The Weight of All Things

Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2000

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Prologue-Chapter 3

Chapters 4-6

Chapters 7-9

Chapters 10-12

Chapters 13-15

Chapters 16-18

Chapters 19-21

Chapters 22-24

Chapters 25-27

Chapters 28-30

Chapters 31-33

Chapter 34-Epilogue

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Chapters 4-6

Chapter 4 Summary

Nicolás boards a bus back to Chalatenango. He chooses a seat next to an old woman because they usually keep to themselves. He notes that young men are too dangerous as they are often dragged off of buses by the soldiers of the National Army (el Ejercito Nacional). An overwhelming presence of men with guns surround the people, from the National Police to the Treasury Police and the National Guard. The narrator explains that the common people are trapped amidst all the fighting: “On one side was the right, claiming it fought against the tyranny of communism. On the other side, the left, struggling, it said, against the injustice of oligarchs and militarists” (18). The novel makes it clear that both sides claim to fight for the good of the common people, yet the common people are the ones suffering the most.

Nicolás notes that over the last year, since the war began, he and his grandfather’s lives have changed greatly. His school is destroyed by the Popular Liberation Forces, there is hardly any food available, and church is so dangerous that no one attends. The bus climbs on through pastures and past the Sumpul River, the air growing hotter and Nicolás drenched in sweat. He takes out a bit of tortilla and cheese and looks forward to surprising Tata (his grandfather) with the indulgence. He wonders if he should tell the truth about his mother. He knows his grandfather will be surprised to find him home after only one day and tries to think up a lie to explain why he has returned.

He imagines telling Tata that he is home to see the pet goat named Blanca Nieves. He chose this name for the goat because his schoolteacher was reading Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. He recalls a conversation with his classmates about the dwarves and becomes sad at the memory of their death when the guerrillas used their school during a fight with the army. Nicolás survived because he was home with Tata that day. Nicolás continues to eat his tortilla and offers to share with the old woman sitting next to him. She tells him he reminds her of her grandson, whose father was killed by La Guardia. Nicolás is filled with anxiety sitting next to this woman because she is “The mother of someone the Guardia considered a subversive. He wanted to jump up and take another seat” (22). She begins to tell Nicolás about how her son’s head was put on a stake in the town when she is interrupted by a roadblock.

Nicolás is worried and thinks about the items in his backpack, including a flashlight and a Swiss Army knife: gifts from his mother’s employer. The bus stops and a soldier enters asking for ID’s from the passengers. The soldier tells a man sitting in front of Nicolás to get out of the bus and other soldiers frisk him outside. Nicolás knows that the man will never be seen again. When the soldier arrives at Nicolás and the old lady, she says that she is his grandmother and they have been visiting her daughter. When the soldier asks Nicolás how his mother is, Nicolás replies that she is fine. When he gets off the bus, he plans to stop at the little church on his way home to light a candle for La Virgen Milagrosa, “in gratitude and thanks” (24).

Chapter 5 Summary

Nicolás arrives home, seeing beauty in a terrain any outsider would view as harsh and depressing. He stands in his village and sees that the street is deserted. The heat is oppressive and there is a strange smell in the air. Dona Paulina’s store is closed, which surprises Nicolás, because she usually has customers from both sides of the war needing essential supplies. Next, he finds that Ursula’s tortilla shop is abandoned. Nicolás anxiously walks along toward his grandfather’s house. He comes around the corner and is shocked to see the remnants of his village. Homes and businesses are reduced to smoking rubble.

Nicolás finds Don Emilio, the local repair man, poking at the rubble with a stick. Nicolás asks Emilio what has happened. Emilio tells him that the army bombed the village with old Vietnam bomber planes in an attempt to get the guerillas who are hiding by the river to come out of hiding. Emilio tells Nicolás he was lucky to have been gone when it happened, and he’s pretty sure the hills where his grandfather lives are still safe. Nicolás asks where everyone from the village is; he explains that everyone fled. Emilio is the only one that remained behind. Nicolás offers to bring him home to stay with Tata, but Emilio prefers to stay behind in the half destroyed church.

Nicolás arrives at the church and finds that it along with the conacaste tree, which had shaded him all his life, has been destroyed. The only remaining wall in the church is the very one holding the statue of the saint of miracles. The offerings people left for her are intact, but the statue is missing. He uses the flashlight from his backpack to find her in the debris.

Chapter 6 Summary

The terrain along the trail to Nicolás’s home is rocky and dangerous. During the summer and fall the shrubbery is spiky and rough, but in the winter the rain softens and plumps the foliage and the creeks are full and rushing. In both seasons, stones and rocks in the path make dangerous footing for a traveler. Nicolás wears thick hiking boots, another gift from his mother’s employer. He remembers the day his mother brought the boots home to the rancho, and his dog Capitán barking with joy at her arrival. Nicolás hikes without stopping, “at every bend he expected a retreating guerrillero to step from behind a ledge, or a frightened townsperson to materialize on a path” (34). Nicolás carries the statue of Our Lady on his back. He reaches the ridge and can see the trees of his rancho. He sees that all of his trees are intact, and he shouts with glee when he sees his home still standing. Yet it is eerily quiet, and his beloved dog is nowhere to be seen or heard.

Nicolás looks around the home and finds everything in its normal place, so he sits and watches the hen in the yard. He suddenly thinks that his grandfather must be fishing. He goes inside and finds that, indeed, Tata’s fishing net and supplies are gone. Nicolás is sure that Tata is downstream fishing for tilapia. Nicolás remembers that Tata always ties Blanca the goat in the cave when he goes fishing so that she won’t follow him. Nicolás recalls discovering the cave after a storm. He describes a cave as a natural chapel. During the dry season they can walk through the cave down to the Sumpul River. He and his grandfather worked for weeks to clear a path through the cave. Then they stocked the cave with food, candles, matches, and hammocks. They keep the cave secret should they ever need to hide. Nicolás approaches the cave from their secret entrance and finds Blanca the goat waiting for him.

Chapters 4-6 Analysis

Chapter four illustrates the feeling of constant threat that the people of El Salvador experience. This threat is exemplified by Nicolás’s fear of sitting next to a sweet old woman on the bus, because he fears that his association with her will lead him to be seen as a subversive. A motherless child cannot trust an elderly grandmother to help him because his world is so consumed with danger and suspicion. El Salvadorans are not safe in their homes or in their towns, surrounded by violent fighting between the left and the right: “caught between their guns were the people, the ordinary people for whose supposed benefit the war was being waged…but while the two sides fought for their principles, most of the dying was done by the people” (18). Nicolás recalls his beloved school and teacher, both of which he has lost to the war. Similarly, his church is destroyed in Chapter 5. The novel makes clear the irony of both sides of the war destroying schools and churches while supposedly making a better life for the common people.

Similarly, the novel continually shows Nicolás surrounded by destruction (his school, his church, his mother’s death) yet surviving unscathed. He is referred to as “lucky that way” (23), and as he begins to see just how lucky he is, he starts to attribute his luck to La Virgencita. He believes he is protected from danger and death by La Virgen, and the plot of the novel makes it impossible to disagree.

This points to the kind of thinking required to survive war and offers insight into a resilient survival strategy. Nicolás believes wholeheartedly that La Virgen is real and her protection is complete. His feeling of protection allows him to see life in an unusually accepting and hopeful way. This is reinforced by the way he sees the landscape of El Retorno. It is harsh, brown, and rugged. Yet “Nicolás saw a friendly palette of browns and duns and beiges” (25). This connection to the earth and terrain of his homeland will serve him well throughout the novel. Chapter 6 introduces us to the important concept of natural hideouts, accessible only to those familiar with the harsh terrain of El Retorno.

Tata and Nicolás take great care to stock their secret cave with supplies, creating a sanctuary for themselves that will come to be their lifesaver. The cave is depicted in religious terms: “nature itself had carved ledges into the walls, so that when candles were set out the cave resembled a chapel” (37). Later, along the same river that this cave is nestled against, it is another natural ledge that will save Nicolás and Tata. The link between the cave, a place of worship, and protection from the war shows how Nicolás blends Catholic spirituality with reverence for nature.