THE AVATAR IN PANAMA - Theses - Flinders University

2.1 The North American Double The Avatar in Panamaan executioner: “Al sentir que sus ojos me taladran buscándose,quisiera no ser testigo, no ser verdugo, no ser yo” (130). 29In “Monsieur du Miroir” and “Testigo”, Hawthorne and JaramilloLevi have both used a classic inanimate object synonymous withdoubling as the central character of their stories. The latter hascombined the modern fear of death as ageing, and the postmodernperception of the mirror as palimpest to create a story disclosing asurprise ending.Death’s Twin Brother: O. HenryWilliam Sydney Porter, known only by his pseudonym O. Henry,was a prolific writer of short stories and one of them, “The Dream”, is ofinterest in the literature of the double. 30 It begins: “Murray dreamed adream. Both psychology and science grope when they would explain tous the strange adventures of our immaterial selves when wandering inthe realm of ‘Death’s twin brother, Sleep’”. 31 This quote harks back tothe original meaning of the double as a soul who wanders while thephysical body remains asleep. 32 “The Dream” relates the curious case ofa man on death row for his wife’s murder. On his way to be executed hemarvels at his own indifference but as he is being strapped into theelectric chair, panic strikes and he is overcome by a feeling of revulsion.His surroundings become unreal to him and he believes a mistake isbeing made: he questions why he is in the chair and the circumstancesleading to his present situation. Suddenly he has an epiphany, a dreamwhere he sees his wife and a child. His thoughts are confirmed; this hasall been a misunderstanding, the trial and death sentence all a dream.Then the fatal current is turned on and the story ends: “Murray haddreamed the wrong dream” (735).At the point in the text where Murray enters the execution room,O. Henry actually dies in real life –however, he had outlined the story inthe way he had intended the conclusion. 33 If Murray had not dreamed29 The idea of a conscious witness appears in several of Jaramillo Levi’s stories. SeeAppendix C Witness.30 Porter (1862-1910) adopted the name O. Henry while serving a jail sentence forembezzlement. He has a long association with Spanish-speaking America: prior to hisconviction, he fled to the Honduras where he lived for several years; his first collectionof stories, Of Cabbages and Kings (1904), is set entirely in South America.31O. Henry, “The Dream”, O. Henry: 100 Selected Stories, (Hertfordshire:Wordsworth, 1995) 732-735. 732.32 “Sleep is the brother of death”. Hypnos and Thanatos were twin brothers in Greekmythology. .33 Indeed “The Dream” is preceded by an anonymous note informing the reader thatthis tale was O. Henry’s last and that the unfinished manuscript was found on hisdusty desk.83