THE AVATAR IN PANAMA - Theses - Flinders University

3.3 Reinventing the Double The Avatar in Panamacoincidence then that metamorphosing people and plants feature inJaramillo Levi's “Germinación” (M), “En el jardín” (ACO) and “Dueña yseñora” (CB).The transmutation in “Germinación” is from boy to plant as theresult of an experiment. The first line of the story sees the protagonistawakening just prior to his own metamorphosis. 28 It begins with hisreference to a foreboding smell he experienced in a dream which hasinfiltrated the state of wakefulness: “aquel extraño olor que veníapresintiendo desde el sueño”. The image of smell is then repeatedthroughout the narrative. He then has an epiphany and there is a senseof inevitability as “Al comprender al fin cuál habría de ser el resultadode su gran dedicación a la botánica, cerró los ojos al absurdo”. Themetamorphosis describes the plant overwhelming almost consumingthe boy contrary to his desire: “Deseó poder perderse nuevamente enel seguro mundo del sueño, donde lo inverosímil nada tenía que vercon la realidad. Pero no pasó de ser más que vago deseo” (104).The loss of the boy’s human identity replaced by that of theplant is depicted imaginatively. The language of transformationdescribes, “[u]na leñosa rigidez se le ha ido extendiendo por todo elcuerpo. Siente la savia hacérsele pesada en la sangre y cómo éstacomienza a endurecerse milimétricamente. Sin querer se maravilla delgrado de hipersensibilidad que lo llena” (104). The image of the“semillas” which seemingly have brought about this mutation is carriedfrom the first half of “Germinación” (“Quién hubiera pensado que podíancoexistir en aquellas semillas características carnívoras y procesososmóticos”), to the second (“Que entierre sus semillas en montoncitosde tierra húmeda” [105]), and forms a connection between both. Theseeds’ carnivorous characteristics foreshadow the next series of events.When his sibling enters the room sometime later, she is confronted by astrange odour and an ever-increasing thicket spreading over the bed.There is a glimmer of recognition from her brother: “Le pareció percibirun ligero tremor de hojas. […] El verde pareció intensificarse e hirió susojos” (105). The sister depicts her sibling as insensitive yet ironicallywhen she steps on the leaves of the personified plant there is “un gritodesgarrado”. The significance of the plant as carnivorous is apparent inthe final line:vio ahora, sin poder articular su terror, cómo delos fragmentos que aún estaban bajo su piemanaba pastosamente un rojo verdoso que fuetrepándosele por los pies, enroscándosele a lasrodillas, cercándole la cintura, besándole los28 Gregor in Kafka’s The Metamorphosis woke up already transformed. See 2.3footnote 4.233