Summaries | Lecturia

H. G. Wells: The Country of the Blind. Summary and analysis

Nunez, a mountaineer from the regions near Quito, accidentally falls into an isolated valley in the Andes, inhabited by a community that has been blind for generations. Convinced that his vision will give him an advantage, and under the motto “In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king,” he tries to impose himself on the rest, but the inhabitants do not understand the notion of “seeing” and consider him sick. When his plan to become a leader fails, he falls in love with a young woman from the valley and wants to marry her, but the elders make the marriage conditional on his undergoing an operation to remove his eyes. Although he initially agrees out of love, when he sees the beauty of the visible world for the last time, he changes his mind and flees to the mountains.

Ray Bradbury: The Dwarf. Summary and analysis

In The Dwarf (1954), Ray Bradbury tells the story of a man with dwarfism who visits the mirror maze at an amusement park every night to reach a secret room where a mirror makes him look tall and elegant. That moment of illusion is his only refuge from a life of humiliation. Aimee, a young woman who works at the park, watches him with sympathy and, upon discovering that he is also a writer, decides to help him by having a mirror just like the one in the park sent to his home. Before the gift arrives, Ralph, the maze’s manager, driven by jealousy and a desire to mock him, replaces the mirror in the park with a distorting one that shrinks and distorts the figure. When the dwarf enters that night expecting to see himself transformed, he is met with a grotesque image that leaves him in shock. He flees in terror and, shortly after, is discovered to have stolen a gun. Aimee, feeling guilty, runs out to look for him.

Gabriel García Márquez: The Trail of Your Blood in the Snow. Summary and analysis

The Trail of Your Blood in the Snow (1976), by Gabriel García Márquez, tells the tragic story of the honeymoon of Nena Daconte and Billy Sánchez, a young Colombian couple traveling through France by car on their way to Paris. It all begins with a simple prick on Nena’s finger when she receives a bouquet of roses at the Madrid airport, a wound that soon turns into persistent bleeding. Although they don’t think much of it at first, the blood continues to flow as they cross the border and drive through the winter snow. Finally, they arrive at a hospital in Paris, where Nena is rushed into emergency care. Billy, confused by the language and bureaucracy, is separated from his wife and left in a disconcerting limbo with no news of her condition. Unable to understand the system around him, he spends his days alone while the authorities search for him unsuccessfully. When he finally manages to return to the hospital, he is informed that Nena died several days earlier.

Edgar Allan Poe: The Black Cat. Summary and analysis

In Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Black Cat,” a man condemned to death recounts his progressive moral decline. An animal lover in his youth, his character is corrupted by alcoholism, becoming violent and cruel. After mutilating and finally hanging his black cat, Pluto, his house mysteriously burns down. Sometime later, he finds another black cat, almost identical to the previous one, with a peculiar white spot that gradually takes the shape of a gallows, increasing his paranoia and fear. The obsessive presence of the new animal fuels his mental instability. During a fit of rage, he tries to kill the cat, but his wife stops him, and he brutally murders her. He decides to hide the body by walling it up in the basement. After several days, the police inspect the house without finding any evidence of the crime, but when the protagonist, in a gesture of arrogance, hits the wall where the body lies, a bloodcurdling scream is heard from inside. When they knock down the wall, the officers discover the corpse of his wife with the cat still alive on top of her, revealing the murder and sealing his fate.

Gabriel García Márquez: Someone Has Been Disarranging These Roses. Summary and analysis

In Someone Has Been Disarranging These Roses, a short story by Gabriel García Márquez, a dead boy recounts how, every Sunday, he tries to take roses from the altar tended by a woman to take them to his own grave. The story takes place in the house where they both lived decades ago. Having died in an accident, the boy remains as a spirit tied to the place, while the woman, who was close to him in life, devoutly maintains the altar erected in his memory. Although she cannot see him, the woman seems to sense his presence and watches over the roses with growing unease. Through the boy’s memories, the relationship between the two and the accident that led to his death are reconstructed. The house, abandoned for years, retains traces of that past life: forgotten shoes, accumulated dust, and the restored altar. The story foreshadows a future outcome: the day will come when the woman dies, and then the boy must find the men who took her to the hill, as they did with him. Only then will she understand that it was his presence—and not the wind—that disarranged the roses on the altar every Sunday.

Mario Vargas Llosa: A Visitor. Summary and analysis

In an isolated tambo between the desert and the jungle, Doña Merceditas, an older woman who lives alone, receives an unexpected and disturbing visit from an ex-convict named The Jamaican, who arrives with a sarcastic and threatening attitude. While he forces her to drink and subjects her to humiliation, it is revealed that he has returned to set a trap for Numa, a man close to the woman. In collusion with the police, The Jamaican turns Doña Merceditas into a decoy: he ties her up and places her in front of the Tambo to lure his target. When Numa arrives to rescue her, he is captured by the hidden agents. Believing he has done his part and expecting his reward, The Jamaican is cruelly abandoned by the Lieutenant and his patrol, who leave with Numa as their prisoner. Alone and surrounded by the latent threat of Numa’s accomplices who have been left free, The Jamaican faces an uncertain fate, while Doña Merceditas bursts into triumphant laughter.