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—María Ospina, Variations on the Body (Coffee House Press, 2021)
In her debut short story collection, Variations on the Body, María Ospina explores the lives of Colombian women from different generations and social strata as they search for community and belonging.
These stories feature a sense of wandering exemplified by a symbol of defiant independence: stray dogs. “I was interested in exploring...how we care for others or ask others to care for us,” said Ospina about her inclusion of stray dogs in each story. Strays complicate the ideas of care and dependence, choosing to exist outside domesticity in search of something greater. In “Collateral Beauty,” Estefanía dresses up as a stray dog for her first Halloween in New York, where she hopes to recover a final connection with a kindred spirit. Marcela in “Policarpa” is a kind of stray dog herself; struggling to rejoin civilian life and hesitant to reach out to her family, she exhibits the solitude of the stray. The rootlessness these characters face when attempting to redefine themselves in a new society is similar to that of Latinxs trying to make the U.S. their home. Like the stray dogs in Variations (and the characters that reflect them), Latinxs strike their own path, battling loneliness and fear while redefining their relationship with the surrounding culture.
Unlike the strays mentioned, the dog in “Saving Young Ladies” doesn’t need saving. In fact, its pride disturbs Aurora. For her, the dog is a proxy for young Jessica, whom she wants to rescue from the perceived shackles of the convent. Her desire to connect with Jessica, however, becomes obsessive. In a culture dominated by machismo, intra-women interactions are foundational for young Latinas. These vital relationships become precarious when power is divided asymmetrically, as in the relationship between Aurora and Jessica and others in these stories. Such a dynamic can, at times, border on the homoerotic, as described by Ospina:“[Women] are drawn to...situations in which they can ‘save others’...That transcends the desire to be with a man...it’s a kind of queer desire, in a way.” When I was a young teen, I experienced something similar. I became drawn to a classmate as if by siren call. There was a certain yo no sé qué that made me want to be near her, to know what pained her, to take it away. I followed her around like a stray dog, though not a proud one, and to this day I can’t quite define the energy between us, though I suspect it is one-sided. This “queer desire” flies in the face of the heteronormative and patriarchical, or machista, culture of Latinxs.
Machismo also limits women’s access to education and, therefore, their ability to tell their own stories, another aspect of the Latina experience that Ospina expounds in Variations. She calls writing a “determinant factor in the modes in which you exist in the world, especially…[in a sexist society]...where women have less access to writing than men.” In “Occasion,” for example, Zenaida attributes her poor spelling to her father, who barred her from school after fourth grade. However, that these women write at all speaks to their innate desire to document their existence. “These stories,” said Ospina, “are about...telling one’s own story, especially as these characters are all migrants...How do you give an account of yourself as you move, as you change spaces?” This concept applies to the Latinx experience in the U.S., where, amid a disruption of place, identity, and language, a sense of groundedness can only be found in oneself. Perhaps this is why so many Latinxs turn to writing and other forms of art: to record this change, to reconcile who they were there and who they are becoming here.
The solitude of rootlessness is expressed in Variations by the destruction of writing; Marcela burns her letters to her mother, Mirla (from the titular story) never writes for television, Aurora burns her manuscript, and on and on. Ospina described the characters’ search for community as a “fantasy” that is ultimately destroyed by the realities of isolation. Isolation results in a lack of control, for which the characters in this collection seek various odd remedies. The narrator of “Fauna of the Ages” tracks flea bites. Mirla collects scissors. Martica, who appears throughout the collection, is tasked with all things skin-related. Ospina categorizes these behaviors as “part of a compulsion, of trying to control” in the midst of instability. (Im)migrants, for whom cultural instability is a given, may gravitate to such behaviors. While I don’t consider myself an immigrant, I relate to these tendencies; I have difficulty discarding seemingly useless items, and I’ve always obsessed over the marks on my skin. Could these be side effects of a fragmented identity, my own attempts at uniting the disparate parts of myself?
Although Variations isn’t set in the U.S., the characters’ experiences parallel those of Latinxs seeking belonging in the U.S., a place that doesn’t yet belong to them. Whether they are emotional, physical, or cultural migrants, the characters in Variations on the Body, and, I suspect, all people, hunger for community, stability, and acceptance.
If you enjoy(ed) the recurring symbols and themes of wandering in Variations, I recommend Adios, Happy Homeland! by Ana Menéndez.
Thank you to María Ospina for making time for an interview and to Coffee House Press for providing a review copy of the book.
Brittany Torres Rivera is a Puerto Rican writer whose work deals with culture, family, and (un)belonging. She has a BA in English with a concentration in Creative Writing from Florida International University. She is based in Orlando, FL.
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