At the beginning of this book I was very intrigued yet scared at the idea of a horror story taking place in this book. What took place was not what I was expecting but it was in fact intriguing and I wanted to read more. The narrator mentions that it will be a story of “murder, detection and horror” but that it wont seem like that. I was confused by this statement but it made such more sense after finishing the book.
The story takes off when the protagonist Lacouture hides in a bathroom of the “Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico for almost 2 weeks to resist the army during the “student movement”. This is something I had no knowledge on prior to reading so I was very worried to see where it would go.
As I read on, I find myself once again relating this book to others we have read in the course. This is because, as I think I may have mentioned in every blog post, major themes of dreams and memories comes up once again. While she has locked herself in the bathroom, Lacouture begins to recall her life. she recalls Belano himself and other poets who were her friends.
As mentioned in the lecture, her memories were described very poetically themselves which was very beautiful to read. One contrast I found interesting was how she was telling these memories while violence was going on just outside of this bathroom stall. It made it seem like two different stories. Sometimes I’d forget she is even hiding because I would get so lost in her memories, then I would remember the circumstances.
Another thing I found myself doing while reading, besides comparing this book to others, is imagining myself in this scenario. I believe because it was set in a University, my mind was imagining bathrooms at UBC and corridors or windows I would be looking out in this circumstance. It was a very easy thing to imagine as all of us reading this attend a University, so my mind just automatically goes there, this definitely heightened my worry for this being a horror.
Lastly, I was confused about the title as there was no mention of an Amulet the entire book, until I read the last lines and see it being mentioned.
My questions for this week are, why do you think Bolano named this book “Amulet” , what significance does it have? and did you find yourself imagining UBC while reading, or picturing yourself if it were you in this scary circumstance?
At the beginning of this book I was very intrigued yet scared at the idea of a horror story taking place in this book. What took place was not what I was expecting but it was in fact intriguing and I wanted to read more. The narrator mentions that it will be a story of “murder, detection and horror” but that it wont seem like that. I was confused by this statement but it made such more sense after finishing the book.
The story takes off when the protagonist Lacouture hides in a bathroom of the “Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico for almost 2 weeks to resist the army during the “student movement”. This is something I had no knowledge on prior to reading so I was very worried to see where it would go.
As I read on, I find myself once again relating this book to others we have read in the course. This is because, as I think I may have mentioned in every blog post, major themes of dreams and memories comes up once again. While she has locked herself in the bathroom, Lacouture begins to recall her life. she recalls Belano himself and other poets who were her friends.
As mentioned in the lecture, her memories were described very poetically themselves which was very beautiful to read. One contrast I found interesting was how she was telling these memories while violence was going on just outside of this bathroom stall. It made it seem like two different stories. Sometimes I’d forget she is even hiding because I would get so lost in her memories, then I would remember the circumstances.
Another thing I found myself doing while reading, besides comparing this book to others, is imagining myself in this scenario. I believe because it was set in a University, my mind was imagining bathrooms at UBC and corridors or windows I would be looking out in this circumstance. It was a very easy thing to imagine as all of us reading this attend a University, so my mind just automatically goes there, this definitely heightened my worry for this being a horror.
Lastly, I was confused about the title as there was no mention of an Amulet the entire book, until I read the last lines and see it being mentioned.
My questions for this week are, why do you think Bolano named this book “Amulet” , what significance does it have? and did you find yourself imagining UBC while reading, or picturing yourself if it were you in this scary circumstance?
When the narrator Auxilio Lacuture began Amulet by describing that she was telling a horror story I thought it would be a story of a homicide or a murder mystery. But I was wrong, the horror Auxilio faced was much more painful than a murder mystery. Auxilio seems like a drifter, she has no concrete …
Because of the warming and comfortable way that Roberto Bolaño writes Amulet, and because of the various memories that it reminds me of, this weeks blog post, is somewhat of a departure from my usual psychoanalytical examinations characters, and is focused more on my own personal experiences and emotions that Bolaño’s work has had to […]
Reading through Amulet definitely pulled me in many different directions than I expected! From the beginning it introduced fear and tension, then it quickly delved into a series of memories from Auxilio’s life and the different friends and people she encountered as she hid in the bathroom stalls of her university. It was different from […]
Posted in Blogs, Bolaño | Tagged with Conflict, history, memories, war
While reading the scenes within the university buildings and corridors, I found myself imagining the scenes in my head. That isn’t unusual in and of itself, but similarly to how I dream at night, the settings of my imagination varied between buildings here at UBC, my high schools in Canada and the UK, and the primary school I left 10 years ago. It was as though different rooms fit different scenes more than others. Or that a particular corridor from my school 6 years ago just fit the bill more than the most recent one. Not to get too on-theme with the novels we’ve read this term, but it’s funny how memory works, isn’t it?
The scene where she rips up the toilet paper that she has been writing on caught my attention. Mainly because I like to preserve practically everything I’ve ever written, so the idea of destroying the thoughts and musings I might have had if I were in her situation feels like a strange loss for me. At first, it also felt like a bit of a waste; my first thought was that if you’re going to destroy it, then why write it down in the first place? But then I caught myself fairly quickly. It can be quite limiting to assume that something is only worth writing if it’s worth keeping, and that’s an idea I think I learnt unintentionally, and am nowadays trying to unlearn. That said, it’s not even very accurate because I often find myself in a situation where I need to write something in order to make my own thoughts coherent. Sure, perhaps in another situation she may have spoken these words aloud where they could then disappear without a trace, but that’s not an ideal method when you’re trying to hide in a bathroom for days on end.
My question this week is: what is the significance of the fact that neither the author nor the protagonist are from the city in which the story is set?
Posted in Blogs, Bolaño | Tagged with Amulet, horror, memory
While reading the scenes within the university buildings and corridors, I found myself imagining the scenes in my head. That isn’t unusual in and of itself, but similarly to how I dream at night, the settings of my imagination varied between buildings here at UBC, my high schools in Canada and the UK, and the primary school I left 10 years ago. It was as though different rooms fit different scenes more than others. Or that a particular corridor from my school 6 years ago just fit the bill more than the most recent one. Not to get too on-theme with the novels we’ve read this term, but it’s funny how memory works, isn’t it?
The scene where she rips up the toilet paper that she has been writing on caught my attention. Mainly because I like to preserve practically everything I’ve ever written, so the idea of destroying the thoughts and musings I might have had if I were in her situation feels like a strange loss for me. At first, it also felt like a bit of a waste; my first thought was that if you’re going to destroy it, then why write it down in the first place? But then I caught myself fairly quickly. It can be quite limiting to assume that something is only worth writing if it’s worth keeping, and that’s an idea I think I learnt unintentionally, and am nowadays trying to unlearn. That said, it’s not even very accurate because I often find myself in a situation where I need to write something in order to make my own thoughts coherent. Sure, perhaps in another situation she may have spoken these words aloud where they could then disappear without a trace, but that’s not an ideal method when you’re trying to hide in a bathroom for days on end.
My question this week is: what is the significance of the fact that neither the author nor the protagonist are from the city in which the story is set?
Posted in Blogs, Bolaño | Tagged with Amulet, horror, memory
I found this novella quite unusual and compelling as it tries to narrate through an unusual character the story of a country and the state of Latin America’s literary talent and tradition in an unconventional and dreamlike voice. Auxilio Lacouture, whose first name comes from the Latin “auxilium” and as mentioned in Dr. Jon’s video, […]
Posted in Blogs, Bolaño | Tagged with enigma, literature, memory, Mystery
Roberto Bolaño’s Amulet starts the novel starts off with a thrilling note as the first few lines are: “This is going to be a horror story. A Story of murder, detection, and horror” (1). However, the narrator, who is later revealed to be a Uruguayan woman named Auxilio Lacouture, makes the quick distinction that the story won’t […]
Posted in Blogs, Bolaño | Tagged with narration style, references, title
