Keeper

“It was not very beautiful. From where Faustino was sitting, it looked rather like an alien with an oversize bald head. And every soccer player in the world wanted it. The World Cup. It burned in the lamplight.”

Faustino’s thoughts looking at the World Cup introduce the idea of how truly unimportant the cup is as a physical object. However, it also introduces the theme of The Power of Sports: While the physical trophy may be unimportant, what it symbolizes—victory, camaraderie, the nation—is vital to millions of fans and players worldwide.

“I’d never really thought about the fact that I was living in a small space hacked from the jungle.”

Gato’s thoughts when he first quits soccer and explores the jungle characterize who he is at the start. The fact that he had never considered what his village is—a space “hacked” out of nature—shows how ignorant he is of the natural world in the beginning of the text.

“What I wanted, most of all, was not to be there. It was like having a nightmare and knowing that you are having a nightmare and that all you have to do is wake up, but you can’t wake up. I was trembling like a leaf in the rain.”

The first time Gato sees the Keeper, he is deeply afraid of him and flees home. These two similes—comparing his experience to having a “nightmare” and his fear to a “trembling” leaf—highlight his fear of the strangeness of seeing someone, especially someone who is not fully human, in the forest. However, he fights against this fear as he realizes the value of being with the Keeper.

“‘Trust the forest,’ [Uncle Feliciano] said. ‘Respect it. You are not exploring it. It is exploring you.’”

When Gato considers whether to continue to train with the Keeper, it is Uncle Feliciano who reaffirms his belief that he should return to the field. This advice characterizes Uncle Feliciano as someone wise and who is different from the rest of the village: He recognizes The Importance of Nature and its strength, as he personifies it as a living, cognizant being through the use of the word “exploring.”

“I was awkward, I know, trying to fill that goalmouth. I knew who I was: Cigüeña, the Stork.”

When Gato first tries to play in the goal with the Keeper, he battles against the self that was formed through his experiences in the village. The fact that he thinks of his nickname, “the Stork,” emphasizes just how deeply ingrained his previous life is in him. This Gato, who feels “awkward” in the goal, is vastly different from the one being interviewed by Faustino, emphasizing the dynamic quality of Gato’s character. His recall of his old nickname also speaks to an important motif in the text.

“Looking back now, Paul, I find it surprising that my father knew very little about these things himself. Not just surprising, but sad, too.”

The narrative structure of the novel—a flashback where Gato recounts his childhood—gives Gato the benefit of hindsight as he talks with Faustino. Although Gato finds it “surprising” that his father did not know about nature, this is ironic: The reality is that Gato was the same way, as was the rest of the village, before he found the Keeper.

“[My mother’s] mistake was to share these dreams with my father, when he didn’t want to know. He didn’t want the safe rhythms of his life upset by ambition. That’s how people got hurt. So now and again he’d snap, like a rope carrying too much weight.”

This simile, which compares Gato’s father to a “rope” with a lot of weight pulling on it, conveys the sympathy that Gato feels for his father. Since Gato is able to get out of his village and away from the life of logging that everyone else lives, he recognizes how difficult that life actually is. He sympathizes with how trapped his father feels, having only one option in his life while trying to do the best he can for Gato’s future. His father’s sacrifices add another dimension to the idea of Self-Sacrifice in Following Dreams, as his father’s self-sacrifice is necessary to support the family.

“‘There were times when I hated him,’ El Gato said. […] ‘He was hard, unemotional. He didn’t seem to know what praise was. He was building me, and he did it ruthlessly.’”

This admission from Gato conveys the complexity of his relationship with the Keeper, as he struggles with his unwillingness to praise Gato. This idea emphasizes the theme of Self-Sacrifice in Following Dreams: While some of Gato’s experiences may have been unpleasant with the Keeper, he was willing to withstand it in exchange for the knowledge and skill the Keeper instilled in him.

“The thing that puzzled and disturbed me was that he didn’t seem to be doing this for my sake, but for his.”

Gato’s thoughts early on in his training with the Keeper are the first instance of foreshadowing the Keeper’s true identity. Gato recognizes that the Keeper has a personal stake in training Gato to be a goalkeeper, a fact that will be revealed later in the text when Gato learns who the Keeper was in life and how he died.

“That clearing in the jungle was like a place taken out of the real world, separate from it. Do you know what I mean? It was a place where I was allowed to feel frightened, hopeless, awkward, ashamed, but it was a place where no harm could come to me. I was protected there. I could get things wrong but have other chances to get them right.”

While Gato is speaking specifically about the field in the forest, his thoughts also translate to the larger world of athletics, emphasizing the theme of The Power of Sports. Training and practice in athletics give people the opportunity to feel many emotions and do so safely, giving them the tools to handle these emotions in more serious situations off the field.

“The goal and its net were the trap; that was where she would make the kill. But the cat had to time it very carefully, because the breeze would carry her scent.”

Gato’s thoughts while he watches the jaguar track the deer convey the metaphorical significance of the jaguar. Just as the net served as a “trap” for the deer, Gato also uses the goal to lure shooters into the net before stopping them. Additionally, the description of the jaguar as a “cat” furthers this metaphor, emphasizing the importance of Gato’s nickname.

“You will do things that now seem impossible. They seem impossible now only because you cannot imagine them. Because you do not believe in them. But you will do them, and afterward you will be amazed that you ever doubted yourself.”

This lesson from the Keeper is another example of his lessons that translate to both soccer and life off the field, emphasizing the theme of The Power of Sports. While Gato assumes the Keeper is talking just about his soccer abilities, this lesson can also apply to Gato’s broader life. For example, at this point in the text, Gato does not believe that he has a future in soccer; however, after he later trains and plays so well at the camp games, it becomes clear that it was never “impossible.”

“As we traveled, the forest began to show its scars. On both sides of the road there appeared vast areas from which every tall tree had vanished […] Farther on, the forest showed its open wounds. It had been scalped. Vast hillsides had been reduced to red mud and blackened stumps. Here and there, low cliffs of rock poked through the soil like naked bone. I simply stared at all this, too dazed to speak.”

When Gato first goes to work, he views the damage that the logging company has done to the forest. He personifies the forest, metaphorically comparing it to a body that is full of “scars,” “wounds,” and has “naked bones.” This figurative language emphasizes both the damage to the forest and also Gato’s newfound understanding of it: He is deeply impacted by the sympathy he feels for the forest as it is destroyed.

“The light was shocking. It took the color out of everything. The surrounding emptiness took on a greater darkness; it was as if nothing but the camp existed in an endless space.”

After work the first day, the workers turn on an extremely bright light to illuminate the camp. This juxtaposition of a “shocking” light against the “greater darkness” of the forest highlights just how unnatural and harmful the loggers’ job is. They are imposing on the beautiful peacefulness of the forest with their light, tools, and destruction.

“And that was the first moment I understood how deeply the Keeper’s teaching had reached into me. I did not remember the jaguar. I did not have time to remember, or think about, the big cat. It was not a matter of me imitating her beautiful agility, the way she shifted herself in the middle of her leap. At that moment I was her.”

This moment marks an important change in Gato’s character. Until now, he was doubtful of the Keeper’s teachings, openly questioning him when the Keeper told him that he was capable of doing what the jaguar did. However, now he realizes what the Keeper has been emphasizing all along: Like the jaguar, Gato has the instincts to train his body to know what to do.

“Change is everything—change is life itself. The only thing that stays the same is being dead, believe me. You have changed, and that is how life sings in you. When you first came here, you were weak and lonely and didn’t know what you had within yourself. Now you know.”

In one of the last couple of times the Keeper and Gato are together, the Keeper stresses to Gato how much he has changed in the forest. These words emphasize the dynamic nature of Gato’s character, while also showing the interplay between the themes of The Importance of Nature and The Power of Sports. Due to their time together on their field training for soccer, the Keeper has also taught Gato important lessons about life.

“I seemed to be on the ground for most of the first forty-five minutes. When I wasn’t, I was twitching in the goalmouth like a spider when rain strikes its web.”

This simile—which compares Gato to a spider—emphasizes how Gato feels in the net, constantly “twitching” as he reacts to the play around him. This emphasizes the broader symbolism of a spider and its web: Instead of just waiting in the goal for the ball to come to him, he is instead constantly watching, judging, and reacting to what is happening around him—just as a spider responds to nearby prey.

“I looked down at the table and concentrated on an ant that was struggling with a drop of spilled cordial. It was hard to tell if the ant was trying to carry the sugary liquid away or escape from the sweet stickiness that had trapped its legs.”

Gato sees this ant while he is waiting for his parents to make a decision about whether he can go to DSJ. The ant is a metaphor for how Gato feels in this moment. He is on the verge of taking the “sweet” thing, his future in soccer, but he feels as though he is trapped in the “stickiness” of the village, his parents, and his current life.

“There are things that you cannot learn here, in this secret little field of ours. You have to go out into the world, and play your game under lights even brighter than those you played under tonight, and against noise that will make what you heard tonight seem like a whisper. You will be afraid, of course. Only very stupid people never feel fear.”

The last time that Gato trains with the Keeper, he emphasizes the importance of Gato leaving to pursue his soccer career, conveying the theme of Self-Sacrifice in Following Dreams. While it would be easier to stay in the field and continue to train with the Keeper, at some point Gato needs to leave to pursue his dreams. The Keeper’s acknowledgment that he “will be afraid” validates Gato’s feelings while reaffirming that it is normal to take risks to pursue his dreams.

“A fake wilderness with asphalt paths and picnic tables and litter. It made me squirm like a worm on a hook.”

When Gato sees the wilderness that separates New City from Old City in San Juan, he compares his feelings to how a worm must feel on a hook being used as bait. This simile conveys two ideas. First, it shows how life in the city makes Gato feel: like he is trapped on a “hook” by his desire to pursue his dreams. Second, it reaffirms Gato’s newfound appreciation for The Importance of Nature. The idea that this swath of land is considered wilderness by the city is shocking to him. It is small, contained, and trapped by the city—the very things that nature should not be.

“Faustino was not what you might call a sentimental man, but he was baffled by the calmness with which El Gato had related the story of his father’s dead. Just as, earlier, he had been baffled by the detached way he had described those…what? Experiences? Hallucinations?”

Faustino’s reaction to Gato’s story emphasizes the type of person that Gato has become during his time on the field, conveying The Power of Sports. Gato has learned to remain calm, control his emotions, and project the image of himself that he wants to others—skills that he uses both while in goal and when interacting with others off the field, like in the interview with Faustino.

“What I did was put another idea into his head, another possibility. Right up to that last split second his only thought was to blast the ball into the goal. Exactly where didn’t matter that much. But then I put a second option into his head, too late for him to sort one from the other. I messed his mind a bit.”

As Gato details the moment that he made the most important save in the World Cup, he articulates what he does in the goal that is so impressive compared to other goalkeepers. His thoughts convey both themes of The Importance of Nature and The Power of Sports. The Keeper’s training has given him a vital real-world skill: To read and manipulate others.

“There was a white spot twelve yards from the goalmouth on which everything depended—his life and the lives and deaths of others.”

Gato’s thoughts as he approaches the penalty line to make the final kick in the World Cup would be hyperbole in a realistic story: A World Cup win would be important, but does not literally have lives depending on it. However, given the magical realism in the novel, these thoughts are actually realistic. In this way, Peet uses magical realism to emphasize The Power of Sports. While sports may not literally save lives outside of his story, they are still extremely important to people, as conveyed throughout the novel.