Part Four: UNCLE PIO
1. Just before the description of his discovery of the girl whom he will form into Camila Perichole, the narrator points out two sources of unhappiness/failure in Uncle Pio’s life. Explain them.
2. Uncle Pio and Camila Perichole are said to love one another (83), but what is wrong with this love? How is the weakness in their love for each other similar to the weakness in the love of Esteban and Manuel?
3. In what ways does the relationship between Uncle Pio and Camila Perichole resemble, and in what ways does it differ from, those of the Marquesa and her daughter and of Esteban and Manuel?
4. Explain why Camila Perichole cuts herself off from everyone following the loss of her beauty due to small-pox.
5. Why is Uncle Pio’s death at the time that it happens particularly tragic? Why is the death of Don Jamie in its way also tragic?
Post-reading
In his youth, Uncle Pio shows the same restlessness and the same independence as do Esteban and Manuel, “He never did one thing for more than two weeks at a time even when enormous gains seemed likely to follow upon it” (79).