The Performing Spectator in Alejo Carpentier's Fictional World

scenario's deceit. When the protagonist steps offstage into a group of actors awaiting their cues, the reader discerns that this is a play set: "Al tiempo sali de la luz, pues son6 el disparo del cazador y un pajaro cay6 en escena desde el segundo tercio de bambalinas. El mirifiaque de mi esposa vo16 por sobre mi cabeza, pues me hallaba precisamente donde le tocara entrar, estrechaindole el ya angosto paso" (68). This scene's most striking feature is the narrator's curious position. As the recalcitrant spectator of a dramatic scenario, he strolls through the fictitious space and pauses on the boundary between onstage and off, neither a participant in the drama nor a conventional audience member. This uncertain position anticipates the alienated protagonist's ontological dilemma throughout the novel, as he seeks the participatory immediacy of an earlier world as an anti-