Eva Luna chapters 3 and 4

One of the main themes that has stuck out to me in this book so far is the contrasts it contains. This is a book of opposites. Not only do we have two different story lines thus far, we also have a host of characters who contrast and oppose each other. There is certainly a class difference going on here, and even brief descriptions of the body give us a clear clue if the character is in the upper class or the working class. This emphasizes a motif I've noticed so far in the book: the distinction between "savagery" and "civility", or the difference between natural desires and the imposed body of social customs. One of the clearest contradictions is between Eva's life working for her patron/patrona and her life on the streets with Huberto Naranjo. When she is on the streets, the body of her environment is described as limitless and freeing, she says that "[t]he street was more appealing than that house where life droned by so tediously" (71). However, this natural desire towards freedom is opposed by the cultural  requirement for her to live and work in a house. Natural desires being opposed by society is apparent in Rolf's story line as well. He and his lovers fall into a happy, natural, three-way relationship. Even though this seems to work out for them, Rolf "struggled with the insoluble conflict between desire -- always spiritedly revived by those two opulent and generous bodies -- and the severity that caused him to view monogamous marriage as the only possible course for a decent man" (99). Rolf and the sisters find a type of relationship which works for them, but are restricted because of the body of societal rules that exist in their culture.