Places Left Unfinished at the Time of Creation

by John Phillip Santos

Finalist for the National Book Award! In this beautifully wrought memoir, award-winning writer John Philip Santos weaves together dream fragments, family remembrances, and Chicano mythology, reaching back into time and place to blend the story of one Mexican family with the soul of an entire people. The story unfolds through a pageant of unforgettable family figures: from Madrina--touched with epilepsy and prophecy ever since, as a girl, she saw a dying soul leave its body--to Teofilo, who was kidnapped as an infant and raised by the Kikapu Indians of Northern Mexico. At the heart of the book is Santos' search for the meaning of his grandfather's suicide in San Antonio, Texas, in 1939. Part treasury of the elders, part elegy, part personal odyssey, this is an immigration tale and a haunting family story that offers a rich, magical view of Mexican-American culture.

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir, History, Biography, Cultural, Family, American

284 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1999

Reviews

[Lorna · Rating 5 out of 5]

"As a raza, a nation, we are a 'Diaspora within a Diaspora.'"

"The land of their birth, the 'nacimiento,' seemed to become a memory of a dream of lost world."

Esto, tambien, pasar."

Places Left Unfinished at the Time of Creation was a passionate and lrically moving memoir by John Phillip Santos. It is through the eys of Santos that we explore the rich tapestry woven from the threads of his Mexican ancestry for generations woven from family remembrances, dream fragments and Chicano mythology giving us not only the history of a family but that of a nation.

This is an immigration tale of generations of the Garcia and Santos families and the history of Spain, Colombia, Mexico and San Antonio, Texas. And this is the rich history, not only of the author's family, but the history of the Mexican people. This is the tale how the soul of one Mexican family was passed down and scattered across borders and rivers and decades. This poetic and lyrical memoir is told through the stories of his elders, part elegy and part personal odyssey.

The striking bookcover is a beautiful professional photograph taken in 1920 in San Antonio at the home of the grandparents of Santos he describes as follows:

"My grandparents stand side by side, their expressions solemn, each of them gripping the handle of a baby carriage where Aunt Connie sits wide-eyed. To one side, Uncle Raul sits aside his tricycle, wearing a white blouse with a harlequin collar and shorts, staring suspiciously at the photographer. My father, two years old, stands to the other side, in white smock and shorts, gripping his sister's hand in the carriage, and looking afraid. They are all in the shade of an arbor of giant hanging grape leaves. But in the background, visible only in the shade of the vines, are the great white columns that ran along the house's large wraparound porch."

[Debbie Zapata · Rating 4 out of 5]

Number 20 of 50 on my Encore List, this is another keeper.

John Phillip Santos tries to understand his family's history, and in working out that puzzle he also ponders the history of Mexico, at least the aspects of it directly related to his own family.

His mother's people lived in Texas when it was still part of Mexico, but suddenly woke up one day as Americans, so he says Mexico abandoned them. But his father's people abandoned Mexico during the Revolution, when life in their native northern state of Coahuila became too dangerous to suffer through any longer.

Although one patriarch swore he would fight for his country if it was attacked from without, he refused to fight for it from within. What a sad statement. I can understand the frustration with circumstances, it was horrible during those years and many more afterwards, but to turn your back on your homeland, what a traumatic decision that would have been. And of course, it still is for many people today, even though there is often simply no other choice. But wouldn't a person who makes such a decision feel guilty about it?

The biggest challenge for Santos, the power behind the book, is that he wants to learn why his grandfather killed himself in 1939. But the family does not want to talk about it, especially not his own father, who found the body. It is not until the final chapter that father and son are actually able to discuss Grandfather. Is it too late by then?

It is a journey of discovery for Santos and he shares it with us, but I wonder if he will ever completely understand the power and magic of Mexico? He almost seems to get it every so often, but he shies away, leaving connections undone that I expected him to make. I lived in the country for eight years and even with the help of my Mexican husband, a great grandson of Emiliano Zapata himself, I am barely scratching the surface of this complex part of the world, so I shouldn't be too hard on Santos.

I just know that Mexico will fill that unfinished place in a person's heart and become a home for your soul, no matter if you stay in country or end up living thousands of miles away. All you have to do is respect the country and its people, and allow her magic in. And maybe not think quite so much about it all. Just be.

[Rem · Rating 5 out of 5]

"It pains me when the incredible histories of our people are trivialized as magic realism; surviving is no magic act. In a time of global migrations and forgetting, these stories remember beyond the Alamo, beyond 1776,1492, and 1519. I would recommend that the governors of Texas, California, and Arizona, the presidents of Mexico and the United States, and the director of the Immigration and Naturalization Service read this book. This is the map of one family, and perhaps of all families who live on several borders. Here, then, are our documents, our papers. This story is our green card."
~Sandra Cisneros (quote from 'The Places Left Unfinished at the Time of Creation'). I agree with her!!

Where do I start??
A hauntingly gripping memoir, poetic, a story of a Mexican-American family struggling to find hope and make a life in America. A story that many people, whether Latino/Chicano, American, African or Asian can relate to.
His story, family culture, and memories are so strangely similar to that of my mother's Mexican grandparents. Through this memoir, I received the message that this journey they embarked upon certainly was taken by many more families before them, and is helping me to understand exactly what, who and where I came from. I can relate to the author's gnawing question and curiosity about the death of his grandfather.
Really I envy that he was able to have been born to an earlier generation, more closely connected to his family and roots than I was when I was growing up.
This is a must read for anyone studying the 'history of the United States'.

[Keleigh · Rating 4 out of 5]

At some points, Santos’ memoir read like “a strange sanctuary devoted to the memory of an accidental death” (171). At others, I got the feeling of accompanying someone on an exhaustive quest, driven “by the Creator to walk twenty-four miles a day” (48). My favorite moments, however, were those in which I could simply bear witness, standing back in awe as Santos circled his family tree like a great Voladore spinning masterful revolutions that brought him closer and closer to the source.

I can’t say I paid astute attention to details like names and dates, or even succeeded in following all of his historical reclamations. What kept me going, enthralled in fact, was Santos’ uncanny blend of pragmatic mysticism. His storytelling was richer, in some places, than I could possibly digest. A constant sensory insistence, which at times overloaded me. However, I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. I found that even if I chose to skim a page of, say, extensive historical description, I seemed to absorb the information on an almost subconscious level, more through his rhythmic lyricism than through the words themselves. I did not feel bonded with any one character, largely because each family member was presented in such a way that invited a sort of inevitable imprinting on the larger whole, rather than favoritism. Somebody already mentioned the word tapestry; indeed, Santos cuts a wide swath across his filial history, weaving stories together as threads of inextricable fate. I loved each character through the eyes of Santos, our faithful and diligent witness, trusting that each person plays a unique and indispensable part in this intricate pattern. The only people I felt a special greed for, a constant longing for illumination, and consequently a thrill of excitement when even bits of them were revealed, were Abuelo Juan Jose and Santos himself. Both were distinctly enigmatic characters, mirroring each other in a timeless reflection pool of sublimity and sorrow. Santos carries an inexplicable fear of drowning, a psychic inheritance passed down from Juan Jose’s mysterious demise. He also shares his grandfather’s cosmic melancholy, while still demonstrating a buoyant endurability that proves deeply reassuring for me as the reader.

Santos’ treatment of macrocosm and microcosm in the book is also transcendently impressive to me. He says that “There are mysteries held within a family and there are mysteries held within the deeper soul of a nation” (141). Without explicitly saying so, Santos illustrates how the story of Mexico is an externalized allegory of his own family–and of every “downtrodden” people who have ever made an exodus from a torn or decaying homeland to a new world. He alternates seamlessly between personal narrative, history, mythology, and a sort of collective dream state, infusing his tale with a spiritual undertone that nevertheless retains a sense of objectivity. He is clearly implicated in his own stories, but remains always standing outside of them, the one dancing at the top of the pole, letting the spirit of ancestors guide him, easy as the wind.

The inclusion of dreams was, I felt, a very effective (and enjoyable) way to bridge the worlds of material and immaterial, tangible and spiritual. As he lets me in to his dream world, a vulnerable and visionary space, I feel closer to him than in any explanations or retellings of family history.

In the end, Santos has shown us how “The dead are always with us, but the dead can be lost, too” (45). Yet I come away from this book feeling that nothing–nobody–is ever truly lost. The ghosts of our predecessors sneak into our lives via our dreams, or they sit at our kitchen tables, or they speak through us in words we didn’t know we knew. Their stories traverse continents to wind their way through our blood. And their ultimate gift to us is freedom from any obligations but those we hold with ourselves–to see clearly, to penetrate the fog, and somehow communicate what we see. To Santos, then, I would say, “Not in vain.”

[Susan Emmet · Rating 5 out of 5]

Like the Azteca voladares spinning upside down on hemp ropes from a tall pole, accompanied by a chanter/singer/dancer up top, Santos weaves an amazing series of stories together - of himself, his family, and ancient peoples who spread throughout Mexico, plumbing the depths of the earth and sky.

I loved his book. I am not of his heritage, but his work as a documentary film maker for PBS and CBS rings bells. I think this remembering of his journeys to understand so much is film-like.

Sometimes there's a dead end that is newly captured and revealed in dreams. Sometimes it's a journey on foot or by car or bus to see what ancestors saw. Sometimes it's working in Europe or Africa and seeing the commonalities between and among people of far-flung territories.

In the end, it's okay to let the past go. "This book was part of my own compromiso with the ancestors and the telling of the story is its own song. I came to see that my father's way of dealing with the story, his singing and his silence, as a powerful testimony celebrating the mysteries that our tradition preserves. My early quest for certainties paled in comparison. In the end, I came to recognize how little differentiates forgetting from remembering; like photonegatives of one another, whether as figures or traces, the shapes remain the same. Our appointment with the past in inevitable."

[Marilyn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although I have no blood connection to the Mexicanos of Texas I was quickly drawn into this tale of conquest, betrayal and abandonment. It is a memoir, but it is also a poem and a song and a history. John Philip Santos brings to life the culture of his people in Mexico and in San Antonio with poignancy and longing...for the present as well as the past.
This was one of those book that I chose to read slowly and savor (no,I didn't really read it in one day!) In this country of immigrants, this country of forgetting our roots, this country of constant movement, it struck a soul chord with me in spite of a completely different cultural background.
Note: I particularly recommend this to Betsy who lives in San Antonio.

[Carlos Cumpian · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you really want to understand the Tejano experience this is an essential book in the puzzle. Poetic excellent writing. I'll return to add much more soon I hope.

[Lizzie McFarland · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book however it is circuitous and rambles bit. The prose is beautiful and the imagery amazing. It reminds me of Isabel Allende's work.

[Elena Sofia · Rating 2 out of 5]

I do not remember the majority of this book. Maybe that's the point.
GREAT ending, sad for him tho

[Alan Braswell · Rating 4 out of 5]

"The things we remember are the things we forget."
The quote from G. K. Chesterton's autobiography is in way apporiate to the memoir of John Philip Santos. For it seems that the quote lives in all of us.
Places Left Unfinished At The Time of Creation is in a sense of looking back at things, events, lifestyles of what has been forgotten and laid to waste covered over like the Aztec theater with its mosaics filling the walls of the theater. The muddy San Antonio river now reduced to a tourists attraction with a canopy of mariachi band singing songs of history that has been pushed aside as were the settlers in San Antonio de Bejar.
John Philip Santos tells of a life of a way of people who believed in religion, mystics, and story telling.
"What is life? A frenzy.
"What is life? An illusion.
a shadow, a fiction, and the greatest good is small:
that life is a dream, and dreams are dreams.

We are not interested in the past. Nor of things that are forgotten. For if we were interested in things that are forgotten we would see ourselves.

"Todo se achaba. Todo se extermina."

[Migg · Rating 3 out of 5]

The title of the book is a bit misleading. What moved me to read this book was that the author's (some) ancestors migrated to the US from Coahuila, Mexico and the seal towns and villages named in it are known to me and my parents and grandparents. I'd like to think that Mr. Santos parents and great-grand parents in all probability crossed paths at some point and maybe even more than once. These narrative hooked me from the beggining and at first I thought that those small towns, ejidos and rancherías would be described as beautiful but ¨unfinished at the time of Creation¨ but no such thing. When the author writes about the prehispanic culture, aztec. toltecs, olmecs jumping back and forth from having a conversation with Tía Pepa and Hernán Cortés I get lost. If I wanted to learn about history of the first conquistadors of the american continent I would pick a good history book. All things considered I still enjoyed (albeit partially) the book.

[Jeffrey L · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another book that has been in my personal library since I don't know when. Having visited San Antonio many times in the past ten years, Santos's memoir was fun to read. The "unfinished" character of the memoir (I won't give away that trope!) was well done, and should be viewed as an encouragement to anyone attempting to write in the genre. Santos has found an imaginative way to complete his memoir without discovering the answer to one of the central questions driving his story. In a provocative quote from a conversation about his book, Santos says, "In the end, I came to recognize how little differentiates forgetting from remembering; like photonegatives of one another, whether as figures or traces, the shapes remain the same. . . .
Recommended, especially for his take on "American" history that most white folks know nothing about.

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although sometimes a little elusive and detailed, I felt honored to be reading a memoir in which the author so gallantly strives to understand his families stories to piece together his own identity and wanderings. In reviewing passages that I marked along the way, I am struck by the lyricism of the prose. The ownership of the parts of the current U.S.A. that were once Mexico is woven into his story with personal knowledge and longing. Seared in my memory is the cruel irony of a photo of a Mexican man in peasant garb attending the gardens at the Alamo. The latter-day fort, which we learn of in our elementary history books, had been a Spanish mission on land that was Mexico. It was built to indoctrinate and domesticate Mexican people in a territory which would gradually be reinvented as Texas. This book presents an alternate viewpoint to see ourselves as others see us. It also invites questions about seeking who we each are - by learning about the struggles and decisions of those who have gone before us.

[Kelly · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just finished a re-read of this book; the first read was 11-12 years ago. I enjoyed the book the first time, but my years spent since then as an immigrant attempting to make new roots in a new place gave me a new lens through which to view the families and their choices. I am also a San Antonio native, so I also felt that knowing heart swell that one can only feel when reading about their home.

Santos' writing is beautiful. The book is full of poetry and legends and oral histories, woven together masterfully. Perhaps I'll re-read the book in another decade and get something new and unexpected from it.

[Enrique Perez · Rating 5 out of 5]

A quarter of a century has gone by … time for a re-read of this tale of Garcia-Santos family in San Antonio, Tx., the city that took my heart and soul and innocence since I was transplanted here at the age of 18.

[Randall · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked the book, even though I occasionally had to consult my dictionary. A beautiful memoir of a family and a culture.

[Jeanne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Absolutely poetic at times and such beautifully written descriptions of specific times and place.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Poetically written family memoir of the border between Mexico and the U.S.

[Rhea · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such a fantastic symphony of memoir, ancestral exploration and magical realism. A triumphant example of the complexities in the post-Conquest Meso-American diaspora. Bravo.

[Julia Langeway · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mesmerizing language

[David Hesson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gorgeous writing. A beautiful memoir not just of a family but of an entire cultural heritage.

[Jackie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved the family history and reading about San Antonio.

[Susan Ferguson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting reading. I quite like the writing style.
One thing I found interesting - when he was speaking of his family's immigration to the U.S. from the wars in Mexico, he mentions that they joined a group of Mexican Chinese from Monclova where they had helped build the railroads. He also mentions Lebanese Mexicans from Saltillo and Jewish Mexicans from Queretaro. I have never thought of the peoples who immigrated to Mexico other than the Spaniards and such. A new vision of Mexico (for me).
There are several themes interwoven throughout the book. The first is the suicide (maybe) of his grandfather, his father's father. There was confusion at the time whether it was suicide, an accident or murder. The family does not speak of the death or much of his grandfather, because of the shame of his death. He's rather a mystery. Then there's the theme of the family's Mexican heritage. How does that carry down - the ancient stories of the Azteca and Nahual and others before them. How about the Spanish heritage? Where does that fit in?
The writing style is rather poetic and dreamlike. Very good.
The book took awhile to read because it was a large paperback and inconvenient to carry everywhere without completely tearing it up. And I don't like to tear up books.

[Azra · Rating 4 out of 5]

I had never heard of John Phillip Santos before I picked up this book. It is the story of a family, interwoven within the greater stories and myths of Mexico. In the family, there are ghosts; Rosicrucians, mystics, rancheros, inventors and a mystery from 1939.

One visual that returns over and over in the book is of the Voladores. The Voladores are sacred dancers who climb a 120 foot pole. One dancer stays at the top and drums and blows on an eagle bone whistle while the others attach themselves to the pole with hemp ropes around one ankle and jump off, whirling through the air as they spiral to the ground.

The book is told in a "spiral" way as well. Some stories are revisited, especially the mystery of the author's grandfather in 1939, and each time a little more information comes out. Other stories are told, always circling and spiraling around the land the lands in both Mexico and Texas the family is descended from. The writer wonders what has been lost in the journey to El Norte - stories, ties to far flung family members who didn't come north, sacred obligations to unknown gods of their native land so the cycles of the earth will continue.

This was a great story of a family and how stories can influence a person, even those born many years down the road.

[Jessi · Rating 3 out of 5]

For the poetical language, I would give this history/genealogy/memoir four stars, save for the fact that I only enjoyed it in pieces. This story of a Tejano man's search for his family's story in Texas and Mexico felt piecemeal, which perhaps is his point, but I found it tedious. Yes, the very nature of stories that have been erased or rewritten is perpetual fragmentation, but I did want, in the end, a story. I was also distracted by the constant explanations that were meant for a monolingual English-speaking reader who had never lived in Mexico. As a bilingual once-student of anthropology who lived in Cholula and studied the ruins he visited, I found some of the telling of Mexico too formulaic, almost like a textbook, and not unique to this author's particular experience. Of course, I understand the translations were probably necessary, but they will be repetitive for bilinguals. Nonetheless, there are moments of exquisite beauty and sweetness, and Mexico is there, in certain colors, foods, and turns of phrase.

[carrie · Rating 3 out of 5]

i suspect my rating of this book will improve as i keep reading. the writing can be transcendent, and the author's voice is strong and believable. how does culture shape us? what are the powers of collective memory? what happens when our history is no longer ours to tell? these are just a few of the questions the author tackles.

however -- so far, anyway -- the book is very light on plot, on story line. instead, we get many small character sketches and much philosophy -- all interesting and well-written, but not sustainable for a book that bills itself as a memoir of the author's family.

i think this is a case of a slow beginning. the author's voice, so far, has been enough to keep me turning the pages, and i'm hopeful it will only get better.

[Kristy · Rating 2 out of 5]

The "wind of story" was also "a wind of forgetting," and as Santos probes his heritage, he comes to understand that "it is okay to move on and forget."

-an except from the blurb on this website

Well, crap that's what I did with this book. I really wanted to like this book. It was chosen for the One Book, One San Antonio citywide reading project. It was written by a native San Antone-ian and set in the city. This is the only reason it got a second star. Pity star...

No dice for me. Was not feeling it. The book was detached from the city and the family. It was dull. My grandma's description of old San Antonio is more interesting and it does not involve family drama and traces to our Mexican roots.

Maybe a non-native would enjoy this book. For me it was flat.

[Megan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had trouble getting into this book. Despite finding it interesting, I often found it a little difficult to keep up with because of its seemingly random organization. However, when I wasn't fretting about trying to remember certain things (since I read it for one of my classes and was scared about what might be on the test), I liked learning about Mr. Santos' family and its history. I had never read a book that had such close ties to my hometown, San Antonio, so I enjoyed that as well. Overall, I think that I would have enjoyed the novel more if I hadn't been tested over it, but I probably would never have read if I hadn't been.

[Tiffany · Rating 2 out of 5]

There were some amazing visual moments in this book, but for the most part it was quite hard to follow and somewhat boring to read. Santos has great skill as a writer, as can be seen in some of the high points of the book, but the book itself just did not work for me at all. That said, there are some cultural and family elements in the book that are truly fascinating, and worth reading, no matter what one thinks of the book as a whole. I can see why it has gotten so much praise in some circles. It's just definitely not for me.

[Wendy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought this (yes, bought - very unusual for me) because the cover said it was a National Book Award Finalist. It's a bit weird, bits of family history and imagination and history of Northern Mexico and Texas, and how to connect with the old identity but make a new identity. I liked the book overall, but it is difficult to describe or categorize. I finished it a couple weeks back and it already seems like a dream. The whole book is sort of like a dream actually.