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Writing With(in) the Borders:

Paratexts in Un viaje de
invierno
John B. Margenot III
a

Providence College

Available online: 08 Jul 2010

To cite this article: John B. Margenot III (2010): Writing With(in) the Borders:
Paratexts in Un viaje de invierno , Romance Quarterly, 57:2, 93-104
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Romance Quarterly, 57: 93104, 2010

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ISSN: 0883-1157
DOI: 10.1080/08831150903504653

Writing With(in) the Borders

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Paratexts in Un viaje de invierno

John B. Margenot, III
Abstract: The present article focuses on the role of paratextual elements
epigram, marginal notes, and musical partituresin Juan Benets Un viaje de
invierno (1976), with special emphasis on their role in the reading process.
Gerard Genettes work on paratexts will serve as a helpful entry to my analysis
of the Spaniards novel. When conceived as the components of a liminal space
that mediates text and off-text, Benets paratexts serve to explore and enrich the
zona de sombras inherent to his narrative vision. This slippage situates readers on
the thresholds of interpretation and underscores the indeterminate quality of
aesthetic (re-)creation. The interconnected, and often contentious, zones of
the work engender multiple readings, vitiate chronology, and reinforce several
recurring themes such as alienation, death, and rebirth. The novel brings to
the fore the readers role in negotiating the highly indeterminant components
of the text and the paratext. Through this process, Benet eschews the tenets
of casticismo and highlights the role of enigma central to his literary theory
and praxis.
Keywords: indeterminacy, liminality, paratexts, stylistic shifting

erhaps no writer from the Generation of 1950 has had a greater

impact on contemporary Spanish letters than Juan Benet. Unlike
many of his fellow writers, he consistently repudiated, in his fiction and theoretical essays, the exhausted and ineffective tenets of
neorealism.1 Benet pioneered a new path for narrative grounded in the enigmas underlying human experience, and his untimely death in 1993 generated
an outpouring of tributes and critical reappraisals.2 Among them, Javier Maras
notes that Benet fue mi maestro, y lo digo no solo en un sentido general y
rimbombante, sino tambien en un sentido literal y artesanal (68), and Vicente
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Molina Foix observes, Para los escritores de mi generacion es, sin lugar a dudas, el maestro indiscutible, el gran novelista de la segunda mitad de nuestro
siglo (62). Situated in the mythical cosmos of Region, Benets fiction challenges traditional strategies of reading. A case in point is Un viaje de invierno
(1972), the final novel of his trilogy that includes Volveras a Region and Una
meditacion. The present article focuses on the role of paratextual elements
epigram, marginal notes, and musical partituresin Un viaje de invierno with
special emphasis on their role in the reading process.3 Gerard Genettes work
on paratexts will serve as a helpful entry to my analysis. When conceived as
the components of a liminal space that mediates text and off-text, Benets paratexts serve to explore and enrich the zona de sombras inherent to his narrative
vision. Accordingly, the narrator writes with(in) the boundaries of Un viaje de
invierno. This slippage situates readers on the thresholds of interpretation and
underscores the indeterminate quality underlying aesthetic (re-)creation. The
interconnectedand often contentiouszones of the work engender multiple readings, vitiate chronology, and reinforce several recurring themes such
as alienation, death, and rebirth. The novel brings to the fore the readers
role in negotiating the highly indeterminant components of the text and the
paratext.
Meaning through the stream the Greek epigram ( oo or dia
rhoon) to Un viaje de invierno lends itself to multiple interpretations, thus,
suggesting the indeterminacy that characterizes the text. What H. J. Jackson
has suggested with regard to the epigraph seems equally applicable to the
epigram since, at its most simple and traditional level, it constitutes a declaration of intent, as statement of theme, as promise of topic to be addressed
(92). On one level, readers may associate the epigram with Arturo de Bremonds movement up the Torce River valley toward the forbidden woodland
of Mantua, a process that is interrupted by prolonged stints as a laborer at
several estates in Region. More broadly, Jose Ortega has commented on the
multifarious quality of the trip, pointing out that, in addition to Arturo, other
characters embark on a transformative journey: Core returns home annually,
Demetrias husband Amat mysteriously reappears in town, the Intruso journeys
to La Gandara, and Von Silenzi realizes a peripatetic rail trip from Central Europe (250). Benet does not simply employ a puzzling epigram for the sake of
it; the epigrams polysemic character compels the reader to consider a plethora
of readings. The multifarious meanings suggested by dia rhoon are further
enriched by its placement on the page, for it occupies the space reserved for
marginal notes that appear throughout Un viaje de invierno. By dislocating the
epigram to the margin, the author foregrounds the subversive nature of paratexts. Furthermore, the displacement of the epigram immediately signals that
paratextual elements will maintain an intimate and often intrusive relationship
with the main text. The periphery will unexpectedly ebb and flow throughout
the stream of narrative discourse, and dia rhoon playfully adumbrates both the
semantic and temporal slippage that characterizes Un viaje de invierno. Situated
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en exergue, the epigram bleeds into the text and underscores the indeterminacy
that characterizes the novel.
From yet another perspective, Benets epigram suggests neither a beginning
nor an end, but instead an endless, ongoing temporal flux that mirrors the
dilated quality of time in the novel.4 Among the critics who speak of a pure
present in Un viaje de invierno, David K. Herzberger observes, Benet presents a
temporal vacuum in which the sense of duration becomes so rarified that days
and months lose their independent value, fuse and disperse into emptiness
in which chronological time ceases to have meaning and therefore to exist
(122). Readers and characters move continuously through the stream of time
in Un viaje de invierno. Because the novel configures a Bergsonian sense of
ever-expanding consciousness, dia rhoon announces the principal focus of the
text: the nature of time and its fluidity free of all chronological constraints.
Quite often the narrator acknowledges the peculiar condition of time. In the
opening pages of the novel, readers learn that Demetria does not organize
her memories of the party chronologically. In addition, the narrative abounds
with sententious disquisitions on time like the following: El tiempo tiene
una dimension hasta el presente y desde el presente ha de gozar de otra,
representacion no fortuita de aquella, pero en el se produce la cortadura que
trasciende a ambos indefinidos de tal suerte que nunca sera lo u ltimo que
paso ni lo primero que ocurrira (Viaje 225). Past, present and future merge
into a continuous flow as is liminally conveyed by the epigram dia rhoon.
The margins of Un viaje de invierno are significantly wider than those one
typically finds in texts without glosses, thus illustrating that the paratext plays
a larger role. As these margins displace the zone traditionally reserved for the
main text, the potential for reader participation increases. An ample margin
foments closer interaction between text and readers, inviting them to provide
their own marginalia. This type of margin brings to the fore the readers role
in the (re-)creative process. Simultaneously, and perhaps more importantly,
the marginal glosses in Un viaje de invierno destabilize the text. The terseness
that characterizes most of Benets notes vitiates their principaland traditionally acceptedfunction: elucidation. As one critic has observed, The text
persuades, the notes prove (Grafton 15). Benet marbles the margins of the
novel with 131 glosses that often consist of one word or a brief clause. For
example, succinct marginalia such as Ficciones (168), Quia (174), and
El alma en paro (293) abound. Although Benets notes appear to eschew
enigma and embrace reason, it becomes clear they are the exception rather
than the rule.5 Benet frequently glosses the narrative with questions: La fatalidad es una propiedad demostrada? (229), El poder del alma? (290),
and El bausan? (372). Instead of providing proof to buttress the text, such
queries create uncertainty and challenge reader expectations. Several notes further augment doubt through the use of the future tense: Sera reclamada
por el juicio como testigo en su vista contra la razon? (154), Sera ella la
que vuelve? (174), and Sera que no son tales y que no existiendo en el
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laberinto ningun camino cortado todos conducen a la misma salida? (231).

Such marginal notes raise more questions than are answered and create a highly
indeterminate text. Since they elude explication and heighten obfuscation, the
glosses function subversively throughout the novel. This does not imply that
the author is focusing on frustrating reader expectations; Benets prose eschews
mimetic readings of Un viaje de invierno thus facilitating a layered and nuanced
recreation that yields multiple interpretations.
One must also consider the implications arising from the use of a smaller
typescript in the gloss when compared to the main narratives. Does this signal
some type of subservience to the text? If so, how does the multidirectional
quality of Benets notes fulfillas is commonly expected of all glossingits
role in explicating parts of the novel? At a first glance, the use of smaller
typescript in the glosses of Un viaje de invierno visually conveys their deferential
status in the hierarchical relationship with the text. That is to say, their main
purpose appears to be one of explication. It soon becomes apparent, however,
that such notes are neither elucidatory nor subservient. A case in point is the
following passage:
El campo queda restringido.

Pero nunca podra decir quienes haban acudido o

quienes haban faltado, quienes fueron los primeros
y los u ltimos, hasta que hora haban permanecido en
la casa, que haban hecho, de que se haba hablado,
de que clase de sentimientos haban hecho gala, que
suerte de localizacion y disipacion en el destino esperaban para el ano proximo y, sobre todo, en que
medida haban huido de las evocaciones. (126)

The enumeration of interrogative clauses engenders an exceptionally ambiguous sentence, and the terse gloss with its emphasis on restriction as well
as interpretation does little to mitigate the uncertainty of the convoluted prose
segment. In short, as the marginalia raise more questions than they answer, the
parodic character of rational discourse emerges.6 The marginal note serves to
increment the uncertainty generated by the narrative thus challenging reader
expectations regarding the traditional relationship between the text and its
paratext. By scrutinizing such dynamics, the author brings into greater focus
the creative process.
Originally, marginal glosses functioned as an organic part of a work as is
the case with biblical scripture. In fact, scholars authoritatively annotated the
pages of the Bible with copious marginalia. Benets use of marginal annotations
does not suggest a univocal truth based on a single, unalterable reading of his
work; it instead turns this notion on its head thus bringing to mind Lipkings
observation that the truth of the margin is that many alternate truths are
possible (640). The notes to Un viaje de invierno lend greater polysemy to
the narration and make no claim to an immutable truth grounded in rigorous
scholarship. They hardly overwhelm the text from a visual and elucidatory
perspective but, instead, mock their traditional function. Benets glosses stake
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no claim to irrefutable exegesis but rather suggest that all attempts to realize a
mimetic interpretation are both misguided and fruitless. Instead of buttressing
the text, the authors marginal notes habitually destabilize it thereby creating
parodic distance.
Several glosses mislead one into believing they fulfill a basic function: at a
literal level they clarify and explain through references to other texts. Such is
the case with one that includes part of the final verse from William Shakespeares Sonnet VIII, Thou single will [sic] prove none (248), or the one
with the allusion to the Book of Ecclesiastes (156). These glosses activate a
process of indirect backing that compels readers to determine the relationship between the backgrounded and foregrounded texts. The biblical allusion
voiced by Demetria, Te has embarcado en una aventura de tu salvacion o sea
la aniquilacion de tu condicion, y no tanto por amplitud de un saber previsor
como por la cortedad de tu vida (156), is loosely coupled to Ecclesiastes 1,
and the reader recalls its eighteen verses of scripture dealing with futility and
meaninglessness.7 Ironically, the note itself mocks its elucidatory function since
it clarifies little, if anything at all. The allusion to Shakespeares sonnet, with its
emphasis on the worthlessness of a single life, remains equally diffuse since the
passage suggests multiple readings ranging from procreation to obliteration.8
The authors propensity to eschew scientific discourse in both his theory
and praxis comes to the fore in the use of marginalia throughout Un viaje de
invierno. The artist, he argues, must abandon scientific inquiry and embrace
the enigmas underlying human experience: No en balde al perder esa absoluta
confianza en la ciencia, una buena parte de su experiencia se desarrollara en la
zona fronteriza entre las luces y la sombra, al asumir con su vida el papel a que
le arrastran sus propias convicciones (En ciernes 51). The slippage inherent
to this zona fronteriza constitutes the focus of narrative discourse and engulfs
the liminal spaces of the novel. Unlike the footnote, which serves as a solid
foundation on which the text rests, the gloss defies the systematic and scientific
documentation of sources. It follows that Benets marginal notes ridicule their
supplementary quality. The author challenges the limits of scientific discourse
by omitting the callouts thus isolating the gloss further from the text. It is
common practice to key marginal notes to a specific segment of the text
(Genette 319). Without such tethers, the gloss is dislocated further into the
margins thus augmenting the fluid zones of the paratext. As Genette observes,
If the paratext is an often indefinite fringe between text and off-text, the
note . . . perfectly illustrates this indefiniteness and this slipperiness (343).
Such slippage enriches (and engenders) the zona de sombras central to Benets
narrative vision thus placing greater emphasis on the enigmas inherent to the
creative process as opposed to the explication of narrative material.9 Several
glosses appear opposite the beginning or conclusion of a paragraph. On other
occasions they occupy a line where a sentence ends or begins. Frequently, they
are positioned where no break in punctuation appears, as is the case with the
opening sentence of chapter 2:
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En principio solamente haba acudido en busca de trabajo,

impulsado por la secreta obedienca a la ley que le dictara
remontar el curso del ro, pocos das o meses despues de que
el paso de la propietaria de la casa, en su u ltimo viaje de vuelta,
pusiera punto final a todas las vacilaciones que haba albergado
al respecto. (149)

Una ley tan gratuita como otra

pero que otorga
un sentido.

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In another passage, it is uncertain what part of the text corresponds to the

gloss:
. . . sin desdecir una sola slaba de sus discursos. No mas preguntas. S, la fiesta, dime si no es un descanso para ese fugitivo
cuya marcha se hace mas pesada no tanto por el nino que lleva
encima de los hombros cuanto por su incapacidad para callarle
y responderle, sin temor y con seguridad, a su insistente donde
me llevas? (297)

La conciencia
nostalgica.

The marginal glosses challenge any systematic strategy of documentation

thus heightening the indeterminacy of the text they moderate. Furthermore,
readers must choose when and where to insert the note, a process that yields
multiple readings. In short, Benets unstable marginalia eschew traditional
scholarly labor by mocking all efforts at scientific corroboration.
The absence of any mechanism to anchor notes to text in Un viaje de
invierno shifts responsibility to the reader. When regarded as dislocations,
marginal glosses rupture the rhythmic flow of reading. Jackson has studied
how the process of reading resembles a contest or struggle, and an oscillation
between surrender and resistance, identification and detachment (8485).
In his view, marginalia form part of this contentious duality. The reader
perceives that a wedge has been driven between text and gloss, which serves
to attenuate the reading process. Several notes in Benets novel clearly maintain
an adversarial role with the text. They wrestle for supremacy over the narration
through commentary, contradiction, and negation. For example, one marginal
note validates the importance of Arturos discovery of a transparent sheet of
paper bearing Amats name: No anda descaminado (180). Another gloss
cautions, Todo es al reves de como lo pintan (156). Such authoritative
statements bleed into the adjacent text because of the omission of callouts and
attenuate the forward progress of the reader. The dismissiveand frequently
combativetone of many notes often takes the form of negations: No se
sabe nada seguro a este respecto (151); La cronica empero no registra ese
dato (192); Una pregunta que parece la misma pero que no lo es (201).
Glossing of this sort highlights the rivalry between text and paratext and
requires readers to evaluate such contradictions.
The sententious tone of numerous notes augments the struggle for narrative
supremacy throughout the novel, as is the case with one of the longer glosses of
the novel: La razon que apunta a la fusion del hombre con su conocimiento,
exigira la destruccion del individuo. Pero solo cuando sucumba la conciencia
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nostalgica, sera posible la participacion con el todo, el triunfo del logos

(307). Benets notes adopt a new line of rhetoric and struggle for control
of the narrative. Readers activate this conflict and often pause thus positing
the possibility of multiple interpretations of Un viaje de invierno. This is not
to say that marginal notes constitute a distraction for readers; they instead
afford them the opportunity to decide whether the logos of the notes or
the conciencia nostalgica of the narration has the last word. By filling in
the gaps created by the unstable relationship between text and paratext, this
reading yields a highly indeterminate work.
Wolfgang Isers writings on the phenomenology of reading constitute a helpful entry to Un viaje de invierno. Readers, he argues, establish a multiplicity of
connections between the literary work and imagination through a process that
engenders the virtual dimension of the text (279). Because reading involves
both anticipation and retrospection, this process may not always manifest itself as a continuous flow, especially when the thought of one sentence has
no apparent connection to the following one. Accordingly, readers experience
blockage, which affords them the opportunity to establish relationships and
fill in the gaps created by the text (280). As each reader bridges these breaks
in different ways, his or her actualization of the text lays bare the dynamics of
reading. Benet exploits the virtual dimension in his third novel and calls into
question the strategies employed to actualize the text. The unanchored glosses
further dilate the fissures that arise while perusing Un viaje de invierno, and they
ostensibly foreground the link-forming process inherent to reading literature.
These marginal devices vitiate attempts to establish a recognizable pattern of
reading thus compelling readers to realize multiple connections. Most important to the present discussion, these strategies activate ones imagination and
reveal ones ability to provide links. Such liminal invitations bring to the fore
the dynamics between reader and text and continuously create new areas of
indeterminacy. As the narrator strives to dislocate the pattern seeking inherent
to the reading process, one encounters alien parts of the text, and ones
awareness of blockage grows. The apparently arbitrary and highly sententious
annotations in Un viaje de invierno posit a plethora of interpretations.
Various references to music further augment the slippage between text and
paratext.10 Benet has commented that the novel is structured en la forma de
sonata, de plus sonata y en las formas a b b a b b d c c d a (Hernandez 102).
In addition, the titleyet another paratextual elementconstitutes a veiled
reference to Franz Schuberts Die Winterreise, a cycle of twenty-four songs set
to the poetry of Willhelm Muller.11 The marginal notes clearly share a degree
of affinity with music, thus bringing to mind Genettes observation that they
habitually create effects of nuance, sourdine and musical register that attenuate
the linearity of discourse (Genette 327). Accordingly, the in-betweenness that
characterizes the contrapunctual dynamic between the notes and the text in
Un viaje de invierno is best understood in temporal terms. Similarly, the score
of Franz Schuberts Waltz K occupies the postface, and its performance at
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Cores annual party highlights its connection to time. This special celebration,
like all festive occasions, serves as a hiatus to chronology. Furthermore, the
musical experience affords one the opportunity not only to wander in time
but to confront time itself (Scruton 75). In short, the experience of music
frees one from the constraints of time, and this is precisely what occurs to
the characters throughout Un viaje de invierno. For example, several passages
regarding the pianists performance of the waltz during the party underscore
the dilated quality of time: Durante ese minuto y mediosin paredes ni
lmites, sin tiempobroto el vals (269). Timelessness supplants chronology
throughout Un viaje de invierno. That is to say, the liminal presence of the
partitures functions both structurally and thematically relative to the elongation of time in the novel. The sheet musictogether with the epigram
and marginaliaoccupies the fringes of the novel and dislocates the linear
progression of narrative discourse.
As a form of code switching, the Greek epigram to the novel foreshadows
the stylistic shifting that continuously occurs between the text and its paratextual elements, especially the terse glosses and the postface.12 For example,
Felix de Azua likens the text and its notes to two distinct stylistic modalities he defines as los decires de la razon y la sinrazon (15). Similarly, the
postface employs an entirely different system of signs. As might be expected,
the juxtaposition of a musical composition to a narrative text in Un viaje de
invierno highlights the ways in which different codes of signification create
fissures in formulating meaning. Benet creates blockage and brings to the fore
the dynamics of hermeneutics by compelling readers to consider the relationships between musical discourse and narrative. Musical expression customarily
baffles semantic expectations (Scruton 200) thus foregrounding the relationship between text and postface in the authors novel. By placing references to
Schuberts work on the borders of the narrative, Benet underscores the ineffable and complex process of discerning meaning. In this fashion, the narrator
customarily destabilizes the process of reading and interpretation in Un viaje
de invierno. A shift from literary discourse to musical syntax and vice versa
convey that language functions in different ways. It therefore becomes clear
that the marginal is pivotal in Un viaje de invierno.
The slippage inherent to the liminal topography of the novel echoes several
thematic concerns. Victor Turner has studied the concept of liminality as it
applies to the transitional points of birth, puberty, marriage, and death, and
these moments are often marked by social ceremonies. Such rites of passage
signal states of in-betweenness and flux that eschew codification and engender
new forms and categories (9394). In this context, code switching and stylistic
shifting emphasize such central themes as transition, otherness, and alienation.
Of particular interest is the focus on death and rebirth throughout Un viaje de
invierno since it explores the classical myth of Demeter, whose daughter Kore
returns home in the springtime after passing six months in the underworld.13
The party as rite is a recurring motif that signals the transition between death
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and regeneration for Demetria: Se dio en pensar si la u ltima raz de la fiesta

no se alimentara del deseo de cancelar con un acontecimiento discreto y
(por decirlo as) lcito la larga serie de los anonimos das invernales (155).
This celebration clearly marks the end of winter and the beginning of spring.
Demetria also remains aloof from everyone and lives alone outside town
recluda a una demente clandestinidad (151). In fact, her house constitutes
a transitory zone between life and death as is evidenced by its remote location
and proximity to the forbidden woodland of Mantua. It is not surprising that
her dwelling shares a symbiotic relationship with the forest, which is zealously
protected by its reclusive guard, Numa: No era raro, por consiguiente, que las
luces de La Gandara se enciendieran, en toda su ruin magnificencia, dos das
antes o dos das despues de que un viajero ingenuo o un cazador desaprensivo
se internara en el desierto para cruzar los lmites de Mantua (302). Demetrias
illuminated home enigmatically marks the transgression of the wildwood and
foreshadows the intruders impending death at the hands of Numa. Other
loners and drifters also live on the fringe of society: Arturo, the itinerant
laborer, is an outsider who witnesses the uncanny events at La Gandara, and
the pianist travels there from afar to perform at the party. Along with the
enigmatic guests, they participate in this modern-day version of the Eleusinian
mysteries that border on the threshold of life and death.14 Such in-betweenness
mirrors the liminal relationship between text and paratexts in Un viaje de
invierno.
More than any of Benets novels, Un viaje de invierno ostensibly brings to
the fore the readers role in actualizing the subversive spaces of the novel. Its
paratextual components require the reader to mediate their frequently adversarial relationship with the main text. Through this process, the author vitiates
the tenets of casticismo and highlights the role of enigma central to his literary
theory and praxis. As he notes: Ninguna barrera puede prevalecer contra el
estilo siendo as que se trata del esfuerzo del escritor por romper un cerco
mucho mas estrecho, permanente y riguroso: aquel que le impone el dictado
de la realidad (Inspiracion 17980). Accordingly, Benet employs paratextual
devices to situate the reader in the inexact zones of intuition inaccessible to
scientific inquiry. The epigram dia rhoon suggests movement through an endless temporal stream that is further reinforced by the timeless quality of the
piano recital. Although one may read the epigram thematicallythat is, as an
allusion to several trips by different characters upstream to Regionit more
appropriately signals a continuous flux through the stream of time. Similarly,
the untethered marginalia attenuate linear readings of the novel and fulfill
a sourdine-like effect in their infructuous attempt to muffle and control the
main text. Finally, the musical references to Schuberts Die Wintereisse and
his Waltz K bring into play the dilated quality of time as well as matters of
signification throughout the novel. Un viaje de invierno not only focuses on
alienation and ambiguity but also scrutinizes the inherent slippage of indeterminate zones realized through reading. This process transcends mimesis and
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elevates one to a more nuanced yet uneasily defined reality. Benet explores
the notion of indeterminacy that characterizes much of contemporary writing
and utilizes the paratext to fashion his enigmatic narrative vision.
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NOTES
1. According to the author, El estilo mas irresistible no sera nunca el de un
costumbrista; el mas alto exponente de la expresividad de la lengua no se debera ir
a buscar, en ningun caso, entre las prosas castizas, en las descripciones sazonadas con
sabores caseros o en la humilde jerga de los silenciosos monjes, los pcaros de corte o
los hidalgos hambrientos (La inspiracion y el estilo 169).
2. See Baeza; Garca Perez; Margenot.
3. Critical reception of Un viaje de invierno has been sporadic at best, in part
because of its relative inaccessibility compared to other works by the author. For
studies on his third novel, see Azua; Benson; Herzberger; Navajas.
4. The author discusses his views on el tiempo absoluto in El a ngel del Senor
abandona a Tobas, esp. in ch. 6.
5. Benson argues that el lector constatara pronto que no hay una clara relacion
de jerarquas entre ambos textos (241). My reading suggests that Benet approaches
the traditional use of marginalia parodically.
6. See Hutcheon for a discussion of parody.
7. See Benets La inspiracion y el estilo (esp. 4650) for a discussion of the Bible
from a stylistic perspective.
8. The complete text is as follows:
Music to hear, why hearst thou music sadly?
Sweets with sweets war not, joy delights in joy.
Why lovst thou that which thou receivst not gladly,
Or else receivst with pleasure thine annoy?
If the true concord of well-tun`ed sounds
By unions married do offend thine ear,
They do but sweetly chide thee, who confounds
In singleness the parts that thou shouldst bear.
Mark how one string, sweet husband to another,
Strikes each in each by mutual ordering,
Resembling sire and child and happy mother,
Who all in one, one pleasing note do sing;
Whose speechless song, being many, seeming one,
Sings this to thee: Thou single wilt prove none. (Shakespeare 752)
9. Benet discusses this concept at length in La inspiracion y el estilo, esp. 15780.
10. From a somewhat different perspective that acknowledges the notion of slippage
but does not account for its relationship to music and time, Azua has observed that
the texts and notes in Un viaje de invierno son como dos temas musicales que resbalan
el uno sobre el otro sin jamas mezclarse (15).
11. Benet draws a parallel between reading Faulkner and listening to Schubert:
Faulkner me ha dejado paralizado muchas veces. Me ha pasado con parrafos y con
libros enteros, porque el no tiene esas bajadas de tension de Conrad. . . . Es lo mismo
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que pasa con los cuartetos postumos de Schubert, que dan de s tanto que puedes
pasarte 15 das pensando, sin hacer nada mas (Alameda 25).
12. See Hess for a discussion of code switching and stylistic shifting.
13. See Gullon for a mythological reading of the novel.
14. See Morford and Lenardon for a detailed account of these initiation rites,
particularly 23137.

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Navajas, Gonzalo. The Deferred Enigma in Juan Benets Un viaje de invierno. Anales
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