Symbolism in The Tortilla Curtain
All Classes of People Live According to Their Animal Instincts
Initially the symbolism of animal instinct in the novel, The Tortilla Curtain, seems to apply more to the Mexican characters than to the American characters. However as the story progresses, it becomes clear that T.C. Boyle intends to portray both parties as animalistic.
Two Men Acting Like Animals
The novel opens with a scene where Delaney Mossbacher hits Candido Rincon with his car as he tries to cross the road. When Delaney considers the accident he realizes that “The man must have been crouching in the bushes like some feral thing, like a stray dog or a bird-mauling cat” (4) Delaney walks around his car, a concerned but frightened human. He talks himself out of leaving more than once and continues to search for the man he hit. When he suddenly realizes that there could be a potential threat to his own life, he straightens up “wary suddenly, catlike and alert.” (6)
While Boyle treats both parties like animals, the beginning of the novel focuses more on the animalistic lifestyle of the Mexicans. Before Candido leaves the scene of the accident, he is compared to an insect pinned on a mounting board and to a wet dog shaking himself.
By the end of the novel, Candido has resorted to killing small pets and eating dog food in order to keep himself and his family alive just like the coyote. Delaney responds to Candido’s intrusion on his territory by attempting to remove the Rincon’s from the development, like an animal defending his territory.
Animal Youth
Jack Jr. and his buddy go to the Rincon’s campsite and indulge in an act of almost inhuman hatred. They destroy the campsite. Candido observes their activities from a hidden location. Three different animal similarities are revealed in the scene. Candido notices that the boys have clear eyes just like their Scandinavian mothers. The face of the shorter boy reminded Candido of a bug – bland when seen from a distance but when magnified menacing and dangerous. The boys’ departure recalls apes dropping down from trees hooting and hollering.
Women Acting Like Animals
There are minor scenes scattered throughout the book where women are compared to animals. However, the most obvious comparison is found in America’s life in the canyon and her realization that her American dream has failed.
When working in the white man’s world, she is like a scared dog that has been beaten by human hands too many times. It is not until she returns to the canyon that she feels safe. “A moment ago she’d been out there on the road, exposed and vulnerable—frightened, always frightened—and now she was safe. But the thought of that frightened her too: what kind of life was it when you felt safe in the bushes, crouching to piss in the dirt like a dog?” (141)
After America is raped and she can no longer escape the reality of the situation she is in, she begins to act like an animal and one day when she is depressed she finds herself sympathizing with a coyote.
“She looked at the coyote so long and so hard that she began to hallucinate, to imagine herself inside those eyes looking out, to know that men were her enemies—men in uniform, men with their hats reverse, men with fat bloated hands and fat bloated necks, men with traps and guns and poisoned bait—and she saw the den full of pups and the hills shrunk to nothing under the hot quick quadrupedal gait.” (129)
A Civilization of Animals
As a naturalist, Delaney finds satisfaction in hiking the Arroyo Blanco canyon near his housing development. However, Delaney’s animal instinct reveals itself when he feels that his personal parkland has been violated. “Delaney didn’t know what to do—slink away like some wounded animal and give up possession of the place forever? Or challenge them, assert his rights?” (114)
The situation in the Arroyo Blanco development is particularly complicated for Delaney. Part of him sympathizes with the Mexican population. At the beginning of the novel, he tries to see individual Mexicans as people. However, when his friends and neighbors shut down the labor exchange Delaney realizes that there will be trouble in the near future.
Because of his interest in natural order Delaney knew “about migratory animal species and how one population responded to being displaced by another. It made for war, violence, and killing until one group had decimated the other.” (193) If the Mexicans can’t work, they won’t return to Mexico – they will fight the local population for resources.
Unlike many in Arroyo Blanco, Delaney resists building a wall around the development. He values his personal freedom and while the proponents of the wall argue that the purpose of the wall is to keep strangers out, Delaney feels as if it were a prison to keep him in. “He was being walled in, buried alive, and there wasn’t a thing he could do about it.”(244)
Kyra sums up the territorial habit of human animals nicely after graffiti artists vandalize the wall that surrounds Arroyo Blanco. Kyra and Delaney’s friend Jack looks at the graffiti and remarks “It’s like an animal reflex, isn’t’ it?—marking their territory?” But Kyra reminds him “Only this is our territory.” (316)
Rich and Poor Animals
Ultimately the Rincon’s are reduced to living like animals and the Mossbachers assume the mentality of animals. Boyle’s novel points to humanity’s propensity to act like animals or, for those who believe in evolution, return to their animal state. However, there is one small ray of light at the end of the book. When the Rincon’s find safety during a mudslide, Candido instinctively reaches out to help Delaney. Humanity is the final word in The Tortilla Curtain.
Boyle, T.C. The Tortilla Curtain. Penguin Books. 1995. ISBN 978-0-14-023828-0
Read more about T.C. Boyle and his books at Suite101.
Book Cover for The Tortilla Curtain
|
What do you think about this article?
More in Reading & Literature
Latest Articles