The Night Face USmmary

Reality is the most subjective aspect of human existence, every single person has a separate experience linked to the ambiguous adventure of life. Occasionally an author will decide to explore these concepts in the form of a short story, such as The Night Face Up by Julio Cortazar, which contains two separate but parallel plotlines surrounding the main character’s shifting sense of reality. The story takes place in Mesoamerica during the mid 20th century and sometime between the 14th and 16th century, depicting both a hospital stay after a motorcycle accident and a Motecan warrior attempting to flee from the Aztecs. Cortazar expertly explores several related iterations of the idea that perception is reality by the aforementioned blending of two complementary plots into one cohesive story and by the ambiguous ending which

For example, the narrative begins in the modern world, which was probably done to introduce the reader to the story and its characters in a relatable environment, with a brief motorcycle ride followed by a hospitalizing accident. Using odors as a transition, Cortazar suddenly places the reader in the Aztec world, presenting it as the protagonist’s nightmare, this sudden, jarring switch puts the reader in the same mental space as someone who is in the midst of fleeing from war. A tension-filled chase scene is juxtaposed with the protagonist going into surgery, depicting the high stakes nature of trying to survive a motorcycle crash and when he is moved out of surgery in the modern world, his bed in the ICU is represented by his inability to run in the Aztec world. Because of the correspondence between the story arcs the reader is given two possible explanations for every physical ailment the protagonist suffers and no clear indication of which story has the true answer, the purposeful absence of definitive proof further solidifies the theme of perception is