What are the different ideas that the people have about how to deal with the very old man?
At first Elisenda and Pelayo seem pretty decent when wanting to help the old man but soon act in a very inhumane way buy locking him up.Many people went to see him and threw rocks at the old man hoping he would move or stand up so they could get a better look, others threw food at him as if he were a circus animal in a cage. I think overall nobody treated him as they would treat a human just because they didn’t know what he was. All interactions towards him are very selfish and egocentric. They all want something from him, miracles, money, or the entertainment of the day or prove and show their wisdom by theorizing about it.
How is he treated in the end? (List all the ways)
The town forgets him and in the house he is treated like the crabs they tried keeping out. Nobody really cares in the end but Elisenda (and probably Pelayo), she doesn’t care in the way that she has a concern for his wellbeing but for her own calm and peace. I think even though she doesn’t mention it she somehow feels responsible for his suffering and would rather not see him to get onto her saily life. I think he constantly is there as a reminder that she could change and help but never does. When he leaves she and Pelayo feel relieved.
What does the church contribute to the story and the old man’s treatment?
They immediately want to catalog him as either celestial and sublime or an animal. As if those were the only two things one can be when one is not a human. Nobody doubts what the church or padre Gonzaga have to say about it. The father gonzora writes higher church authorities for he thinks it is best for them to decide and determine the man’s nature.
Is there any evidence in the text that he is in fact an angel, or any evidence that he is not?
It depends on what an angel really is. His wings make him seem like an angel and that he comes from above but he could also just be a creature never before seen. The way angels are strictly related to religion and myths (which can be nothing but stereotypes) make it hard for one to believe he is an angel when he is described as old, weak, needing rest and overall dirty and sick. Although some miracles such as the blind man growing three new teeth or the man with leprosy growing sunflowers from his wounds are believed to be thanks to the old manwith wings.
Father Gonzaga does not think he is an angel as he “does not speak the language of God” but then again, the sublime and celestial has been mythified around the world.
Father Gonzaga also mentions soon after that it cannot be determined whether he is or he is not an angel by his wings, probably because he knows he nor nobody else could know for certain based on looking at him.
How would you compare this story with Filiberto’s experience with Chac Mool?
It is similar because it is something that does not happen everyday but is still not seen as a huge thing or at least not in the long run. It seems odd for Chac Mool to come to life and for an angel to be in Pelayo’s backyard but they try to seem to go on with their lives. Both situations affected their routines but not really the way they see things.
Both Chac Mool and the Angels have been mythified to the point where people think they know what they do, eat, look like and must be like. So when noth come in different ways and acting differently as expected people do not know how to interact or what to categorize them as.
Use Zamora and Faris' definition of magical realism as a mode that "facilitates the fusion, or coexistence, of possible worlds, spaces, systems that would be irreconcilable in other modes of fiction" and explain how you think this definition might relate to the elements of this story?
I believe that it links both worlds and the man with wings is then tried to be understood from the point of view and world the town lives in. It seems, as I mentioned before, odd for the man with wings to be there but acquires some sort of reality by how people treat him. They do see him as something weird and possibly out of this world but are not as surprised by it like one would expect them to be. After a few days he becomes something ordinary and they even treat him badly around the house and then even feel sorry for him, like they would with any animal or poor man they were to see. He also acquires reality when the doctor checks him and thinks it is so natural and normal: “Resultaban tan naturales en aquel organismo completamente humano, que no podía entender por qué no las tenían también los otros hombres.”
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