Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep. Musings from someone who sees stories everywhere.

Monday, April 16, 2007

returning to an old friend




Some books form a personal connection with me. One of these is Gabriel Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude. I picked up my copy after several years and remembered my dear friend Maria from Spain, who had sung praises of this bible for Spanish readers. The dog-eared bookmark with Maria's fading handwriting, exchanging personal impressions as we discussed my progress through the book, the soft focus sepia tinted memories returned.

"Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendía was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice." Thus begins One Hundred Years of Solitude, from a terrifying point in the distant future, where the firing squad is preparing to shoot to kill. Dream and memory whirl into a heady mix to draw the reader into a narrative where time moves in many directions at once. This matter of fact yet incredibly farfetched note typifies the essence of Magic Realism.

I entered Macondo again. Staying awake till the early hours, I joined the villagers of Macondo as an insomnia epidemic threatened to erase all layers of culture and identity. I witnessed "the precise moment when Aureliano Babilonia would finish deciphering the parchments, and that everything written on them was unrepeatable since time immemorial and forevermore, because races condemned to one hundred years of solitude did not have a second opportunity on earth."



One of the world’s most famous modern-day classics, One Hundred Years of Solitude encompasses in its epic sweep the history of the Buendia family. A mix of the political, emotional and magical, this novel is among the best known and most popular novels in the tradition of Magic Realism. This novel has been translated into many languages including English, and has sold over 30 million copies worldwide. It portrays the history of Macondo on a larger-than-life level, tracing events from its mythic foundation to its final disappearance. A middle-class family chronicle set against the backdrop of Latin American history, this novel tests the boundaries of narrative fiction. Garcia Marquez once said that he seeks to bring out “the magic in commonplace events.” The events in the novel may seem fantastic, but much of it has a solid grounding in reality. The massacre of hundreds of banana plantation workers in the novel is based upon an actual strike by workers against the United Fruit Company in 1928.

6 comments:

Suzan Abrams, email: suzanabrams@live.co.uk said...

That difficult except made me cry, Moni. How true that in pain and hardship or when life gets too much, the mind regresses in spurts, to a time of childhood and a memory of sweetness, when life was gentler and kinder. It is the human spirit's own compassion and comfort for the aching soul.
Enjoyed this lovely post.

monideepa sahu said...

thanks for dropping by, Susan. One Hundred Years is one fascinating book you can enjoy again and again.

Unknown said...

I've recently finished reading, for the first time, Love in the Time of Cholera - A Hundred Years of Solitude is sitting on the shelf waiting to be read - I look forward to it!

Jobove - Reus said...

We have visited his blog-web and find it interesting, congratulations

There visits ours, the irreverent and iconoclast of the world,
is in Catalunya - Spain

Http: // telamamaria.blogspot.com

Thank you very much for the visit

Maria

monideepa sahu said...

Atyllah,I'm sure you'll enjoy love in the Time of Cholera. It is rated higher by some critics than even Hundred years.
Maria, thank you for dropping by. I visited your colourful and interesting looking page, but I'm afraid I don't understand Spanish. (I read a translation of Hundred Years). I did learn a few words and phrases in Spanish from my friend Maria, but beyond that I confess my ignorance. I would love to learn Spanish and other languages some day.

Thy said...

thanks for the recommendation! i've been looking for books to read. my school library currently equips books such as "You are so not invited to my batmitzvah"