MAN AND WOMAN: HOW THEY SHOULD RELATE TO EACH OTHER

     We have just read "The Horse-breaker", a short story written by Javier de Viena. It is a narration about a man who breaks horses so they can be managed and do their owners' bidding. A young girl named Blasa provides the anti-thesis to the hero. A simple story with a simple plot, it is effectively presented with a minimum of details.
     Here is the plot summary: Sabiniano arrives at a ranch in the wild country somewhere in South America. He has been hired to break some wild horses, one of which is owned by the ranch owner's daughter. After a short exposition, other characters are introduced including the situation, action begins. Sabiniano starts his job as a horse-breaker. A conflict develops between him and the haughty Blasa but is not resolved. 
    When his job is finished, Sabiniano bids goodbye to the ranch owner. But before he leaves, a dance is held but he does not join the merrymaking. Blasa seeks him out and invites him to dance. He refuses for which reason, Blasa flares up but controls herself. She tells the man he could not leave because, as she says it," Don't you know I love you, you wretch?"
     The humbled Blasa ends up kissing the horse-breaker who stays for good. 
     By portraying Sabiniano as a tough guy in a tough environment, who has a code of honor and who "always do what he sets out to do," Javier de Viena has drawn the image of the ideal man who always wins despite the odds. But the author cautions that to be able to master men (that includes women) and circumstances,"one must know how to master himself."
     In the case of Blasa, Viena also has created the image of what a wife should be: Obedient, submissive, so that as the "mastered" in the union, she would make her husband happy, too.
     Set in the macho country of either Argentina or Brazil, the story makes a statement about how men in another culture treat women.
     In another culture, a woman is abandoned when she loses her value because she can't beget children. The man leaves her for a more fertile woman. This is painfully captured in the fiction written by the Philippine author Amado Daguio in "Wedding Dance" set in the country's highlands and tribal culture.