Adieu to Gabriel Garcia Marquez

When I was in final year of college, I read Gabriel Garcia Marquez for the first time. The name of the novel was Chronicle of a death foretold. The style of story telling left an indelible mark on my mind. The narrative was awesome, the plot intriguing. A stranger arrives in a village, and he enthralls all the ladies of the village by his charm.




Next year, he was awarded Nobel prize in literature.By that time he was already very well known. His work was part of some of our top university's curriculum by 1980's.


Very soon I read another of his novel, 'One hundred years of solitude'.
This was kind of wow effect of me. Wow, what a novel. A village, where it rains for 10 years at a stretch, a decorated army officer who married several times, and at last the last scion of the family dies horribly.




Most of his novels have been set in typical latin american village. Most of the time it is mancodo.

Garcia Marquez used his imagination quite wildly.

In his short stories we see animals like zebra, giraffe, tiger etc being fished from the sea. Or we see a young man who has illness, simply, he is dead. And yet he he is growing all the time. So him mother call the doctor and the doctor diagonses his illness. He is dead.

Or as in another story, a rich American gentleman arrives at a village, and he declares that he wants to give away all his money. Thereby he involves the men of village in gambling. But of course all of them lose to him, and he takes away all their money. The message is simple: America is not here to give money. In the name of giving money it will take away all your money.

His vision and understanding of the latin america left a deep impression in me as well as in entire generation.

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