THE SEARCH FOR THE PAST: THE ROLE OF AZTEC MYTHOLOGY IN LA REGIÓN MÁS TRANSPARENTE

Carlos Fuentes' use of Aztec mythology in La region mas transparente has a far more important function than simply creating an exotic and uniquely Mexican atmosphere for his national epic. Fuentes' use of indigenous mythology and symbolism, especially his novelistic transforrnation of the Aztec fire rites, is intimately related to the development of one of the novel's central themes - the rise and fall of Federico Robles. Only through understanding the significance of the Aztec fire rites can the reader fully understand Robles' destruction and subsequent rebirth. SAW

The use of primitive imagery centers around the figures of the ancient Teódula, the Widow Moctezuma, and her son Ixca Cienfuegos. Teódula and Cienfuegos clearly incarnate the mythology and values of Indian Mexico. When wefirst see the widow, she ís enacting the rites for the dead, a function which symbolically links her to the pastoHer thoughts all lead to the. past and remembrances of her youth establish a vísion of the mythological past as an "edad dorada" with which the imperfect present must always be compared. Implicit in this idealized vision are the concepts of innocence and perfect union with nature which always characterize the myths of creation: -Luego por aliá hay mucha selva, y culebras color de vidrio, y yo salía a pasearme con mis joyas. Quería hacerme una falda de fiesta con ias pieles de Ias serpientes pero cuando salía a pasearme todas Ias bestias se quedaban asombradas dei ruido y Ia luz de mis joyas, y era como cosa de encantamiento corno se apartaban y yo ya no podía ponerles trampas a Ias inocentes. Pero aliá lasjoyas eran, i,cpmo tcdiré?, IlTI pedazo de toda Ia luz y el color, no eran cosas aparte para esconder o disfrutar a solas, hijo. Aquí en México es donde se me ocurrió que podrían robármelas, o que Iasjoyas ya no eran de todos, sino sôlo mías.! Teódula voices the need to retum to this sense of cosmic unity. After propitiating the G~ds,~an could then tive in harmony with nature, and like the widow in her youth, enJo,y l~<><:e~tsexual strength. But to regain this unity, sacrifice is necessary " ... un sacríficio diario, un alimento diario para que el sol iluminara corriera y alimentara a su vez" (p. 254). ' The idea of sacrifice is a complex concept embodying severalkey ideas. Firstly the Aztec sacrifíce links the pre~ent to both the past and to the future. The sacrifice is enacted according to ritualistic formulas established by past tradition, yet it points towards the future. Indeed, its purpose is to ensure the future continuation of life. Second~y, sacrifice implíes the subordination of the individual to the collective. Ac~ordmg to Aztec legend, the sun was created when a leprous god cast himself into the braízer as a sacrifice. He rose from the blazíng coals changed into a star. 2 This must 25 continue, for H_ el mundo no nos es dado ... -tenemos que recrearIo. Tenemos qUI mantenerlo" (p. 251).
T eódula charges her son, Ixca Cienfuegos, with the task of procuring the sacrífn, which will reinstate the world of the Indian past. Cienfuegos ís a complex figure, bou character and symbol." The elaborate metaphors of flowers, feathers, eagles, sacrífícís obsidian knives, and sun and moon imagery, which are always present ín his ínterío monologues serve to remind the reader of his symbolic function as the representative 01 the primitive pasto This drive towards the past is, in addition, his chief thematic function He stimulates all of the other characters to remember, to re-examine the pasto His seard for the sacrificial victim who would provide the link to the past unifies the novel anp rovides the only point of continuity between diverse characters and episodes . .' The world of cosmic unity Teódula and Cienfuegos envision is clearly not the work of modern Mexico City, a city H... deforme y escrofulosa, lIena de jorobas de cemento I hinchazones secretas ... " (p. 215) where the only nature its people know is "Esta lluva ocasional y contaminada" (p. 249) that never reaches the soil, The contrast between the ideal world of the past and the realities of life in present day Mexico City can be seen in the lives of all of the central characters, but is especialIy evident in the business magnate Federico Robles, who is in many ways Ixca's antithesis. Having risen from a cornfield in Michoacán to a positíon of poweF through the Revolutíon, Robles denies his Indian origin and refuses to acknowledge the past: HeI pasado no existe ... México es otra cosa despué de Ia Revolución. EI pasado se acabó para siernpre" (p. 266). " ... Aquí hay que mirar hacía el futuro" (p. 265). Far from the mythological ideal of the individual sacrificing himself for the collective, Federico represents selfishness in the extreme, maintaining tha1 because of what he has suffered in the Revolution, he has the right to take whatever he wants. He lives an incomplete, fragmented life separated from both nature and society. Our first view of him looking over the city from his office window while he himself remains encased in glass, isolated, privileged, sounds the keynote for hís characterization. His marriage of convenience to Norma Larragoiti ís joyless, and sterile. It is only in hs relationship to his blind Indian mistress Hortensia that Robles discovers the freedom of an instinctive sexual relationship that becomes his source of strength, and provides hirn with a tenuous link to nature and the cosmic unity implicit in Teódula's vision. • Ixca's search for a victim leads him to Norma and Federico. Rumors he starts lead to the collapse of Robles' fmancial empire and precipitate a confrontation between Federico and Norma. Norma refuses to accept their ruin; the two argue víolently, and as Robles leaves the house, overturning tables and furnishings in his fury, he inadverten t1y starts a fire which destroys both Norma and his remaining material possessions. This fire scene occupies a pivotal position within the work, for after the fire both Robles and Cienfuegos change dramaticalIy. The full significance of this change, however, become apparent on1y upon realizing the fire's symbolic importance in Aztec mythology.
The Mexican equivalent of our century was a time period of 52 years. At the elose of this period, the fate of the universe was in doubt. When the sun set on the last day 01 the century, no one knew whether it would rise again or whether the world would end amid the cataclysms which, according to Mexícan myth, had destroyed the four prevíou' worlds or "suns. Una vez producido eI Fuego Nuevo significaba que el mundo no había sido destruido ai finalizar el 'siglo,' que el sol seguiría saliendo y Ias Pleyades contirruarfan su curso por el firmamento. Los habitantes de cada pueblo renovaban sus alhajas, vestidos, esteras, y todos los utensilios de sus casas eran nuevos en sefial dei ano que comenzaba. Rompían sus objetos domésticos de barro." Other aspects of Aztec mythology associate fire with creation and rebirth. The fire god Xiuhtecuhtli was also the lord of life and time, and fire was often seen as a creative force. Burland comments: There appears to have been some vague feelings among the Mexicans that death and life in the underworld was not the end of the sou\. At some point or other it was taken to the fire, and escaped through the fire into life; but this was not specifically set out in any document, only suggested in some of the poerns." Throughout the Aztec religious writings fire is seen as the life in all things. The fire which destroys is also the spirit which creates anew.
It is clear that Fuentes intends for the fire scene to act as a turning point in his novel, and that he invests fire with some of the symbolic significance of the ancient rituals. Throughout the novel Robles, with hís futuristic ethic, has been one of Ixca's chief ideological opponents. Cienfuegos attempts to understand him, to penetrate his essence in order to destroy him. True understanding escapes him, but he intuitively realizes that either he or Robles must perish: i, Cuál era este origen, verdaderó origen, de Robles? Ixca, detenido en Ia esquina de Madero y Palma para encender un cigarillo, sabía que debió ser de tal manera escueto y sencillo que él, Ixca, jarnás 10 entendería. Que Ia vida oscura y marginal que Hortensia Chacón le ofrecÍa era un sustituto, a 10 sumo un reflejo intermedio de ese encuentro original, que el ejercicio de poder descrito por Librado Ibarra (y también, de otra manera, por el propio Robles) no era sino una fuga, que a Ia vez suponía una constitución, de ese mismo origen escondido. Y en el destino de ese origen, sintió en ese momento Ixca Cienfuegos, allí se Iibraría Ia batalla, allf triunfarían, o Ia nueva imagen de Robles, o Cicnfuegos y Teódula .. o (pp. 346-47)0 Estudos Ibero-Americanos, 11( 1976J Under Ixca's prodding, Robles begins remembering his past immediately after realizing his ruin. This stimulus to remember has a purga tive function. It prepares hirn to face the realities of his life without his habitual excuses and self justifications. Then before the fire: ... sintió en el centro dei cuerpo, un afán nuevo, de asco y destrucción y nuevo encuentro, que sin saberlo había germinado en Ias voces, los recuerdos y Ias horas solitarias dei última día (p. 384).
The fire which follows Robles' meditation destroys alI of his material possesions, ano takes Norma's life. Old TeóduIa casts her ancestral jeweIs into the blaze murmuring "-Asi 10 queríamos los dos, Ixca hijo ... -Te 10 dije; ellos andan escondidos, pero Iuego saIen. A recibir Ia ofrenda y el sacrificio" (p.396). The destruction of Robles household goods and Norma's sacrifícial death in the flames have an obvious paralIeI to the sacrifices connected with the ceremony of the new fíre .. Indeed, ít seems that one 01 Ixca's principal functions in the novel is merely to act as a catalyst for the flame that consumes Robles' old life. Even his name binds him symbolicalIy to the fíre rites.
Once the ritual ís completed, the two men undergo dramatic reversals. lronicalIy Cienfuegos, who had hoped to re-establish the past and resurrect the indigenous strength he represents, appears at the noveI's end as an entirely defeated mano Even his physica appearance mirrors hís collapse, and he can on1y continue the now futile and meaningless search for a sacrifice by almost causing Rodrigo Pola's death before he vanishes in mists at the novel's end, absorbed by the city. Robles, on the other hand, undergoes a type ar rebirth .. After the fire as he drives through the city, " ... se sintíó ai final de un largo viaje ... " (p. 419). After his remembrances of Frolián and Feliciano Sánchez, he is now able to identify wíth Gabriel and alI the nameless, faceless masses ofMexico's poor: Más aliá de sus huesos y de su sangre, en Ias vidas de otros que en ese minuto de humillación y carne rendida eran su propia vida, en Ias vidas mudas que 10 habían alimentado, sintió Ia razón verdadera ... (p. 422).
These few lines trace the possibility of an optimistic future for Robles. This note of optímísm is conspicuously abserit in the lives of the other major characters. Sommers notes: In Where lhe Air ls OeJlr, the ex~erience of defeat. is decisive. for all of~he l~ading h acters. Ixca's attempt to regam the past ís ultimately fruitless. The idealism of :acona meets senseless death, Rodrigo admits finally that he has forsaken his cherished personal goals. For Robles, defeat proves to be purgative and restorative, and of all the destinies, his appears to come to terms with defeat, as it impels him to rearrange his outlook and reorder his existence. The defeat which cioses the doors of the capitalist world to him seems to be followed at the novel's end by a search for a new life.' The new life that opens to Robles is based, paradoxica1ly, on a return to many of the mythical ideais Ixca Cienfuegos advocated. Havíng been led my memory back to bis origins, and having accepted.these origins, he returns to Hortensia as she had predicted he would. The two then leave Mexico and return to the land. Again the open and innocent sexuality he had enjoyed with Hortensia provides the key to Federíco's re-entry into a life in union with the archetypal forces of nature; the son they conceive is the symbol of thís new accord. Robles, then, represents the on1y possible solution for the problems of Mexico posed in the novel. Ixca's quest to recapture the past is as futile as Robles' original denial of the pasto Life ís neither past nor future, but a present whích demands cognizance of. both. In his new life, Robles seems to have come elose to the balance recommended by the idealistic Zamacona: "El progreso debe encontrarse en un equilibrio entre 10 que somos y nunca podremos dejar de ser y 10 que, sin sacrificar 10 que somos, tenemos Ia posibilidad de ser ... " (p.61). It is most fitting, of course, that Robles symbolize the future for Mexico, because of a1l the characters, on1y Robles incorporates nearly a1l elements of the Mexican experience: the Indian, the Revolutíonary, and the Capitalist -Nouveau Riche. His future can thus validly symbolize that of bis nation. And it seems c1ear that in the character of Robles, Fuentes leaves a note of hope for the future.
In summary, Teôdula and Ixca's efforts to re-establish the world of the primitive past are fruitless. Yet their presence within the novel provides the stimulus which forces Robles to examine the past, and to acknowledge his debt to it. And it is the Aztec myth~logy~ienfuegos voíces that provides Fuentes with the symbolism of the ancient fíre ntes which he uses to underscore the destruction and subsequent rebirth of Robles which is the novel's central theme. '

Department of Languages
The Ohio State University (Lima Campus), USA