SOURCE: "'Total' Reality in Severo Sarduy's Search for Lo Cubano," in Romance Notes, Vol. XIII, No. 3, Spring, 1972, pp. 445-52

[In the following essay, Johndrow examines Gestos and De donde son los cantantes, exploring Sarduy's use of "pintura gestual" as a device for representing what it is to be Cuban.]

In Paris to study art criticism Severo Sarduy fell under the influence of French authors (such as Alain Robbe-Grillet), artists and critics. Applying techniques involved in the plastic arts, he tries to lead the reader to a higher understanding of a situation by presenting him with a painting whose colors are words and whose canvas is the book, thus interpreting reality in terms of painting rather than in conventional literary ones. He tries to maintain a maximum distance from his works arguing that the new or "total" realism cries for an honest reproduction of an object (or person) as opposed to an "artistic" interpretation. An accurate view of twentieth century reality would not see a subjective man-centered world, but an object world inhabited by man. Since "todo objeto tiene un sonido interno que es independiente de su significado exterior," objects have more than utilitarian importance [Severo Sarduy, "De la pintura de objectos a los objects que pintan," Mundo Nuevo, No. 1, July, 1966].

Originally brought into a man-world for his convenience, objects which have the capability of producing yet other objects now dominate. Men, too, are the creatures and not creators of language, "condicionados por sus estructuras." Man brought language into existence for the convenience of communication only to find that now his life is dependent on language and communication. Having invented himself into dependency and subordination, he still retains the right to control the existence or non-existence of his objects and language. Nevertheless, because of the complex relationships developed between man, object and language, through destroying them man would virtually be committing suicide. At least superficially accepting the principles of the "nouveau roman," Sarduy changes traditional perspectives by placing objects on an equal footing with man and by using new systems of language.

In Paris, with the perspective of distance, Sarduy intensified his search for the meaning of Cuban culture, an intrinsic element in his fiction. He says in an interview with Emir Rodríguez Monegal:

Mientras estaba en Cuba, era algo que estaba demasiado presente; no podía saber qué era. Cuando quedó lejos, pude empezar a plantearme esa pregunta [¿Qué es Cuba?], que es la que poco a poco ha centrado mi trabajo. A saber: cuáles son las posibilidades, diria de un modo un poco presuntuoso, las posibili dades ontoláogicas, las posibilidades de ser de mi país. ["Las estructuras de la narración", Mundo Nuevo, 2, August, 1966]

The Cuban revolution intensified the quest for self-knowledge and the search for cultural identity. Believing that a society cannot form from a vacuum, the Cuban revolutionary government hopes effectively to formulate a new Cuban identity, a problem which Severo Sarduy considers in his two novels.

In the first novel, Gestos (1963), he limits himself to showing the daily routine of being a Cuban living in the twentieth century, specifically that of a Negress who washes clothing by day and performs at night. Besides being a washerwoman-singer-actress she is also a terrorist and plants bombs.

Sarduy says that the title, Gestos, refers more to the artistic technique of pintura gestual rather than a mere movement of hands: "El arte me sirvió de intermediario con la realidad, como en la segunda novela el lenguaje ha sido el intermediario" ["Las estructuras …"]. He employs this technique (pintura gestual) so that when the reader begins a chapter in the book the impression of a drawing, usually in colors, forms in his mind. At first he is not sure of the reality being represented by the text, but details usually follow adding the needed information to form an interpretable reality.

Often this gestural drawing in words causes confusion in the mind of the reader in trying to distinguish objects from people. In one case Sarduy speaks simultaneously of a stoplight changing from red to amber to green and of a man wearing red socks and green trousers. In another part of the novel he sketches the arrival of the azules (police):

El auto azul y blanco, el auto azul con el techo blanco, el gran reflector deiante, el auto azul de la policía que suena siempre la sirena, la policía los azules bajan armados, y claro está, disparan.

Sarduy uses language very skillfully in certain parts of Gestos. Once when he switches from narration to an apparent interior monologue in which he tries to show rapidly shifting mental images his gestural technique results in an almost poetic prose in which the woman's headache forms a triumphantly coexisting counter-theme to her meditation on her daily life:

Lavar el día la cabeza cantar la noche la cabeza la cabeza qué asco de vida lavar todo el día él no ha venido la cabeza miren qué estampa la aspirina la vida es fantasía qué dolor de cabeza hasta que llegue la muerte la aspirina.

In yet another manifestation of his use of language dealing with exterior monologue Sarduy begins with two unrelated thoughts, the lesser in importance being in parentheses. As the emphasis on the thoughts switch so do the parentheses subordinating what was earlier more important:

Hoy han comenzado las bombas (deme un café). Ha comenzado la guerra en Oriente (café por favor) y ahora la cosa sí que va en serio (no joda deme un café) dicen que tienen hasta aviones (un café, coño) que van a venir en una invasión.

Un café, por el amor de Dios (la bomba de anoche). Si no le es molestia, un café (dicen que fue enorme). Yo preferiría caf, con este calor no hay otro remedio (he leído usted los periódicos). Cómo toma usted café (pero tú todavía crees en los periódicos). La C de caliente, la A de amargo, la F de fuerte, la E ¿de qué?…, ¿de hecho al minuto, no? Hoy explotó la primera bomba (hoy explotó la primera bomba). Un café.

The author, in adhering to the technique of gestural drawing, cannot give more importance to men who happen to be in the scene than to objects which often comprise a larger area of the panorama and which just as often hold more optical aesthetic interest than do men.

Sarduy never mentions the name of the protagonist, the washer-woman-entertainer-terrorist. He gives the names of two people—a singer (Musmut) and a Dolores Rondón who seems to be a character of a semi-myth known only by the author. The fact that the protagonist plants bombs interests the author and he, in apparently maintaining absolute objectivity towards all segments of this reality, shows no interest in her name.

Sarduy claims that he wrote the book impelled by a desire to search for lo cubano, but the result remains ambiguous. On the one hand, through this "total" realism he shows the universal existential situation of man who inhabits an object-world, and on the other hand he tries to make the setting very Cuban with the lottery, the bars, the daquiris, and the theaters. But, terrorism and the other actions in the book could occur anywhere. Sarduy, a man in search of cubanidad, has taken away his characters' essences leaving them on a similar plane to the objects about them, suggesting that lo cubano lies not in the people, but in their lotteries, daquiris, and in the objects and actions that surround them.

In his second novel, De donde son los cantantes (1967), he delves into the actual makeup of the Cuban and finds that he is a fusion of three cultures: Spanish, African, and Chinese. In presenting these three cultures he divides the book into four sections: "Curriculum Cubense," "Junto al río de cenizas de rosa," "La Dolores Rondón," and "La entrada de Cristo en La Habana." In the first part he presents the characters. The second part deals with the Chinese influence, and the following two treat the African and Spanish influences.

Sarduy uses deviating language structures whose meaning and coherence become so tenous that he deems it necessary to include an explanatory note at the end of De donde son los cantantes. His use of language recalls that of Jose Lezama Lima who richly embellishes his work often employing neologisms which alone are incomprehensible, but which transfer sense perception in his contextually plastic description. Using embellished language but without the baroquely elegant flights of Lezama, Sarduy utilizes altering planes and levels of language flow giving the same impression of depth and expansion as a master artist who with varying shades of similar colors enriches a painted scene.

If in Gestos Sarduy employed gestural drawing, in De donde son los cantantes he uses a technique that "… es un poco el proceso del collage, pero que no es exactamente un collage. Yo diría que es un collage en profundidad, un collage hacia adentro" ["Las estructuras …"]. The term collage is often "applied to a process which combines painted surfaces and miscellaneous material," [James A. Schinneller, Art/Search and Self-Discovery, 1968]. Sarduy's "painted surface" is the theme of his presentation, and his "miscellaneous material" comprises a vast use of metaphorical ornamentation, but, added to these, he uses constant metamorphosis, anti-chronological and non-chronological time, abstraction of essences forming synecdoches, and an enormous storehouse of culture and personal mythology. In treating each culture in the novel Sarduy develops each individual collage about a central theme which expresses the essence of lo chino, lo africano, and lo español that goes to form lo cubano.

Throughout the novel three reappearing characters provide the only unity observable. Auxilio, Socorro, and Mortal Pérez play a role in each section and are in constant metamorphosis. Mortal Pérez remains more static than the other two who are also called (among other names) las Floridas, las Piediminuto, las Siempre Presentes, and las Dueñas-de-todaposible-ciencia. While all change their roles completely in the three main parts of the novel, the latter two constantly metamorphose:

Son fluorescentes, son de acetileno, son tambores que imantan pájaros, son helicópteros, son sillas en el fondo de un acuario, son eunucos obesos con los sexos diminutos entre flores rosadas, son pirañas, son ángeles leprosos que cantan "Metamorfosis, metamorfosis", son dos pobres criaturas que han querido escapar a un Príapo jubilado. Se les perdona. [De donde son los cantantes]

In the Chinese section Auxilio and Socorro are members of the chorus in the Shanghai theater. In the African part they take the form of maids, but they also seem very much like the witches in Macbeth. During the Spanish division they become metaphors for mystical erotic devotion finally taking on the role of Parcas. Mortal Pérez in the three successive sections goes from an erotically aroused general chasing Flor de Loto to a politician from Camagüey to a blond Spaniard who is a double for Christ.

Besides these characters no unifying threads exist in the novel except the author's idea—that of portraying the composition of lo cubano. Sarduy apparently realizes that the reader will experience great difficulty in establishing understanding for from time to time "Yo" explains: "Bueno, querido, no todo puede ser coherente en la vida." Later when "El Lector" appears again Sarduy makes the parenthetical comment "cada vez más hipotético."

"Junto al río de cenizas de rosa" takes place in the Shanghai, a burlesque theater in the barrio chino of Havana. The "painted surface" or main plot is the symbolic chase of Flor de Loto and María who is described as "ausencia de pájaros, el Deseo". The "miscellaneous material" is composed of drugs, illusion, and the Chinese orchestra. The distillation of this collage yields its central theme and, for Sarduy, the essence of lo chino in lo cubano: desire.

"La Dolores Rondón" begins with a poem by Dolores about herself, and then two "Narradores" begin telling about her life not in chronological order, but in the order of the lines of the poem tracing her rise from poverty in Camagüey to power in Havana as the mistress of Mortal Pérez. Her life is summed up best by: "Duro Oficio el de Dolores. Cortesana y poeta. Cortesana lo fue toda su vida. Poeta por un día. Pero el tiempo lo disuelve todo, como el mar en el mar." Besides the obvious contributions of the Negro to lo cubano (music and rhythm, mythology, color, etc.) Dolores adds her slogan, "¡El poder está en las caderas!"

The last section of the book, "La entrada de Cristo en La Habana," spans roughly one thousand years in time beginning in the Islamic world of tenth century Spain and ending in a mythical twentieth century Havana where Christ (the double of Mortal Pérez) dies in the snow in an extraordinary transformation of the city where there are kirsch factories, subways, and strange plants. According to Sarduy the snow is "la total asimilación de lo exterior" ["Las estructuras …"]. The central theme of this section (besides showing the whiteness and blondness of the Spaniards) gives one of the main Spanish elements in lo cubano, faith and belief in life after death which, in the symbolic trek of Christ through time and space, begins a slow disintegration climaxing in complete putrefaction in Havana. He characterizes the Cuban conception of life after death saying that what waits for us on the other side is "la orquestica de mambo" and "Que quien bien baila, entra" [De donde …].

Both novels represent an effort by Sarduy to isolate and analyze lo cubano with his own technique of "total" realism which he develops through an artistic or "painterly" analysis of Cuban reality. The correct interpretation of the novels depends on the reader's approach being that of one analyzing a "word painting." In Gestos he uses the gestural painting method with an attempted direct transference of visual images to paper in word form which results in sketchy, superficial scenes from life. De donde son los cantantes takes the reader several steps farther into abstraction presenting a word collage in which Sarduy presents a multi-sense attack on the essences which go together to form lo cubano. The second novel, although utilizing some of the same technique of the first, indicates a profound evolution in the writing of Sarduy. The first novel, even though making use of the difficult objective mode, remains superficial and ambiguous, whereas the sheer chaos of sense images in the second novel almost defeats his purpose.