Pedro Paramo

Comala is a town beset by violence. This violence is not an isolated event; over the course of many generations, violence and trauma have been passed down across successive generations. The novel depicts violence as something that becomes cyclical, ruining places and people on both a large and small scale.

The moment at which Pedro abandons any pretense of morality, for example, is at the wedding where his father was killed. Though the death of Don Lucas was considered to be an accident, Pedro “slaughtered” (88) nearly every guest to perpetuate the violence that was enacted against his father. Don Lucas was not a good man and he was killed through his proximity to other violent people. His death caused his son to abandon his morality and embrace violence, which Pedro then passed down to subsequent generations in turn.

Not only was Miguel considered to be a monstrous young man, but the other sons of Pedro Paramo are also trapped by this violence. In an ironic twist, Pedro is killed by one of his sons. If he had not abandoned Abundio, if he had given Abundio the inheritance and support he may have been entitled to as Pedro’s son, Abundio may not have lost his wife. He may not have found himself, drunk and grieving, on Pedro’s street. Pedro is killed by one of the children he abandoned; his actions perpetuated the cycle of violence that eventually trapped everyone in Comala.

The violence depicted in Pedro Paramo extends beyond Comala, however. After Pedro’s rise to power, violence breaks out across Mexico. Bands of revolutionaries rise up against the “lowdown bandits and slick thieves” (108) who control the land and the money in the country. The motivations of these men are implicitly connected to the cycles of violence portrayed in the novel. Men like Pedro rise to power through violent means (such as murdering Toribio Aldrete) and then hang on to their power by continued use of violence (e.g., Miguel murdering Renteria’s brother and buying the priest’s silence). The powerful institutions of Mexico and its system of local landlords are built on a foundation of violence, so the rebels are embracing violence as a means of dismantling the system.

Unfortunately for the rebels, they are not as well-acquainted with violence as Pedro. Rather than bargain with them or defeat them, Pedro chooses to fund them. He gives them money and men, allowing them to escalate the violence that they are carrying out across the countryside. The escalation of the rebels is further escalated by Pedro, widening the cycle of violence ever further. Pedro does not care about the causes of the revolution. He simply cares about violence. This, he fundamentally understands, is all that he knows.

After Pedro’s death, Comala collapses into ruin. There is no one left, but the cycles of violence continue. Even an innocent man like Juan, when drawn back to the town, is exposed to levels of trauma and violence that horrify him. Juan becomes trapped by the cycles: After being frightened to death by the ghosts of Pedro’s victims, he is buried beneath the cursed earth of Comala. Juan is trapped in a coffin of his father’s creation, finding the violence and trauma that are his true inheritance. In this sense, violence spreads both geographically and intergenerationally through the novel, tainting all that it touches.