Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Motorcycle Diaries, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Class Consciousness
Suppression and Reclamation of Indigenous Culture
Medicine, Politics, and Helping Others
Growing Up
Individuality vs. Ideology
Summary
Analysis
Ernesto and Alberto stop for a few days in the town of Andahuaylas, where Ernesto recovers from his earlier asthma attack at the hospital and they wait for a truck traveling toward Lima. They find a ride just in time, because Alberto gets in a fight with some Civil Guard officers harassing an Indian woman, and after that the local police are unwilling to help them.
Ernesto and Alberto have become mature and politically astute enough to perceive oppression even when it’s affecting people unconnected to them. Repeated incidents of injustice over the past few days cause the men to align themselves so strongly with the proletariat that they alienate members of their own class, like the police who usually help them.
Themes
After a rainy and miserable journey in a truck transporting bulls to Lima, they arrive in Ayacucho, a town famous as the sight of an important battle fought by Simón Bolívar. They spend the night with a local who is interested in foreigners and continue onwards towards Lima.
Simón Bolivar was a famous revolutionary who helped many South American countries extricate themselves from Spanish rule. The fact that Ernesto envisions himself traveling in Bolivar’s path shows his growing tendency to think about social reform in dramatic, revolutionary terms.
Themes
