Through the Arc of the Rain Forest

“I have heard Brazilian children say that whatever passes through the arc of a rainbow becomes its opposite. But what is the opposite of a bird? Or for that matter, a human being? And what then, in the great rain forest, where, in its season, the rain never ceases and the rainbows are myriad?” 

Yamashita uses her epigraph to propose questions to the reader before the story begins. By asking what the opposite of a bird might be, birds are imbued with significance and go on to become the most significant animal in the novel. The opposite of a living bird could be a dead bird, same with humans, and ties into the novel’s conclusion where many birds go extinct and many humans die from typhus, DDT, and plastic poisoning. Additionally, by describing the rain forest as a place with endless rainbows, the setting becomes a place that is ever shifting, turning things over, mutating them. Telling, considering all the strange events that occur throughout the course of the novel. 

“J.B. had never been to a foreign country and was initially alarmed at what he felt to be a sudden listlessness in his third arm. Upon examining himself in the hotel mirror, he actually thought his third arm might be atrophying in this hot tropical weather. And it exasperated him that things did not seem to work in this country. There was no organization. And they didn’t use plastic clips; the metal ones absorbed the humidity and rusted onto his papers. How could a third arm survive in such a place anyway? By the time he had located Mane Pena and exposed himself to the natives and the French ornithologist in an untypical show of ineptitude, J.B. was beginning to have serious doubts about his effectiveness in the Third World.” 

This passage succinctly captures J.B.’s interior skepticism upon his arrival in Brazil. His character traits, desires, and fears, all combine to make his motivations clear for the reader. Yamashita additionally utilizes both J.B.’s normal character qualities, such as his obsession with efficiency, along with his heightened characteristics, like his third arm. J.B. therefore has realistic and relatable reasons for disliking Brazil while additionally adding to the magical realism elements of the story.