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Part 3
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Line Becomes a River, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Trauma and Emotional Detachment
Natural Migration vs. Human Boundaries
The Value of a Human Life
Nature, Beauty, and Humanity
Institutional Violence
Summary
Analysis
Cantú is in Big Bend National Park one hot evening when he sees a man on a horse riding across the Rio Grande.
The Rio Grande marks the natural boundary between Texas and Mexico. This man’s ease in riding across the river contrasts with the extreme difficulty of crossing the manmade border that Cantú was paid to enforce earlier in the book. In this way, Cantú again reminds his readers that there’s nothing inherently deadly about migration or crossing borders—humans have simply made it that way.
Themes
The man asks Cantú if he’s with border enforcement, and Cantú says no. Cantú asks the man about his village, and the man says it’s very safe: there’s no trouble from drug cartels or border enforcement. He invites Cantú to breakfast the next morning.
The lack of violence compared to Juárez suggests that border enforcement itself breeds violence in border regions by creating the necessity for people to circumvent the laws of border crossing. As such, Cantú implies that institutions can create a self-perpetuating cycle of violence.
Themes
The next morning, Cantú mounts the man’s horse and rides with him over the river, into Mexico. He reflects on how much he’s trusting this stranger and how peaceful the village is. The man tells him people in the village look out for one another, so the violence of the surrounding area hasn’t reached them.
Cantú discovers that just as violence breeds violence, trust and a sense that one’s life is valued are self-perpetuating, too. This episode lays bare how counterproductive violent and forceful institutions are in attempting to achieve peace and healthy communities.
Themes
The man takes Cantú back across the river, into the United States. Cantú asks him about the border crossing—whether there are cameras or sensors—and braces himself for the sounds of vehicles or men. But he hears only the river.
In this book, nature’s beauty is often a gateway to wisdom and humanity’s full potential. Here, the natural sounds of the river serve as a reminder that there’s nothing essential or natural about the militarized border, and that nature has far better, gentler, wiser models of boundaries.
Themes
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Later that day, Cantú swims in the Rio Grande, noticing the fish and birds flying overhead. He crosses the river over and over, until for a moment he forgets which country he’s standing in.
Cantú ends the book with a reminder that natural boundaries, unlike manmade ones, are living, porous, and beautiful: a benchmark humans should aspire to in thinking about boundaries and borders.
Themes
