The Christological intention of Vicente Leñero: an introduction to his novels

Abstract

The labyrinth metaphor is effective in describing the novelistics of an author like Vicente Leñero (Guadalajara, 1933 - México, D. F., 2014). Especially if we do not forget that the labyrinth, in the Cretan imagination, referred to the dwelling of the minotaur, the man-eater. Anyone who has been in one of the many labyrinths that exist today (of mirrors, of cement, of trees) will know that, despite the fact that there is no hungry mythological beast, the intricate network of roads is capable of causing us fatigue and a feeling of extremely overwhelming frustration. Escher's labyrinths, as well as the “forking paths” in Borges's tale, recover that metaphysical dimension and that potentiality as mirrors of infinite possibilities, while placing viewers and readers on a plane of observers and Witnesses of the inviolable but of the sacrificed. It is here where the labyrinth intersects with chess, the most pleasant game for Leñero: the ominous plot of both, guarded by an unnamed player, is one of the narrative axes of Jalisco.