Uruguay

In a remote jungle village, a widowed mother finds an orphaned tiger cub and, moved by compassion, nurses it as if it were her child. Thanks to the intervention of a wise snake, the tiger takes on human form and is raised as a boy under the name Juan Darién. For years, he has lived as a noble and studious human being, although his peers reject him because of his appearance and uncertain origins. When his mother dies, he is left alone and vulnerable. An inspector suspects his animal nature and exposes him publicly, unleashing the townspeople’s hatred. Juan Darién is brutally tortured and burned until his body reveals tiger stripes during a festival. Believed dead, he takes refuge in the jungle, where he survives. Having become a wild beast once again, he returns to take revenge on the tamer who led his punishment. After executing the guilty man, he visits his mother’s grave and renounces his human name to assume his animal identity. The story ends with his final return to the jungle, accompanied by other tigers, after carving his name on his mother’s cross as a last act of remembrance and farewell.

The Giant Tortoise (La Tortuga gigante), written by Horacio Quiroga and published in 1916, tells the story of a sick man who moves to the jungle to recover. There, he finds a giant tortoise injured by a tiger and decides to take care of it instead of taking advantage of it. In time, the tortoise recovers, and when the man becomes seriously ill, the animal shows extraordinary loyalty.

“Adrift,” a short story by Horacio Quiroga, narrates the intense struggle for survival of Paulino, a man who lives in the imposing missionary jungle on the border of Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay. One of the most emblematic of Quiroga’s work, this story immerses the reader in an experience where Nature plays a crucial role. After … Read more