The Dreamer

The toy sheep symbolizes Neftalí’s inner self. When Neftalí feels alone and unloved, like when he’s bullied at school or unable to improve his math grades to please his father, he gives affection to the sheep. He includes the sheep in the things he loves doing, like reading about distant worlds and daydreaming. Through these actions, Neftalí is nurturing his inner self. His father disapproves of traits that Neftalí feels are part of who he is. The bullies at school taunt him because he’s different, because he’s skinny, because he’s more interested in poetry than sports. These are the aspects of himself he must choose to either nourish or banish. He gives the sheep all the love and acceptance he is deprived of from his father and community. In essence, he is giving that love and acceptance to himself.

Glowing embers appear more than once in the story. They symbolize resilience. A glowing ember first appears after Uncle Orlando’s newspaper office is burned down by the developers as a warning to stop advocating for the rights of the Mapuche people. When Neftalí looks around at the ashes of the burned office and says, “There is nothing left, except one empty drawer. They have won…” (308), his uncle kicks over a mound of ash to reveal a glowing ember pulsing like a heart. He tells Neftalí, “Lust like Mount Llaima, there is always something burning beneath the surface. Sometimes it takes years to erupt. But, eventually, it will. Nephew, they may have silenced La Mañana, but they will never silence my pen’” (308). Instead of being defeated by the actions of the powerful developers, he vows to keep speaking out against injustice.

Later, Neftalí’s father burns his notebooks. In the midst of despair, Neftalí nudges aside a pile of ashes from the heap of burned books. Underneath, a tiny ember blinks. This repetition of the image from the newspaper office fire carries the symbol of resilience forward. It proclaims Neftalí’s resilience and his will to continue fighting injustice, including the injustice of his father’s emotional abuse.

Neftalí’s notebooks symbolize his identity. He fills them with his thoughts and feelings, his hopes and dreams, his disappointments and frustrations, and his worries and his secrets. When his father burns them in the street, the author describes the scene metaphorically:

Neftalí’s innermost feelings turn[ed] to yellow and orange and blue. His thoughts and cares and affections grew singed and curled. The remnants of his soul floated into the sky like gray snowflakes. His despair and fury about injustice flamed upward and disappeared (327).

An illustration of a notebook on fire with an image of Neftalí on its pages bolsters this symbolism: Burning the notebooks is Father’s final attempt to change Neftalí’s identity. It ends with a symbolic allusion to Neftalí’s resilience—the image of the glowing ember. This suggests a final resolution to the conflict between Neftalí and his father and proclaims Neftalí the victor. His identity is not destroyed in the fire as his father hoped. It lives on in the ember, and Neftalí will continue to define himself and his destiny.

A recurrent motif in The Dreamer is that objects are imbued with qualities and stories from those who owned or touched them. According to the author, Neruda called this “the permanent mark of humanity on the inside and the outside of all objects” (356). These qualities can be transferred to others who come into contact with the object, creating connections between living things through the world around them.

Neftalí describes this idea to Laurita regarding an old boot they see in the road. If it was owned by a stonemason, he tells her, he might receive the stonemason’s strength through the boot. If a baker owned the boot, running his hands over the leather might transfer to Neftalí the ability to make bread. His father passes down a hat to Neftalí, who imagines absorbing his father’s authority through the hat’s brim. When Neftalí feels something “deep and fierce” growing inside him at Puerto Saavedra, he wonders if swimming in the ocean has given him some of the sea’s energy.

This recurring idea illustrates how Neftalí is inspired by the world around him—by its objects, its people, and its creatures. He recognizes, too, how identity does not exist in a vacuum. If traits like strength and authority can be transferred through objects, then one’s identity can be influenced by one’s surroundings. This motif contributes to the book’s thematic exploration of Inspiration, Influence, and Identity.