, Ixca needs to sacrifice a human life for the gods. At dawn, after Norma burns to death, Teódula points to the sun, which she believes rises again because of the rejuvenating sacrifice. Ixca searches for a victim in order to put his mother’s beliefs into practice, but near the end of the novel he is exhausted by his attempts to conform to ancient rituals.
A number of briefer portraits surround the central figures of Carlos Fuentes’s novel. These minor characters suffer in obscurity throughout the city. Gabriel, a migrant worker, whose brother occasionally serves as a waiter at parties attended by the more affluent characters, returns from the United States with a blender for his mother, only to find that his family’s shack has no electricity. They use the blender as a flower vase. Gabriel, one of the novel’s many sacrificial victims, is senselessly killed by a local thug in a cheap dive on the poor side of town.
Bibliography
Boldy, Steven. The Narrative of Carlos Fuentes: Family, Text, Nation. Durham, England: University of Durham, 2002. Analyzes Where the Air Is Clear, describing how this book and Fuentes’s other early novels used the genre of the family drama to address broader issues of Mexican identity, history, and intellectual traditions.
Brody, Robert, and Charles Rossman, eds. Carlos Fuentes: A Critical View. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1982. Good and varied collection of essays on the stories and the novels.
Duran, Gloria. The Archetypes of Carlos Fuentes. Hamden, Conn.: Archon Books, 1980. Discusses female archetypes in Fuentes’s major works of fiction.
Faris, Wendy B. Carlos Fuentes. New York: Frederick Ungar, 1983. Excellent introduction to Fuentes’s works. Focuses upon Fuentes’s capacity to absorb, transform, and transmit multiple voices.
Guzman, Daniel de. Carlos Fuentes. Boston: Twayne, 1972. Overview of Fuentes’s work, placing it in a historical, social, psychological, economic, and cultural context. Includes bibliography.
Gyurko, Lanin A. Lifting the Obsidian Mask: The Artistic Vision of Carlos Fuentes. Potomac, Md.: Scripta Humanistica, 2007. Designed as a guidebook for students of Latin American literature, this book provides analysis of all of Fuentes’s work.