THE AVATAR IN PANAMA - Theses - Flinders University

2.3 Dobles and Duplos: Latin American Perspectives The Avatar in Panamasin involucrarme. Presiento que de algún modolas palomas han contribuido al cambio (110).The metamorphosis itself is provoked by two events: “el choquecon otra cultura” she experiences; and her consideration of thecomparison made between her and the birds. The alternative role she isforced to adopt in the second culture is paradoxical as while it stillrepresents a double or second existence, her lack of communicationskills and loneliness in effect reduce her new national status to personanon grata. That said, it is somewhat ironic that the object into which shetransmutates is not capable of speech, an expression of the self. Afterthe metamorphosis, she describes events from her new perspective ofthe bird, yet she simultaneously sees what must be herself in humanform before her bestial transformation, although she may not be awareof the woman’s identity. In her telepathic discourse with the birds she isphysically and verbally divided: “[n]o la desairen, les digo a mis amigascon el pensamiento, no me desairen; es delicada como yo, comoustedes”, yet parallel events occurring to both subjects are related fromthe one perspective:una [paloma] se le ha posado en la cabeza, seme posa. Otras llenan mis hombros, se losllenan. Ya no la veo, la joven no puede verme.Un dulce cosquilleo acaricia mis oídos, lossuyos; recorre su columna, la mía; se pasa pormis brazos, los de ella (111).The birds envelop both subjects who disappear into the clouds:“Ahora surge, por entre alas, la cabeza de la joven. Alza una mano, laalzo. De pronto comienza a elevarse la masa gris […] Me llevan enapretada formación, se la llevan” (112). The concluding paragraph hasthe protagonist witnessing her former self taking leave of her now avianself; a dénouement of division and disintegration.The city of Budapest provides the setting for the confrontationof the double in Cortázar’s “Lejana”. 10 The existential double is revealedin written accounts of diaries as it is in “Le horla”. Alina Reyes visualisesher double as a maltreated beggar wearing “zapatos rotos” (thereference to which confirms her status as mendicant) trudging throughsnow. Her double’s suffering is juxtaposed with her social standing inBuenos Aires and she is unable to reconcile her two lives, the second ofwhich invades her mind at inopportune moments. She has a connectionwith her other self: “Anoche la sentí sufrir otra vez. Sé que allá me10 Cortázar, “Lejana”, Blowup. See analysis of Chico Buarque’s Budapeste in Braziland Budapest 137.118