2 ?b90

270
The son is burdened by the weight of his symbolic undershirt (out of which
he cuts the circles) and the pressure imposed by the images of the three
women which he reads in the waves. All three are part of the feminine and
the Unconscious, as he now realizes, but he must continue his flight along
the Malec(Sn until he offers the tangible evidence of his sexual experience
to the waves: "Extrajo la camiseta y con disimulada impulsi6n la lanz(5 a la
voracidad de las aguas" (1,417). As soon as he puts aside this symbol of
his success and shame, he is able to see more clearly, from his position on
the sea wall, which "servia de divisi6n entre la luz limitada de los faroles
y la oscuridad sin lfMites de la marina" (1,417). The sea is identified
even more closely with the Unconscious when it receives the offering; it
becomes the serpent of the ouroboros, the negation of masculine and feminine,
"la gran serpiente marina. " The circle of cloth, before being submerged,
assumesthe same form: "La camiseta misma antes de anegarse, se fue circuli-
zando como una serpiente a la que a1guien ha trasmitido la inmortalidad
(1,417). The two are part of the same entity, but the immortality awarded
by the ouroboros is illusory, as we have seen in the case of Foci6n. Its
disappearance coincides with the advent of "la serpiente f6lica" (1,417),
the power of procreation in mortal man:
era necesario crear al perder precisamente la inmortalidad.
Asi el hombre fue mortal pero creador y la
serpiente fglica se convirtid en un fragmento que debe
resurgir. Fronesis sentia que los dos cfrculos de la
camiseta al desaparecer en el oleaje, desaparecerfan
tambign de sus terrores para dar paso a la serpiente
circuncidada. (1,417).
" La serpiente circuncidada " is an important choice of phrase because
.
circumcision is used by many races as a rite of passage. It is clear that
Fronpsis regards himself as a victor, and insofar as the feminine aspect of
his trial is concerned, this is true. Yet the problematic imagery conti-
nues even after he has come to terms with the unconscious half of his mind.