Innocent Eréndira

Above, Eréndira washing her enormous and generously tattooed grandmother. The character of the rapacious grandmother seems very similar to the appetitive Yubaba character in Spirited Away, with her gems and mountains of pastry and ice cream.

What do you think this story is about? It could be the nightmarish logical conclusion of one person treating another as a possession. The end, the knowledge that comes to Eréndira at her freedom and immediately matures her face seems to me to be about the price of assuming responsibility for the self. Sometimes we'll put up with an enormous amount of pain, conspiring with our oppressors, simply to avoid seeing.

The last story of the Innocent Eréndira collection, the title story, brings back as supporting players some of the characters which appear in the earlier story. It's also suggested that the hero Ulises (a hero almost by default) is descended from the winged ancient in the first story, A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings:

"The one with wings was my grandfather", Ulises answered in his natural way, "But nobody believed it".

Peek at Erendira

Here is a detail of the illustration for Garcia Marquez's The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Eréndira and her Heartless Grandmother. If you want to know what is going on here before the 30th, you will have to read the story.

The (theoretical, volcano-dependent) date for my departure to England is approaching. As of today, I have an illustration project to occupy me at Pound View Farm - that would be drawings for The Poetry Bus Magazine, now virtually incarnated as a blog.