The novel “The Time of the Doves” by Mercè Rodoreda is a powerful novel that tells a story of Natalia’s life as she grows a family and lives through war and loss. I liked this novel despite its sad undertones. Everything goes downhill for a bit, but it seems to have a content ending. While … Continue reading Week 7: Rodoreda’s “The Time of the Doves” →
Posted in Blogs, Rodoreda | Tagged with family, fiction, life, narrative, relationships, Romance Studies, story, war
For this week’s reading, I read The Time of the Doves by Mercè Rodoreda. It was an easy read to get lost in. It felt like an emotional rollercoaster as I read the book. The past tense narrative of Natalia made it seem like she was reliving these momen…
Posted in Blogs, Rodoreda | Tagged with family, gender, poverty, war
For this week’s reading, I read The Time of the Doves by Mercè Rodoreda. It was an easy read to get lost in. It felt like an emotional rollercoaster as I read the book. The past tense narrative of Natalia made it seem like she was reliving these momen…
Posted in Blogs, Rodoreda | Tagged with family, gender, poverty, war
Hey Everyone, I hope you all had a restful reading break. I spent the past week really taking my time to read The Time of the Doves by Mercè Rodoreda. This book has somehow taken the longest for me to read so far, possibly because I had the most time to read it. I found […]
Posted in Blogs, Rodoreda | Tagged with doves, literature, Natalia, Quimet, romancestudies, romanceworld, romanticliterature, ubc
I was passionately engaged while reading The Time of the Doves, mainly for two reasons. First of all, I really enjoyed the narrative of the novel. I felt like the first-person narration of Natalia made the narrative more credible. Normally, first-person narratives are less credible than a “neutral” third-person view, but since this story was […]
Posted in Blogs, Rodoreda | Tagged with Bricolage, Construction, family, gender, literature, narrative, Recovery, Relationship, temporality, war
This is the first novel that I have a physical copy of and the feeling of holding a book and flipping through the pages was so different compared to scrolling through the pages on a computer, so I was looking forward to reading this novel. This week I chose to read The Time of the […]
Posted in Blogs, Rodoreda | Tagged with blog, family, poverty, war
Mercè Rodoreda’s The Time of the Doves presents processes of multifaceted change during the Spanish Civil War through the lens of the life of an ordinary Catalan woman named Natalia. Setting in Barcelona, this is the first Catalan novel I have read. It is particularly noteworthy to consider the relevant background of the work. From […]
Posted in Blogs, Rodoreda | Tagged with gender, politics, power, urbanism
Of all the novels thus far, this one had the most unexpected ending and plot twist. The story starts rather sweetly, and suddenly escalates until the main character, Natalia, makes a horrifying decision. Initially, Natalia gets swept off of her feet and marries a man who ends up not being a good husband or person. Quimet, the husband, is rather lazy and undependable and displays abusive and toxic behaviours consistently. He continuously brings home doves but leaves them in the care of Natalia. In a way, I think that what Natalia was doing to the doves foreshadowed the climax of the story. Her husband had left her with helpless animals when she was unable to adequately care for them.
The way in which the story was written translates to how frantic Natalia may have been during that time. The author uses run-on sentences to replicate thought processes that Natalia may be having. She exhausts herself emotionally and physically as she develops fears about the war and surrounding world. The story is very tragic and explores how desperation can cause irrational beliefs and ideas.
The description of the family living a “bare life” is very accurate. Due to her lack of resources, her family is forced to merely survive and they are unable to truly live. This causes Natalia to make the extreme decision to kill herself and her children after her husband is killed. I think part of the reason that Natalia’s decision was so shocking was because it was the complete opposite of what one would expect from a mother. Her actions do not fall in line with how we perceive mothers or parents to behave. I feel like the audience would expect Natalia to do everything possible and sacrifice herself in order to protect her children. Perhaps, the reason she made such a radical decision was due to her surroundings at the time. She saw the impact of the war through the chaos and destruction around her, and therefore she decided that she must take extreme action. If her family would have fallen on hard times during a different time period, she may not have decided to act in that way. Her surroundings are a factor when questioning why she would make such a desperate and irrational decision.
My question to the class is, do you think that Natalia’s decision to kill herself and her family was brave/strong or cowardly/inhumane? And do you agree that Natalia’s decision may not have been so reckless if it were not for the war surrounding her? Or can we see through her other actions that she may have regardless made the same choice?
Posted in Blogs, Rodoreda | Tagged with extremism, tragedy, war
Of all the novels thus far, this one had the most unexpected ending and plot twist. The story starts rather sweetly, and suddenly escalates until the main character, Natalia, makes a horrifying decision. Initially, Natalia gets swept off of her feet and marries a man who ends up not being a good husband or person. Quimet, the husband, is rather lazy and undependable and displays abusive and toxic behaviours consistently. He continuously brings home doves but leaves them in the care of Natalia. In a way, I think that what Natalia was doing to the doves foreshadowed the climax of the story. Her husband had left her with helpless animals when she was unable to adequately care for them.
The way in which the story was written translates to how frantic Natalia may have been during that time. The author uses run-on sentences to replicate thought processes that Natalia may be having. She exhausts herself emotionally and physically as she develops fears about the war and surrounding world. The story is very tragic and explores how desperation can cause irrational beliefs and ideas.
The description of the family living a “bare life” is very accurate. Due to her lack of resources, her family is forced to merely survive and they are unable to truly live. This causes Natalia to make the extreme decision to kill herself and her children after her husband is killed. I think part of the reason that Natalia’s decision was so shocking was because it was the complete opposite of what one would expect from a mother. Her actions do not fall in line with how we perceive mothers or parents to behave. I feel like the audience would expect Natalia to do everything possible and sacrifice herself in order to protect her children. Perhaps, the reason she made such a radical decision was due to her surroundings at the time. She saw the impact of the war through the chaos and destruction around her, and therefore she decided that she must take extreme action. If her family would have fallen on hard times during a different time period, she may not have decided to act in that way. Her surroundings are a factor when questioning why she would make such a desperate and irrational decision.
My question to the class is, do you think that Natalia’s decision to kill herself and her family was brave/strong or cowardly/inhumane? And do you agree that Natalia’s decision may not have been so reckless if it were not for the war surrounding her? Or can we see through her other actions that she may have regardless made the same choice?
Posted in Blogs, Rodoreda | Tagged with extremism, tragedy, war
Out of all of the books we’ve read, I’ve never felt so emotionally connected towards a character as I do for Natalia. I feel pity for Natalia; her life was by no means perfect, even before the Spanish civil war reached its peak. Her first-husband, Quimet, was a detestable man who degraded her and abused […]
Posted in Blogs, Rodoreda | Tagged with dove, hope, manipulation, poverty, starvation, war
