Los locos son una terrible equivocación de la Naturaleza; son las faltas de ortografía de Dios

“Los locos son una terrible equivocación de la Naturaleza; son las faltas de ortografía de Dios” is an aphorism about madness that turns a medical and human condition into an image of errors in nature and in divine writing. Alice Gould recalls it at a moment of sadness, when the words deepen her grief at leaving the patients who believe she is their mother.

Wording and Attribution

The phrase is attributed to the Author of the Theory of the Nine Universes. Dolores Bernardos had recounted it to Alice, who remembers the sentence rather than hearing it anew in the scene. Its two linked images—nature making a terrible mistake and God committing a spelling error—give the aphorism its force: madness is figured as a flaw in the order of the world, not as mere foolishness.

Alice’s Recollection

The saying returns alongside Alice’s memory of Rómulo and the small lobe of his ear, the ingenious, delusional reason he believed himself to be her son. Remembering both him and the aphorism, she breaks into tears again. The recollection therefore binds the phrase to her attachments inside the hospital: as she contemplates leaving people who think of her as their mother, the aphorism becomes part of a larger moment of separation and melancholy.