Las fronteras del migrante. Movimiento y límite en la narrativa de Eduardo Antonio Parra

The literary language has become a means of expressing and reporting the reality, of listening to the voices of those who witness the present tragedy of migration, and, eventually, of feeling their deep and sorrowful human dimension. By assuming this perspective, my analysis seeks to address the figure of the migrant within the time-space dimension of the border as it appears in three novels by the Mexican novelist Eduardo Antonio Parra: “Piedra del río”, “El caminante” y “En la orilla”. The border is a non-space: by a literary point of view, it multiplies itself through symbols and metaphors. Yet, it is a well-defined geographical reality located in the north of Mexico and, as such, it tends to be seen as a detached reality with its own history and conditions. To stress the consequences of such space for the characters as well as the importance of the border as a mirror of its inhabitants becomes here of utter importance. Parra digs into the concept of a cyclic and mythical time where the border seems to fade under the past and present tenses of the narration. This process unfolds through a realistic writing style which, on the one side, unveils the migrant’s weakness and his/her being a victim of a brute capitalistic system, and, on the other, leads us to think of the atrocity of the human condition.