Melissa Gilkey
May 6, 2003
English 303, TTH 6-7:50
Dr. Ramirez

W. H. Hudson’s Green Mansions (pages 117-176)
I.  Overview
 In chapters 13-19 in Green Mansions, Abel desires more closeness with Rima and fears that he will lose her on her quest for Riolama.  To give each other space, Abel returns to Parahuari.  He knows that it is a risk and, even though they welcome him, the Indians treat him like a stranger.  Abel becomes a prisoner to this land but manages to escape and return to Rima.  Their journey to Riolama results in discomfort due to heat and rain, but Rima’s constant distance is worse for Abel.  Nuflo decides to tell Abel Rima’s story.  Seventeen years back Nuflo and his gang had encountered a beautiful woman.  Nuflo swore she was a saint but the others had their doubts.  After that night Nuflo was looked upon as weak and is forced to leave the gang.  When he returns to the cave he finds her with a broken ankle.  She recovers, but he finds her to be pregnant.  They travel to a Christian settlement and Riolama, or Rima, is born.  Rima and her mother share a special bond and a bird-like voice.  After her mother grows weak and dies, Rima and Nuflo head for the forest by Ytaioa.  When they reach Riolama, Rima is disappointed and wants to climb the mountain in search for her people.  Abel tells her that her mother was found alone but Rima refuses to believe they are all gone.  In the end, she collapses of a broken heart and Abel and Nuflo fear that she is dying.  As Abel kisses Rima she opens her eyes.  They realize that this is their perfect love.  She returns to her forest to wait for him but when Abel and Nuflo return they find their house burnt down and no sign of Rima.  Abel goes in search for her, encounters a group of Indians hunting, and decides it best to return to Ytaioa.  Runi tells him that after the Indians had learned that the three of them had left, they found it safe to hunt in the forest.  When Rima returns they know they must kill her and when she climbs a tree they burn it and her down.  Abel, angry and broken-hearted, escapes the village that night.  When he hears Kua-ko following him he waits and stabs him with his knife.

II.  Analysis
 In these chapters, love is the central theme.  Rima and Abel fight hardship in order to be with each other.  Abel confronts Rima’s superstitions and her unwillingness to be close with him; Rima struggles with her need to answer the questions of her past and find a way to communicate with Abel.  He knows that he loves her, but “her very ignorance of the meaning of the feeling she experienced, which caused her to fly from me as from an enemy, only served to make the thought of it more purely delightful.” (Hudson 117)  Rima feels different from Abel because of their language barrier.  When she talks to her mother, she uses their language; but when she speaks to Abel, she believes it is not really words.  She desires him to understand the way she feels by what she is saying, the very thing he is unable to understand.  This is overcome when Rima awakes in Abel’s arms and kisses, realizing that she will never be lonely: “At last, the shadow that had rested between us had vanished, that we were united in perfect love and confidence, that the speech was superfluous.” (Hudson 152)  Abel finally finds intimacy between them and all the emotions and differences they share finally come together: “For this is love, Rima, the flower and the melody of life, the sweetest thing, the sweetest miracle that makes our souls one.” (Hudson 153)  Yet, with this newly found love comes the great disaster.  The Indians have never known Rima and have superstitions of her abilities.  With Abel’s interaction with her they are forced to be suspicious of him as well.  This puts him at a risk and he must give a falsehood of their relationship to protect him and find information on Rima’s whereabouts.  When Runi is telling Abel the story of Rima’s death the reader feels compassion and sorrow for both characters.  From Rima “came a great cry like the cry of a bird, ‘Abel! Abel!’” (Hudson 174)  We feel sorrow for Rima and her unnecessary death and last cry for love, and Abel, for not being there when she called out to him for the last time and never saying goodbye.

III.  Questions
1. Why is it important for Abel to reveal the truth to Rima about her people?

2. What is the significance of loss?