Close Reading of Chapter 1 Pedro Paramo

The death grip of Juan's mother is symbolic of the hold that she had on what she wanted him to do after she died. She was so fixated on the idea of taking back what belonged to them by Pedro Paramo that she indoctrinated this idea onto her son on her death bed and made him promise to do this after she died. Juan said that he would've promised her anything since she was dying but that he never planned to actually do it. When she died, he was freed from her hold and fixation on Pedro Paramo which is visually conveyed when he says "I pulled my hands free of her death grip" (pg. 3) However, he was not because he later says "But before I knew it my head began to swim with dreams and my imagination took flight. Little by little I began to build a world around a hope centered on the man called Pedro Paramo...That was why I had come to Comala." (pg. 3)