Faith, Love, Time, and Dr. Lazaro

Faith, Love, Time and Dr. Lazaro Author: Gregorio C. Brillantes - Filipino award-winning writer from Tarlac - Palanca Award Hall of Famer - among the Philippines’ most popular English writers - early works were about Catholicism - most works are about alienation from family, society, and self Plot Summary: - Dr. Lazaro receives a an emergency call from a distant location about a baby with tetanus - He at first doesn’t want to go, saying it’s too far and that the baby’s situation is hopeless - His wife convinces him to bring his son along on the trip, with the son (Ben) driving - On the long drive, father tries to make small talk, but ends up talking about Ben’s future

- They arrive at the caller’s house, and Dr. Lazaro fails to save the baby - Dr. Lazaro doesn’t think much about the incident, but Ben baptizes the baby before they leave - Upon arriving home, Dr. Lazaro contemplates on the night’s events before going to sleep Thesis statement: The setting, point of view, and symbolism in the story lead to the theme of Dr. Lazaro’s alienation because of his lack of faith, love, and time. OUTLINE: Thesis Statement: I. Setting II. Character/POV III.Symbol, Irony, and Theme I. Setting: ● Throughout the story, the setting has light around him to guide the little light in him. The street

lamps, there’s only one, the flashlight, he relies on that. His life is not completely shrouded in darkness. There are flashes of light that still guide him. He acknowledges that there exists the idea of faith and love guiding people, but because of his profession and his beliefs, he can’t accept it for himself. - “He hurried down the curving stairs, under the votive lamps of the Sacred Heart.” - “The stations appeared as they coasted down the incline of a low hill, its fluorescent lights the only brightness on the plain before them, on the road that led farther into deeper darkness.” - “gazed at the wide darkness around them, the shapes of trees and bushes hurling toward them and sliding away and he saw the stars” (light and dark imagery, showing the stars as “guiding lights” in contrast to the darkness of night)

- “A late moon had risen, edging over the tops of the trees, and in the faint wash of its light” (moon= it is during night time when it is dark but it provides light) ● Quiet province ■ Lazaro is a provincial doctor ■ Empty plaza during a festive season ○ “Quietness” fits the atmosphere and Dr. Lazaro’s detachment ○ Dr. Lazaro’s “silent” epiphany ● Religious community ○ Wife sews vestments for the church, goes to mass with Ben in the mornings ■ “Religion and their grandchild certainly kept her busy” ■ “the plaster saints she[Mrs. Lazaro] kept in the room, in their cases of glass” ○ Ben baptizes the baby before it passes away ○ Old woman comforts baby’s mother by saying, “it is the will of God…”

II. POV and Character - Third person limited (Dr. Lazaro) - Sees everything in darkness > “slid the door open on the vault of darkness” > “gazed at the wide darkness around them, the shapes of trees and bushes hurling toward them and sliding away and he saw the stars” (light and dark imagery) > “its fluorescent lights the only brightness on the plain before them, on the road that led farther into deeper darkness” - Detached, indifferent - beginning paragraph about being in a state of an indifferent half-sleep: “Dr. Lazaro remembered nothing, his mind lay untouched by any conscious thought, he was scarcely aware of the April heat; the pattern of music fell around him and dissolved swiftly, uncomprehended”

- “There had been the man, today, in the hospital: the cancer pain no longer helped by the doses of morphine; the patient’s eyes flickering their despair in the eroded face. Dr. Lazaro brushed aside the stray vision as he strode out of the whitewashed room; he was back in his element, among syringes, steel instruments, quick decisions made without emotion, and it gave him a kind of blunt energy.” (The nature of his job as a doctor has desensitized him) - “And in that moment, only the child existed before him; only the child and his own mind probing now like a hard gleaming instrument.” (The child as an object of an instrument to be merely examined) - Pessimistic - “He had no choice left now but action: it was the only certitude – he sometimes reminded himself – even if it would prove futile, before, the descent into nothingness.”

- He knows it’s a hopeless cause - “felt he was being dragged, helplessly, toward some huge and complicated error, a meaningless ceremony” (p.5) - Faith and love (what others use) cannot save the baby, only cold rationality can - He used to believe in God but not anymore - “One can only cure, and know nothing beyond one’s work…” - While everyone else felt miserable about the child’s death, he was unaffected knowing that there was nothing more that he could do. - “He thought with a flick of anger: Soon the child will be out of it, you ought to be grateful.” III. Symbols, Irony, and Theme Darkness: - Associations with darkness/loss of light:

- Distance: “...as though darkness had added to the distance between the house in the town and the gas station beyond the summer fields.” - Despair: “the patient’s eyes flickering their despair in the eroded face.” - Finality, futility: “Dr. Lazaro gazed at the wide darkness around them, the shapes of trees and bushes hurling toward them and sliding away and he saw the stars, hard glinting points of light yards, black space, infinite distances; in the unmeasured universe, man’s life flared briefly and was gone, traceless in the void.” - Familiarity with darkness: - Home: “As he slid the door open on the vault of darkness, the familiar depth of the house.” - “The engine sputtered briefly and stopped. “Battery’s weak,” Dr. Lazaro said. “Try it without the lights.””

- When he tries to save the infant, there is darker imagery (“Dr. Lazaro had a moment’s tremor of fear as the boar slide out over the black water; below prowled the deadly currents; to drown her in the depths of the night…”) - He has to remain apathetic and remove himself from faith and love in order to save the patient (otherwise it will be painful like his son’s suicide) - Darkness: void of light and all that the light stands for Light: - First paragraph: “In the scattered light from the sala...” - The light for him is not clear or not full - Associations with light: - Family: “Mrs. Lazaro had resumed the knitting; in the circle of yellow light…”; “In the glow of the dashboard lights, the boy’s face relaxed, smiled.”

- Hope: “...his mind said as it considered the spark that persisted within the rigid and tortured body” - Faith and Joy: “Dr. Lazaro found himself wondering about the world of novenas and candles, where bread and wine became the flesh and blood of the Lord, and a woman bathed in light appeared before children… as though he had been deprived of a certain joy...” - While Dr. Lazaro is familiar with darkness, other characters are familiar with light - Light: faith, family, hope, joy - Light amidst darkness but is overpowered by darkness - “spark” in the infant’s body persists but disappears - “But the glimmer was lost instantly, buried in the mist of indifference and sleep rising now in his brain.”

Name Symbolism - Lazaro: from Lazarus - Bible figure raised from the dead--raised out of darkness - Ironic: Lazaro seems to remain in the darkness Irony - Aside from the irony of his name, irony lies in his job - He’s a doctor: supposed to be the hope and light of others but feels immersed in darkness himself Theme “As he slid the door open on the vault of darkness, the familiar depth of the house, it came to Dr. Lazaro faintly in the late night that for certain things, like love there was only so much time.” - Darkness is still familiar to him - Realization: time is fleeting - but he has not resolved to do anything to make his time precious

- Comparison of time to love: love is also fleeting - Things like love and making time are things that he cannot bring himself to prioritize, which is what alienates him from everyone else - Alienated because of his lack of faith, love, and time - Which is why he remains detached and in the darkness “But the glimmer was lost instantly, buried in the mist of indifference and sleep rising now in his brain.” - The brief moment and conversation he enjoyed with his son is a rare one of bonding (“He felt closer to the boy than he had ever been in years.”) - But with the glimmer lost, he remains alienated from the world Points of Alienation - Faith - Love

- Time FAITH - Explicitly stated: Lazaro no longer has faith in God (“He used to believe in it, too.” -- Since he studied abroad) - Only wife and son still go to Mass - Questions church’s belief on divine consequences (unbaptized babies not going to heaven) - Lost his faith because of all the suffering he’s witnessed because of his profession (“senseless accidents of pain”) - “The sparrow does not fall without the Father’s leave he mused at the sky, but it falls just the same. But to what end are the sufferings of a child?” after baby’s death - also his own suffering in his own son’s death LOVE - Alienated from his family - his job takes up his time from his family

- “Dr. Lazaro would ramble about miracle drugs, politics, music, the common sense of his unbelief; unrelated things strung together in a monologue; he posed questions, supplied with his own answers” - “[wife’s] silences had ceased to disturb him” - when Ben went off to college, they became more distant - “few brief, almost formal letters to each other” - Lacks compassion in his work - “...duty had taken the place of an exhausted compassion…” - brushing aside a cancer-suffering patient at the hospital - “casual scribbled items in a clinical report” - he doesn’t really care about the patients’ well-being; he’s just doing his job TIME - “...everyone had a claim on his time. He thought: Why not the younger ones for a change? He had

spent a long day at the provincial hospital.” His job as a doctor kept him busy and his time is in demand - “Time was moving toward them, was swirling around and rushing away and it seemed Dr. Lazaro could almost hear its hallow [sic] receding roar; and discovering his son’s profile against the flowing darkness, he had a thirst to speak.” - Time with his family was slipping. - “...for certain things, like love there was only so much time.” - He was too late to save the baby because he lacked time. - His time as “precious” - However, he also only goes through the motions of day to day life