Distant Relations (Masterplots II: American Fiction Series, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Carlos Fuentes
- First Published: 1980
- Type of Plot: Fantastic narrative
- Time of Work: The early 1980’s
- Setting: Paris, Mexico, and the Caribbean
- Principal Characters: The Comte de Branly, The narrator, Hugo Heredia, Victor Heredia, The French Victor Heredia, André Heredia
- Genres: Long fiction, Fantasy, Magical and occult fantasy
- Subjects: Caribbean, France or French people, Surrealism, Ghosts or apparitions, 1980’s, Mexico or Mexicans, Archaeology or archaeologists
- Locales: Caribbean, Mexico, Paris, France
The Novel
Most of Distant Relations takes place during one long afternoon in Paris, but the events that it recounts take place in Mexico and the Caribbean as well as France and extend two centuries into the past. The title refers not only to the familial connections between the characters in the novel but also to the historical relationship between the French and Spanish-American traditions. Fuentes puts particular emphasis on a series of French writers born in Spanish America—writers who, to a greater or lesser degree, bridge the distance between the two cultures. A...
[The entire page is 2062 words long]
