Wichita State University

Carmen Kurtz has published sixteen works of adult prose fiction and at least as many books for a juvenile audience, yet her writing is virtually unknown in this country. This despite the fact that she has won numerous literary prizes, including the Planeta in 1956 for her novel El desconocido. The novel presents the story of a couple who are reunited after a twelve-year separation. The husband, who was taken prisoner by Russia in 1942 while fighting as a Spanish volunteer on the German side in World War II, returns home in 1954. Kurtz presents the trauma of separation and reunion from two perspectives, which often contradict, elucidate, or complement each other. The use of this autotextual technique to examine a psychological and social problem will be the first focus of this study. In addition, intertextuality, the use of epigraphic quotes from the Odyssey as well as other allusions, will be analyzed as both a parody and, paradoxically, a means to inspire genuine sympathy for the two protagonists.

Kurtz divides each of the three books of the novel into two parts -«Él» and «Ella», with the first part of one book continuing the perspective which ended the previous book. Book I begins with the wife awaiting her husband's repatriation. Her feelings of confusion, anxiety, and excitement are combined with flashbacks to their whirlwind romance, their subsequent marriage, and his departure for Germany in World War II. She also recalls her feeling that she had been abandoned as she waited year after year for his return. Dominica's section of Book I ends as the ship carrying her husband approaches the dock. «Él» narrates his perspective of the same events, including flashbacks, plus his memories of the Russian work camp. His narration then advances the plot, when he is reunited with his family.

In Book II he narrates his first few days at home, focusing on his feelings of love and uncontrollable desire for Dominica. His psychological conflict stems from her unspoken, but obvious resistance to his advances. Finally, he asks her if she loves him, and she answers truthfully that she does not. Part 2, «Ella», begins after that unfortunate declaration. Dominica's rejection of him is clarified to the reader: she realizes that she continued loving the former, remembered Antonio, not this stranger. She finds repugnant his assumption that he has a right to her body because they happen to be married. She then lies to Antonio, saying that she does love him after all. Thus part 1 ends with her rejection and part 2 ends with her feigned acceptance of her husband. All of Book II, then, is a continuous narrative with no parallels of plot but with several similarities in their thoughts and numerous contrasts in emotions.

Book III is completely sequential, beginning moments later and continuing with her perspective, her despondency, and her attempted suicide. In deep sleep, she calls out to Antonio to help her die. In «Él» Antonio is wakened by Dominica's weak cries for help. After she recovers, he decides that they must start afresh. In Palafrugell, where they met, he visits and courts her. They take the first, tentative steps toward real communication. This lengthy summary is essential to an understanding of Carmen Kurtz's use of autotextuality, in which the two parallel narratives from contrasting perspectives comment upon each other.

The plot is parallel and complementary in book one, presenting the husband and wife as they wait to be reunited. Related techniques are used throughout the book, however, both in flashbacks to the same events and in their thoughts. On at least three occasions, the narration explains the actions of one partner which are misunderstood by the other. When she silently tolerates his lovemaking, he mistakenly believes that her love has been suppressed or at least deeply submerged («ahondado»), and, therefore, that he must help her bring it to the surface again. In Dominica's thoughts, the reader discovers that she rejects not the Antonio she remembers, but this stranger who is not Antonio. He smells like a prisoner and does not have the spontaneity and zest for life that her husband had twelve years ago. Because he believes she needs time and does not want to make love, he leaves almost nightly after dinner so that she will have time to go to sleep before he comes home. Only in that way can he resist her: «Para eso había aguardado, se había mortificado y vencido» (Kurtz 158-59). Dominica interprets his self-imposed sacrifice as a new indifference -«Antonio ya no quería nada de ella» (193).

Dominica also feels sure her psychological suffering was greater than his during his absence:

Meanwhile, when he talks with his doctor, his thoughts about suffering flow between parts of the dialogue: «No sé, Pedro, es como si todo se hubiera perdido, achicado durante todos estos años... Tendré que estar fabulosamente contento y no lo estoy» (131). Also during his arrival he had thought that he was of a finer sensibility and had, therefore, suffered more than Germán, his friend and fellow prisoner, who was already inured to suffering by its repetition (63-4).

Another lack of understanding occurs when he announces their impending move to their own home so that she will have something to occupy her time. This, rather than delighting her, frightens her, for she has never directed a household or servants. Later, she feigns interest in the house project because she knows she will commit suicide that night. He misreads her new animation as a step toward their reconciliation.

Related to the reader's ability to know the truth about misunderstood words and gestures by comparing disparate views in two or more separate parts of the novel, is the comparison of juxtaposed opinions, one spoken and the other thought. When Antonio tries to explain and compare their feelings toward each other, her italicized thoughts argue against his views, though she says nothing. The only exterior indication that she objects to his words is her attempt to put her hand over his mouth.

This same kind of counterpoint is repeated when the couple take a walk with Germán, and the subject is again suffering, loneliness (207). The fact that neither person expresses this conflict exacerbates their lack of communication.

Though both people are concerned about their problem, each one has a different, but related, solution. He says that if it were possible for him to become another person and court her, he could make her love him:

At the same time, he is aware that changing his identity is impossible; therefore, he urges his wife to accept the situation as it is and continue with their life together: «Nada puede ser como antes, Domi. Pero hemos de superar esa diferencia. Has de olvidar el antes. En el hoy presente todo es distinto y no existe motivo para un alejamiento» (166). By contrast, Dominica perceives the problem to be his change of identity into another man; i.e., the man who has returned to her is not the   —45→   former Antonio with his lust for life: «Aquel hombre no era Antonio. Era su desconocido» (165). When the stranger -Antonio tries to continue life as if nothing has changed, she withdraws into herself and rebels. She thinks,

Her solution is paradoxically similar to Antonio's: she wishes he had courted her before trying to make love to her:

The problem and/or solution, then, is Antonio's becoming or having become a desconocido. The word implies that he is not a complete stranger; rather, he was known and has been forgotten or is not recognized/recognizable in his present state of being.

Another facet of autotextuality is the structural linking of opposites. For example, their backgrounds are opposite, so their points of view are more likely to clash. His family's summer home in Palafrugell with its arid, decaying courtyard contrasts with the neighboring lush garden of Dominica's grandmother, where they meet for the first time. His organized, efficient family life (they always eat lunch at exactly 2:10) contradicts her parents' bohemian way of life. He was spoiled by his mother, who always combed his favorite cologne into his hair and often expressed her love. Her parents, on the other hand, traveled extensively, leaving their daughters with a nanny.

Each analyzes the transformation of the other. Antonio contrasts Dominica's present actions with those of the wife he remembers from twelve years before, when she hated beauty salons. Now she visits one often to have her gray hairs dyed. At night she now turns out the fight whereas she used to revel in his looking at her body when they made love. He misses her innocence and childlike qualities -the same qualities that attracted him but later made him impatient with her before his departure. She also observes his metamorphosis: he lacks his former impetuosity, his love of life- that quality which made him attractive to her.

The ultimate contradiction is that when he longs to tell her how he recovered his love for her while in prison, evoking her in times of danger (115), she has just realized that her love for him died the night he arrived home, when he took her against her will (164-65).

Correspondence of ideas is another linking technique used in the work. His understanding of Dominica's feelings leads to an admission of a depressing similarity between the two: «Ahora somos iguales... Dos desconocidos violentos. Dos personas que acaban de encontrarse y pueden revolcarse juntas sin amor» (196). Another negative correspondence is that he correctly believes that Dominica still blames him for leaving her; her voice is hard as she says she did not have gray hairs twelve years before (130). Compare her thoughts: «Él la había dejado. Le pareció siempre una enorme injusticia» (162).

Duplication of thoughts also occurs when both realize separately that during the day they are more in harmony while night brings conflict (141, 179). Both likewise acknowledge privately that they seem to enjoy suffering because that assures them that they are alive and more aware than other people. Compare Antonio's «acaso amara el sufrimiento y prefiriera guardarlo para él» (140) to Dominica's observation that «nos falta a todos nosotros la inteligencia del instinto tan viva en los elementales. Y hemos de suplirla con la sensibilidad» (177). Similarly, each rejects the vulgarity of Anita and German, and they both understand German as a person whose motivations are physical needs because of the hunger he endured in the past.

Memories of their courtship are also very similar, though they are narrated in the context of their family experiences. Antonio realizes that Dominica also wishes to recover their past: «también, quería aunar los dos pasados» (127).

A final correspondence is one that offers the reader some hope for the couple's future. Dominica admits to herself that she feels empty: «es la nada en mí lo desesperante» (181). After her attempted suicide, her husband recognizes her need and, reiterating her unspoken reference to nothingness, tries to help her: «Trataré de construir algo sobre esa nada que ha quedado en Dominica. Esa nada, es ella, mi mujer» (295). Thus, they begin anew as friends, renewing their courtship.

To the use of such autotextual material as contrasts, counterpoints, parallels, and   —46→   correspondences, Kurtz adds two intertextual techniques: allusions to saints and heroes, and quotations from the Odyssey. These serve to illuminate and universalize the work.

Symbolic names occur throughout the text. The name of the male protagonist, Antonio, may refer to St. Antony, the Egyptian hermit who lived in the desert and around whom a colony of hermits grew up. After all, Antonio lived in the psychological desert of a Russian work camp and isolated himself from most of the other internees. Nonetheless, he was not isolated physically, for he was surrounded by hundreds of fellow prisoners. More probably, the name evokes an ironic contrast to the great leader and general, Marc Antony, who returned from war victorious, whereas Antonio fights on the losing side, is taken prisoner, and comes back in defeat many years later.

Antonio is also compared to Lazarus. Before his return home, he bathes repeatedly as he thinks, «Lázaro olía así después de resucitado. Y la gente huía de él» (53). This idea is repeated in Dominica's thought that this stranger smells like a prisoner (165). One must remember that she considers the best part of Antonio to be dead. Later Antonio muses, «Darse cuenta de que mientras él había estado semimuerto, el mundo seguía rodando» (100). Another resurrection, that of Christ, is also mentioned when Antonio disembarks and sees his sister smiling happily. He says of her attitude: «Las campanas voltean el Domingo de Resurrección sin acordarse ya del Viernes Santo» (84-85). Antonio's return is not miraculous, just long-delayed, and his new life is not an entirely joyous one, for the old prison life haunts him, and his problems with Dominica worsen.

Symbolic references extend to other characters as well. For example, Dominica's name is a geographical reference rather than a literary one, for she was named for her native island, the Dominican Republic. The name reinforces her portrayal as a different, exotic person, a foreigner in Spanish society.

Antonio's «conscience», his childhood friend, was Gabriel. Like the archangel who traditionally was portrayed as the trumpeter of the Last Judgment, Gabriel made the affluent Antonio aware of social inequities and his own cooperation in them.

The last name of Antonio's companion, Germán Expósito, refers to the man's life of poverty -he is like a foundling. The first name, of course, suggests the word hermano to symbolize the close friendship or brotherhood between the friends. (Antonio describes Germán as going beside him as «la sombra acompaña al cuerpo... Sabía que ningún hombre podía ni debía tratar de separarse de su sombra» (51). Germán, which is Hermann in German, Arminius in Latin, is also an allusion to a former Roman soldier who became a leader of the Germans and defeated the Romans (Columbia Viking 66). The modern German is a former Spanish Republican soldier who then volunteered on Germany's side in World War II, so that he would be able to say that he had fought on the winning side once in his life. Ironically, he is defeated just as his friend with the heroic name was. Both men return on the ship Semíramis, whose name also mockingly represents victory, for Semíramis was a conquering Assyrian queen, believed to have founded Babylon and Ninevah.

The most consistent allusions, however, are to the Odyssey. In addition to direct quotations from the poem (which will be discussed shortly), there is a more subtle use of flowers to evoke thoughts of Odysseus in the land of the lotus-eaters. The reader of course remembers Odysseus's statement that his men «wanted to stay there with the lotus-eating people ... and forget the way home» (Odyssey 139; 9.94-97)⁶⁰. Lotuses are specifically mentioned twice in the modern work. The first episode involving the flowers occurs when Dominica recalls her lonely childhood and her need to meet Antonio («necesitó conocer a Antonio», 21-22). During their subsequent courtship, they walk in the garden of his parents' home in Barcelona. She remembers: «Hubiera tenido una alegría enorme si dentro de aquellos muros hubiera visto una charca con lotos. "Tenemos lotos en Santo Domingo." Pero no los había. Aún no los había» (22). Here the use of lotuses serves two purposes. First, they emphasize the fact that she was remembering her past in Santo Domingo. Secondly, their association with the episode in the Odyssey in which the people wanted to forget their way home clarifies her relationship with Antonio and his family. She not only loves them, but she also wants to use marriage to escape her past. In that way, she would remain in Spain rather than returning home. The paragraph following this use of the flowers supports this view: «la casa y la familia   —47→   [de Antonio] formando un bloque indestructible» are attractive to her because they contrast to her insecurity in her own familial relationships. She does not wish to destroy her past; rather, she only wants to «forget the way home» to her own family by means of her incorporation into another way of family life. The lotuses are only longed for and not present because she has not yet «escaped» by marriage.

The second use of lotuses occurs long after Dominica's marriage, after Antonio's return home. Dominica is suffering silently one afternoon in the garden, when her father-in-law, who intuits that his son and Domi are experiencing the traumas of reunion, suggests that she help him gather some lotuses. She is delighted: «Le quiso como nunca había querido a su propio padre. Le llenó de gozo la idea de recoger las flores». As she cuts the flowers, she forgets her present home and its accompanying pain, evoking the happy moments of her past when she used to hide among the flowers and her nanny would call her. Almost immediately after she gathers the lotuses, she takes them to Antonio's friend Germán, who will use them to decorate his new restaurant-store during its grand opening. On her way home, she wanders to the docks in Barcelona's harbor. There she remains until after sundown, i.e., she temporarily «forgets her way home» just as the men in the Odyssey longed to do.

Each chapter of Kurtz's novel is prefaced by an epigraphic quote from sections of the epic poem which narrate the reunion of Odysseus and Penelope. In this way, Antonio and Dominica are identified with the epic hero and his long-suffering wife. The first quote is Eurykleia's speech urging Penelope to wake up and see her dream fulfilled: «¡Hija mía! ¡Penelope, aprisa, levántate pronto, para ver con tus ojos lo que cada día anhelabas»: In the novel, Dominica awaits Antonio's arrival and his mother exclaims, «¡Hija! ¡Dominica! ¿Te das cuenta?» (14) The narrator records Dominica's silent reply: «No se daba cuenta». She has waited twelve years, longing for her husband's return, and she will only believe the news when she sees him.

The next epigraph is Pallas Athene's warning to Odysseus: «y ni a hombre o mujer, a ninguno, reveles que vienes de regreso de tanta aventura; antes bien, en silencio sufrirás muchos males; soporta la injuria del hombre». Though no one advises Antonio to keep silent, he tells little of his experiences, which certainly are not a hero's adventures. He suffers silently and feels wronged by Dominica's rejection of him («la injuria del hombre»).

The next citation refers to Penelope/Dominica's reaction to her husband: «Y ella estaba callada, con el corazón sorprendido. Y, al mirarlo, unas veces veía que aquél era Ulises y otras no, porque estaba vestido con tristes andrajos». This portion of the novel narrates Antonio's readjustment to society and to his wife. The latter treats him as a stranger, though she recognizes his physical body immediately. The section «Él» ends with her declaration that she no longer loves him, a statement which can also be linked to the «injuria» of the previous quote. By extension, the rest of Book 23 of the Odyssey tells of Penelope's eventual recognition of her husband and their passionate and joyful lovemaking. The night ends with coitus for the modern couple as well, but only one partner enjoys it. Whereas the epic couple recount their experiences immediately after making love, Antonio and Dominica fail to communicate. Only at the end of the novel does Antonio tell her about the forced marches he endured in captivity and his constant thoughts of her which gave him strength.

The fourth excerpt, «¡Desdichada! ¿Por qué tanto insistes en que te lo diga? Pero voy a contártelo sin omitir cosa alguna. Mas no habrá gozo en tu corazón, como yo no lo tengo», foretells trials to come and sets the tone for the dissatisfaction narrated by Dominica. The modern speaker would be Antonio who confronts his wife with their dilemma: she does not love him; he both loves and hates her; they are enemies. The prefatory quote also refers to Germán who tells Dominica many things about Antonio's experiences in Russia. The contrast is important, for Odysseus tells everything to Penelope, while a third party is needed in El desconocido. The modern husband and wife's communication is usually negative and counterproductive.

The next section, which begins: «Sufro tanto, que un blando sopor ha logrado rendirme», refers to Athene's having cast Penelope into a deep sleep while Odysseus killed all the suitors. The poem continues: «How I wish chaste Artemis would give me a death so soft, and now, so I would not go on in my heart grieving all my life, and longing for love of a   —48→   husband excellent in every virtue» (Odyssey 275; 18.201-05). Dominica also longs for death, but this death wish occurs after she has recovered her husband. She still needs Antonio as he was, «excellent in every virtue». Penelope only wishes for death; however, Dominica tries to achieve it by an overdose of sleeping pills. Attempted suicide is not the proper action of an epic heroine.

The final part of Kurtz's novel quotes Penelope's remark to her husband: «Si una dulce vejez algún día te otorgan los dioses, aún los dos escaparnos podremos de tanto infortunio». The reference to old age is ironic in the novel, for Dominica sought to end her life at age thirty-five. Nonetheless, the novel ends with their desire to try to continue their life together. The last paragraph foretells their continued journey in life together, their odyssey; i.e., the novel evokes the classical work, without directly mentioning it. Antonio believes that they must continue walking, or living, and communicating without looking backward:

Intertextuality thus parodies the twentieth-century couple's life by their contrast to mythic figures. Mikhail Bakhtin observes in his essay «Epic and Novel» that «in an environment where the novel is the dominant genre, ... any strict adherence to a genre begins to feel like a stylization ... taken to the point of parody, despite the artistic intent of the author» (Bakhtin 6). In Carmen Kurtz's novel the dialogic principle appears to work in reverse, for the epic hero is used to emphasize the human frailties of the modern protagonist, though not necessarily in a comic way. Therefore, though both Odysseus and Antonio were prisoners, they differ greatly. Odysseus was held on the island of Calypso because the hero was so charismatic and handsome; Antonio, on the other hand, was held prisoner at the hands of the Russian government because of the defeat of the Germans. Both were required to visit the land of the dead -Odysseus, Hades to consult with Tiresias; Antonio, the camp, which he describes as «la lenta muerte que allá lejos le aguardaba» (155). Whereas Odysseus returned home alone, unwelcomed but soon triumphant, Antonio returns among hundreds of other repatriated prisoners to cheering thousands. Despite the enthusiastic reception, Antonio remains a defeated anti-hero. Antonio thus satisfies one of Bakhtin's prerequisites for a novel: «The hero of a novel should not be "heroic" in either the epic or the tragic sense of the word: he should combine in himself negative as well as positive features» (Bakhtin 15). Implicitly, Antonio's environment, Spain in the 1950s, also contrasts unfavorably with the Greek epoch, for there are no heroes, and no one is a decisive winner.

At the same time that this identification with legends calls attention to the protagonist's imperfections, it also inspires genuine sympathy for Antonio and Dominica, for they are ordinary persons who have experienced the extraordinary hardships of heroes. Antonio is extraordinary only according to his own definition of heroism, which includes nearly all people:

He did what was necessary to survive in captivity, as would a hero, and he will attempt to recover his wife and her love by any means necessary⁶¹. Once again, however, there is another interplay in the novel, for while Antonio is verbally expressing these ideas about potential heroism in everyday life, he is mentally recalling an example of heroism he witnessed in the work camp. An extraordinary horse, which seemed to side with the prisoners against the Russian guards -persisting in its resistance until its death- was given the Greek name Thalassus. Thalassios refers to anything of, in, on, or from the sea or belonging to it, as in mariners or those who live by fishing (Intermediate Greek-English Lexicon 357). Poseidon, the god of the sea, is also associated with horses of the sea. Thus, the name chosen for the animal may allude to Odysseus's sea adventures and to a struggle between two powerful, yet ever-present, forces: people versus the sea, Odysseus versus Poseidon, captives versus captors.

Obviously, Kurtz's novel is more than a simple narration. Literary allusion is at work on two levels. The point of view of one spouse complements and clarifies that of the other within the text of the novel itself.   —49→   In addition Kurtz brings her characters into contact with other real or fictional beings from other texts who contrast with, expand upon, or clarify the meaning of the man and woman in the novel. The use of both autotextuality and intertextuality makes the work a rich tapestry of literary allusion and psychological exploration.

Bakhtin, M. M. The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays. Ed. Michael Holquist. Trans. Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist. Austin: U of Texas P, 1981.

The Columbia Viking Desk Encyclopedia. 2 vols. New York: Columbia UP, 1953.

An Intermediate Greek-English Lexicon. 7th ed. 1889. London: Oxford UP, 1961.

Kurtz, Carmen. El desconocido. Barcelona: Planeta, 1956.

The Odyssey of Homer Trans. Richmond Lattimore. New York: Harper and Row, 1967.

Hispania [Publicaciones periódicas]. Volume 71, Number 1, March 1988