Eva Luna

“Words are free, she used to say, and she appropriated them; they were all hers. She sowed in my mind the idea that reality is not only what we see on the surface; it has a magical dimension as well and, if we so desire, it is legitimate to enhance it and color it to make our journey through life less trying.”

Consuelo’s philosophy on storytelling shapes Eva’s life. This quote corresponds to the theme of Reality and the Power of Storytelling, suggesting that words can draw out hidden aspects of reality and create a better version of the world. From her mother, Eva learns to use words as a weapon against life’s injustices.

“While in South America embalmed bodies were accumulating in the house of Professor Jones and a copulation inspired by a serpent’s bite engendered a little girl whose mother would call her Eva so she would love life, also in Europe reality took on abnormal dimensions. The war sank the world into confusion and fear.”

Here, Allende highlights that reality can be as strange as fiction by contrasting the fantastical images from Consuelo’s life with the reality of WWII. The comparison makes the point that these moments of fantasy and love are not inherently less reasonable than a brutal war. This moment sets the stage for the abstract reality of Eva Luna.

"In their hearts they knew that from that moment they would try to forget, to tear that horror from their souls, resolved never to speak of it, with the hope that time would erase it. Finally, slowly, exhausted, feet dragging, they returned home. Last came Rolf Carle, walking between two rows of skeletons, all equal in the desolation of death.”

Rolf’s strategy for dealing with trauma is to bury it away and not speak of it, contrasting with Eva’s approach of putting everything into words. However, the image of the concentration camp highlights the importance of telling the true stories of tragedies and injustices so that they are not repeated in the future.

“‘There is no death, daughter. People die only when we forget them,’ my mother explained shortly before she left me.”

In Eva Luna, memories keep spirits alive, and stories preserve memories. By continuing to tell stories from her mother’s life, Eva maintains her connection to Consuelo across the boundary of life and death.

“She believed men had it best; even the lowest good-for-nothing had a wife to boss around.”

Eva Luna explores several aspects of oppression, notably The Role of Women in South American Patriarchy. While class and race affect individual experiences within a patriarchy, this quote highlights the way patriarchal power structures transcend all other social constructs: Men from all walks of life subjugate women.

“All I have ever done in my life is work, and it looks like that will be your lot, too.”

As a poor girl, Eva is not expected to achieve any social mobility. Her future is laid out with cold practicality. Eva accepts the reality of her situation and makes the best of it through her optimistic perspective, which eventually helps her achieve upward mobility.

“Nevertheless, his ideas about manhood were deeply rooted from childhood, and the things that happened to him later, all the battles and passions, all the encounters and arguments, all the rebellions and defeats, were not enough to change his mind.”

Naranjo has been indoctrinated with patriarchal ideals since birth and never given a chance to develop his own opinions on masculinity and femininity. This quote illustrates how deep-rooted systemic and societal biases are, as well as the difficulty of eradicating these attitudes once they exist.

“While those in power stole without scruple, thieves by trade of necessity scarcely dared to practice their profession: the eyes of the police were everywhere. That was the basis for the story that only a dictator could maintain order.”

The power of storytelling is a double-edged sword. While Eva tells stories to control her reality, the government tells its citizens a certain story to normalize corruption and discourage rebellion. They obfuscate their own large-scale theft but persecute people who steal for survival. This passage reflects Power and the Inevitability of Corruption.

“The boys vowed to keep the memory of their deed alive, and they succeeded so well that the story passed from mouth to mouth, enhanced at every telling, until it was transformed into a heroic feat.”

Through the transformative power of storytelling, Lukas Carlé’s murderers are made out to be fairy-tale heroes. Often, the difference between good and evil in the public eye is down to the dominant narrative which the majority buys into.

“When she saw that the prayers and the witchcraft and the herbalists’ brews did not bring an end to her adversity, my madrina swore before the altar of the Virgin Mary to never again have carnal contact with a man, and to ensure that vow she had a midwife stich up her vagina.”

The public shaming of Eva’s madrina after she gives birth to a child with a severe birth defect is rooted in misogyny, racism, and sexual repression. Once a woman who proudly owned her sensuality, she is driven to mutilate herself for the perceived crime of being a sexual being, reflecting the oppressive social mores of her society and The Role of Women in South American Patriarchy.

“I did not understand why the part of my body that was sinful and forbidden could at the same time be so valuable.”

Eva highlights the hypocrisy of coveting women’s virginity while condemning women’s pleasure as sinful. As she matures, she rejects this paradox and seeks out pleasure for herself.

“That was a good time in my life, in spite of having the sensation of floating on a cloud, surrounded by both lies and things left unspoken. Occasionally I thought I glimpsed the truth, but soon found myself once again lost in a forest of ambiguities.”

The sensation Eva describes here parallels the effect evoked by her own surreal narration. Blending the ordinary with the extraordinary, Allende creates a dreamlike tone which suspends the reader in their own “forest of ambiguities,” reflecting the theme of Reality and the Power of Storytelling.

“He was convinced that learned men exist for the purpose of being honored with statues, and that it is nice to have two or three to exhibit in textbooks, but when it is a question of power, only the high-handed, feared caudillo comes out on top.”

The General is correct in his assessment that the same type of fearsome and brutal military leaders continually triumph in Eva Luna, an allusion to the reality of Venezuela’s decade-long military dictatorship. The persistent link between Power and the Inevitability of Corruption is the reason that the many changes in government do not improve Eva’s life.

“They could not evict the occupants because the palace and everything inside had become invisible to the human eye; it had entered another dimension where life continued without aggravation.”

Amid the corruption and cruelty of the unnamed country’s dictatorship, the Palace of the Poor stands as a sanctuary free of human evil, in which a handful of people can exist in peace, protected by some benevolent force (See: Symbols & Motifs). Tellingly, the Palace appears as a mirage, highlighting the exceptional nature of such a resting place.

“In the days that followed, the sun beat down on the house, converting it into an enormous saucepan in which the mangoes slowly simmered; the building took on an ocher color; it grew soggy and weak, and burst open and rotted, impregnating the town for years with the odor of marmalade.”

Eva relates many impossible-seeming stories. Allende uses her unconventional perspective as a vehicle for introducing magical realism to the narrative, maintaining an undercurrent of fantasy in a narrative that deals with serious, real-world problems.

“He had been educated in the rule of silence: it is forbidden for a man to demonstrate his feelings or secret desires. His position as husband had made him Zulema’s master; it was not proper that she should know his weaknesses, because she might use them to wound or dominate him.”

Gender roles based in patriarchy harm men as well as women, constraining men’s ability to express emotions. Riad is only one of many male characters who have internalized the idea that men should be cold and emotions are a weakness. Meanwhile, Eva’s emotional approach to life proves that being in touch with one’s feelings is a strength.

“Long live the people, death to imperialism, they shouted, said, whispered: words, words, thousands of words, good and bad words; the guerillas had more words than bullets.”

Like the government, the guerrillas understand the power of language to drum up revolutionary fervor. The image of revolutionaries with “more words than bullets” foreshadows the guerrillas’ nonviolent subversion at the end of Eva Luna.

“Something was growing beneath the hardness and silence, something akin to a boundless affection for others, something that surprised him more than any of the changes he had undergone.”

Despite the dictator’s beliefs that a leader has no room for emotion, Naranjo’s character proves that love and compassion are the basis for truly effective leadership. In leading his comrades with love, he breaks through the patriarchal convention that expressing emotion is weak.

“I realized that our problems were not related in any way to the fortunes of the guerillas; even if he achieved his dream, there would be no equality for me. For Naranjo, and others like him, ‘the people’ seemed to be composed exclusively of men; we women should contribute to the struggle but were excluded from decision-making and power.”

The cause that the guerrillas are fighting for is separate from women’s liberation and true equality between genders. There is no intersectionality in their revolution; they are men fighting for men’s freedom. This sobering realization leads Eva to conclude that women must fight their own battle for equality to change The Role of Women in South American Patriarchy.

“Little by little, the past was transformed into the present, and the future was also mine; the dead came alive with an illusion of eternity; those who had been separated were reunited, and all that had been lost in oblivion regained precise dimensions.”

As Eva finishes writing Bolero, the strength of her storytelling ability is on full display. Her writing synthesizes the past, present and future into a single moment, reanimating the dead and repairing lost bonds. While it can be read as a metaphor for the power of words to preserve memories, this moment can also be taken literally within the context of the narrative as an example of magical realism—an example of Reality and the Power of Storytelling.

“’But if he can’t change things, who can?’

‘You and I, for example. What has to change in this world are attitudes.’”

Mimí outlines why the guerrilla movement will not help her or Eva. To enact truly fair and equal legislation, the governing body needs to be composed of a diverse set of representatives who can understand the needs of different communities. To achieve that goal, the unnamed country must move past the view that women are unfit for powerful positions.

“She had delved deeply into her own story and now could not take back her words; but neither did she want to take them back, and she surrendered herself to the pleasure of blending with him into a single story.”

The story that Eva tells Rolf in the mountains is their own love story. Her story serves as a means of connection, indirectly communicating her feelings to a man who shies away from displays of emotion. Her creation of this love story foreshadows their union at the novel’s end.

“But the Indians were not interested in his revolution, or anything that came from that hated race; they could not even repeat the long word he had used. They did not share the guerrillas’ ideals; they did not believe their promises or understand their reasoning; and if they had agreed to help in a venture whose outcome they were not capable of measuring, it was the military were their enemies and this gave them the opportunity to avenge some of the harm done to them over the years.”

While she largely focuses on women in South American society, Allende also highlights the marginalization of several other groups in the unnamed country. Indigenous Americans in the unnamed country have been driven off their own homeland by the military and government. They too are unconcerned with the political goings-on in the country because they know to expect continued persecution by default and realize that the guerrillas’ promises of revolution do not extend to them.