Rediscovered works from a Mexican master
The Golden Cockerel tells the tale of Dionisio Pinzón, a dirt-poor resident of the town of San Miguel del Milagro. Hampered by a lame arm, he can’t even perform manual labor, so as an act of charity he is granted the job of town crier. Among his duties is serving as announcer at the local cockfights. One evening, after a fight, the owner of the defeated bird is just about to put his wounded animal out of its misery, when Dionisio Pinzón steps in and asks him to reconsider. The man gives his unwanted bird to Dionisio Pinzón, who takes the golden rooster home and nurses it back to health. From that moment, Dionisio Pinzón’s life changes for the better, in luck and in love. He travels from town to town with his golden cockerel, raking in riches from the fighting prowess of his beloved bird. He also wins the heart of a beautiful cabaret singer. With his newfound riches, however, Dionisio Pinzón undergoes a change from simple, likable peasant to a man consumed by greed.
Unlike the more blatantly modernist style of Pedro Páramo and The Burning Plain, the writing of The Golden Cockerel is not overtly experimental or surrealist in its structure and storytelling. Rulfo relates the story in straightforward language, but with his own unique voice and humor. The plot has the quality of a folktale or fable, like a modern Mexican version of some semi-supernatural cautionary tale of Balzac’s, such as The Magic Skin. The most enjoyable quality of the novel is the blunt naturalism and gallows humor with which Rulfo depicts his native land. He doesn’t romanticize Mexican culture but certainly displays an affection for it that is contagious. Rulfo gets the reader to care about this time and place, these people, in a way similar to how García Marquez brings rural Colombia to vivid life in One Hundred Years of Solitude.
The “Other Writings” in this volume are a mixed bag of short-shorts, including a poem (“The Secret Formula”), correspondence with a loved one (“A Letter to Clara”), an autobiographical piece (“My Father”), and a bit of travel writing (“The Castillo de Teayo”). A couple of the short stories bear a warmth and humor similar to The Golden Cockerel (“A Piece of the Night” and “The Discoverer”) while a few others have a dark, spaghetti-western atmosphere that would have been right at home in The Burning Plain (“He Was on the Run and Hurting” and “Ángel Pinzón Paused”). A few of the pieces are too brief to really amount to much. In all cases, however, Rulfo’s stellar literary talent shines. The Golden Cockerel isn’t quite as impressive as Rulfo’s two better-known books, but it’s still worthy of this highly esteemed Mexican master. Rulfo fans lamenting his paltry output will be delighted by the long lost writings in this volume.
Stories in this collection
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