City of the Beasts

Though fictional, the narrative makes explicit reference to real-world conflicts occurring both in the Amazon and around the world. The destruction of native peoples and natural resources for the gain of personal wealth, governmental power, and military objectives is commonplace in countless global settings. Here, Allende addresses this ongoing conflict by delving into different interpretations of the role that the Amazon’s native peoples and natural resources play in an ever-progressing world. 

It’s clear from the start that the members of the International Geographic expedition come from a culture that is ostensibly more advanced than those of the native Amazon peoples, with Alex noting that many are “still in the Stone Age” (49). With their fire, technology, and weaponry, the expedition and the other explorers who have come before them seem to have a significant advantage over the Indians. However, Dr. Torres notes that the introduction of these advantages to the natives has not been a gift but rather a curse that corrodes their society: “with a knife, any warrior felt he was a god” (118). Conversely, the natives possess an advanced connection to nature, animals, and each other that seems foreign and surprising to Alex, who has never observed such an asset in his own culture. This tension between what is truly “primitive” or “advanced” comes to a head when Leblanc sees the carnage his expedition has caused in the peaceful village and realizes: “[h]is worst nightmares had been reversed: [t]hey themselves were the savages, not the Indians” (355). Throughout, Allende questions the narratives of progress that underlie real-world attempts to do away with the traditional ways of life of native peoples. 

The value of the pristine Amazonian land is similarly fraught. Mauro Carías acts as a stand-in for the idea of progress at all costs; to him, undeveloped Amazonian land is pure waste, in that leaving it intact means leaving resources like ore and wood unused. However, it becomes clear that developing the land is also wasteful, as it destroys existing resources like the plants necessary for traditional medical remedies and, perhaps most importantly, the calm stasis that the native people have established with the land over the course of countless generations. By the time Alex and Nadia meet the Beasts and learn the truth of their symbiosis with the People of the Mist, it is clear to them that the entire rainforest is a macrocosm of exactly that kind of interconnection; no aspect of the land can live for long without the support of all the other aspects. By underscoring the immense value of this delicate balance, Allende argues against the removal of natural resources for raw material gain.