Haunted House And Filiberto

Haunted House and Filiberto

Introduction

The story is presented from two contrasting views: that of Filiberto and that of the friend who recovers his body. After learning about the tragic death of his co -worker Filiberto, the narrator will collect the possessions of Filiberto and make the arrangements for a funeral. While he does, he meets Filiberto’s diary, which tells his terrifying battle with a sculpture of Chac Mool, the Aztec god of rain, who slowly began to come alive.

Developing

In the story of Fuentes, Filiberto, a collector of pre -Columbian artifacts, buys a statue of Chac Mool in the Lagunilla market. He houses the new statue in his basement. During the course of the coming months, Chac Mool gradually comes to life and takes control of the house and the life of his unfortunate owner. Filiberto flees to Acapulco, where he drowns in mysterious circumstances. When a friend returns the body, an old Indian meets him in Filiberto’s house, who orders him to carry Filiberto’s body to the basement.

Questions for Reading and Preparation of the Story

• Many critics have read Chac Mool as an example of a fantastic story of the twentieth century.

Do you agree with this reading? How would the fantastic of this story lie? Think, for example, the definition of the fantastic of Todorov and its update/review by Alazraki and Roas could also think of other modalities such as the strange, the wonderful, to address the unusual and disturbing aspects of the disturbing story regarding the known realityand rationally explainable?

I agree with this reading. Reader’s hesitation between a natural or supernatural explanation around narrated phenomena constitutes the very essence of the fantastic and is also present in Chac Mool. Fuentes weaves their story in magical realism leaving all the people involved in the story trying to solve what is what. The magical element in Chac Mool is the transformation of the statue. Chac Mool begins to speak, move and act like a human. At the end of the story, the statue seems to have finished its transformation completely, when the narrator meets him in Filbert’s house.

•  What symbolic interpretation could the figure of Chac Mool in the story? Remember who was Chac Mool and keep in mind that the story narrated is in the Mexico of the twentieth century

Chac Mool obviously represents the indigenous past that, putting the mask of civilization, penetrates and finally takes possession of the present. The Chac Mool has an indigenous figure, bad smell, yellow skin and a ugly face with a strange smile. His personality is very dominant, imposing his will on Filiberto’s. It acts as a very violent animal with the protagonist despite needing it to survive. The description of the yellow Indian in the final paragraph represents the Chac Mool becoming a life in the form of a human who sacrifices Filiberto as in the Mayan-Toltec rituals that takes its place in the world.

•  Think at Julio Cortázar’s house. Do you see any similarity between the two stories or some aspect in Chac Mool that remembers from Casa taken? Also think of structural.

First, both stories belong to the genre of the fantastic story and are a game between fantasy and reality. House taken and Chac Mool play with your mind. It was necessary for both authors to begin with a story based on reality, and then weave a mythical story to obtain the effect they wanted. This type of writing often leaves the confused reader, trying to solve where reality ends and fantasy begins.

conclusion

 Due to the unlikely nature of the events that Filiberto registered, the reader is inclined to consider his account as a fantasy, or at least as the product of an unbalanced mind. Is this also the case with a house taken, where you can ask if this take is a creation of the imagination of the brothers, that the sounds they hear are real sounds, but that their imagination has linked a fictitious story, that of the shotFrom the house, to these noises?

In addition, as in the house taken, there is also a haunted house. Once Chac is installed in the basement, the pipe begins badly and the municipal drainage pipes rise again to the basement for the first time. Excess moisture causes Chac to become covered with slime. The idol begins to soften and its stone acquires a texture as meat.