Sarasola exploits the first-person narrative voice and limited narrative perspective of the character

(protoganist), Joaquin Lencinas, to evoke the destabilising effects of dictatorial rule and enslavement
in a moving, personal way. With every paragraph commencing with the same pronoun (“I”), the
reader immediately notices an attempt by Joaquin to affirm his own identity and not relinquish his
sense of self and past experiences. Yet the personal pronoun seems intentionally over-abundant,
suggesting that his incessant efforts (to retain who he once was) are as ineffectual to him as his
“shadow” is to his body.

What does this “shadow” represent?

Sarasola commences in a pithy, dramatic way, with the character making the emphatic declaration
that “I, Joaquin Lencinas, I am a shadow”. This same phrase is repeated three paragraphs later. The
author clearly wants to draw the reader’s attention to this metaphor, with the sentence structure
leaving “shadow” at the end for heightened emphasis and the double reference to himself
highlighting the nature of the two things Sarasola wishes the reader to compare: the narrator and
the shadow. But what does this mean?

Perhaps Sarasola uses this metaphor to express the narrator’s feelings of impersonality having been
degraded by many people and experiences in his lifetime. This is supported by the subsequent
qualifications that Joaquin offers to the shadow; the reader learns it is “reflect[s] an unnamed
sadness that nobody has yet described nor will ever describe”. By constructing this sentence using a
negation, Sarasola rhetorically accentuates just how “unnamed” the shadow, emblematic of
Joaquin’s personhood, actually is. Not only has no one described his sadness, but no future person
will ever succeed in doing so – the rhetorical figure (dirimens copulatio) draws attention to just how
anonymous and impersonal his suffering really is. Moreover, the way he likens his shadow to “the
only child” of a “cursed Prince” suggests he is alone in his suffering, isolated from a support network.
The dislocation arising from this isolation is apparent in the lexical field of dreams (insert your
sentence here). Link back to feelings of impersonality. We learn about his degrading experiences in
the next paragraph.

How does Sarasola juxtapose Joaquin’s past life with his present one?
Sarasola uses a wistful but reserved tone to present Joaquin’s past life. The paragraph begins with
the narrator listing that he “was a slave, a water bearer, a fugitive, a pirate”. The absence of any
conjunctions makes the list feel uncomfortable or uneasy, although the last item in the list (“a
pirate”) creates a sense of intrigue as the freedom and rashness associated with being a pirate
seems inconsistent with the emotional and physical subjugation associated with being a slave.
Perhaps because of this intrigue, the narrator deems it appropriate to qualify his experiences as a
pirate, assuring the reader that he “never saw…women with fish tails whose singing leads to
misfortune, or that monster with huge tentacles that can destroy whole ships”. His imperfect
knowledge of mythology is highlighted by his verbose description of sirens and krakens, but the
effect is endearing, suggesting he looks on his time as a pirate with some fondness. This wistfulness
burgeons later on, where he talks about his “passionate love…[for] Soledad Cruz”; the mere thought
of “Mamba” seems to be a form of escapism for Joaquin, enabling him “grow upright and once again
become a bull who rides and rejoices in her…”. One way of interpreting the figurative language is
erotic in nature, with “grow upright” and the “bull” being emblematic of male fertility. But this
undercuts the uplifting effect of the narrator’s nostalgic tone; the memory of the past is better
interpreted as giving him the fortitude in the present to physically stand up resist his “bones” which
he describes using the simile of being “as fragile as dry branches” (exemplifying his current, old age).
Sarasola juxtaposes this wistfulness with the sense of subjugation in the latter half of the paragraph.
“Now”, Joaquin is reeling from old age and is “a prisoner in this jail without bars, locks, or prison
guards, but with a stifling heat and perennial rains”. The repeated references to physical
obstructions to freedom (“bars”, “locks”) accentuate that the narrator’s prison is mental. The
“stifling heat” operates as a transferred epithet, describing how the narrator is flustered by the
humidity of the prison – after all, it occupies a single headspace. The extended metaphor of the
narrator’s imprisonment becomes allegorical when it is revealed that the prison guard (who was “a
terrible man with obscure habits: the Supreme One”) once lived but now is “dead”. Sarasola likens
the deceased dictator (or “Supreme One”) to the dead prison guard and Joaquin to the prisoner,
figuratively emphasising the lasting effects of tyrannical, authoritarian rule on political subjects like
the narrator. It seems that the narrator (like the “locals” he attempts to distance himself from using
hyperbolic language) similarly does not wish to leave his “jail”, out of fear that “at any point [the
dictator] could wake up from his tomb and govern them until the end of time”. Indeed, he presents
himself as eternally subjugated, with “perennial reins” forming his imprisonment, so it is
questionable why he exaggerates the threat posed by the passed dictator.

How does the narrative focus shift from the third paragraph onwards?
- Comment on the general and the story I don’t want to do it cos I think its some kind of
cultural reference idk?
- Comment on how the shadow adopts a newfound meaning (probably need some critical
race theory)
- Examine the effects of imprisonment from the other person’s perspective

How does Sarasola conclude the chapter?

And then finally conclude with the significance of his only valuable, a *CORRODING* spear. Link back
to introduction and explain the withering sense of self again.