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K.D. Absolutely's Reviews > One Hundred Years of Solitude
One Hundred Years of Solitude
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After extremely enjoying the famous works of Hemingway (Old Man and The Sea), Neruda (Love Poems), Coetzee (The Life and Times of Michael K) and Steinbeck (Grapes of Wrath), I told myself I have to read some works of the other Nobel Prize of Literature awardees and I was not disappointed picking ONE HUNDRED YEARS OF SOLITUDE by this Columbian author, Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
This work introduced to literature the "magical realism" style in story telling. Fantasy was incorporated to reality in telling the story of the seven generations of the Buendia clan. It is a thick book (450 pps) but I finished this in just 6 days. Thanks partly to Pasig Day - July 2, 2009 but also to the beautiful prose of G. G. Marquez. There is never a dull moment as there are always something to look forward to every time you turn the page. The characters are also well developed and even if there are 7 generations told in the 500 plus pages, the characters in the first generation still influence the way the last generations lived their lives which at some point made me wonder if they were still alive. Ursula, the matriach lived up to 130 years and she shrunk and shrunk and ended up blind and "like a raisin" when she died but she was still influencing the lives of Aureliano, Amaranta Ursula, etc. Even the ghost of Melquides was still talking to Aureliano the way he talked to Colonel Aureliano Buendia and Aureliano Segundo.
I finished this while visiting my hometown Quezon and I could not help imagining myself like when G. G. Marquez visited his hometown in Columbia after several years of staying in Mexico. During that visit, he was able to talk to his grandmother who was fond of telling fantasy stories with a poker face (as if the story was true). G. G. Marquez got the idea from that visit for him to devote 18 months of uninterrupted writing of this novel. Well, I am not writing any novel but when one stayed for several years in the city and one day goes back to the province and talk to some old people there, one will surely hear many old stories - fantasy, tragedies, supernatural, gossips, etc.
One highlight that I struck me most is the power of the past generations of our family to us. There are tales, practices or even prejudices that we now have in our family that were just passed on to us. This novel made me aware of some of those.
Gabriel Garcia Marquez really deserved his Nobel. There seems not to be anybody like him.
This work introduced to literature the "magical realism" style in story telling. Fantasy was incorporated to reality in telling the story of the seven generations of the Buendia clan. It is a thick book (450 pps) but I finished this in just 6 days. Thanks partly to Pasig Day - July 2, 2009 but also to the beautiful prose of G. G. Marquez. There is never a dull moment as there are always something to look forward to every time you turn the page. The characters are also well developed and even if there are 7 generations told in the 500 plus pages, the characters in the first generation still influence the way the last generations lived their lives which at some point made me wonder if they were still alive. Ursula, the matriach lived up to 130 years and she shrunk and shrunk and ended up blind and "like a raisin" when she died but she was still influencing the lives of Aureliano, Amaranta Ursula, etc. Even the ghost of Melquides was still talking to Aureliano the way he talked to Colonel Aureliano Buendia and Aureliano Segundo.
I finished this while visiting my hometown Quezon and I could not help imagining myself like when G. G. Marquez visited his hometown in Columbia after several years of staying in Mexico. During that visit, he was able to talk to his grandmother who was fond of telling fantasy stories with a poker face (as if the story was true). G. G. Marquez got the idea from that visit for him to devote 18 months of uninterrupted writing of this novel. Well, I am not writing any novel but when one stayed for several years in the city and one day goes back to the province and talk to some old people there, one will surely hear many old stories - fantasy, tragedies, supernatural, gossips, etc.
One highlight that I struck me most is the power of the past generations of our family to us. There are tales, practices or even prejudices that we now have in our family that were just passed on to us. This novel made me aware of some of those.
Gabriel Garcia Marquez really deserved his Nobel. There seems not to be anybody like him.
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Thanks for the vote, Em. It was actually my kuya (Joselito - also in 欧宝娱乐) who recommended this to me. I bought and tried reading this maybe 5 years ago but I found it confusing. Last year, I tried again and I just persisted. Does your book have the Buendia family tree? It helped me a lot. The names are repeated from generation to another, e.g., Aurelio Jose, Jose Aurelio, etc. so I had to refer to that table from time to time while reading this. This is part of my favorite top 5 novels ever for fiction.
I wouldn't say that Marquez "introduced" magical realism to the world (many attribute that to Kafka)-- but he did help to popularize and modernize the genre. He was very influential with the literary boom in South America. If you love this, you must read The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende, if you haven't already. Em-- this was actually the first book I read by Marquez. I've seen read Love in the Time of Cholera and Memories of My Melancholy Whores, and next to this novel, the other two were just forgettable.
My brother just bought a copy of this. I plan on reading it after he does. May fear lang kasi baka sa sobrang sophisticated eh hindi ko ma-gets or baka sa sobrang ganda all other books will fail in comparison.
It is not sophisticated, Ian. Not in the league of say Henry James or Charles Dickens or Leo Tolstoy. Though of course, I am not sure what you mean by sophisticated.Rather it is, for me, entertaining. Just keep the family tree in front of you while you read so that you will not be confused.
I am glad you liked it too, Emir.
Am not usually a fan of fantasy, magic and myth. Your review has piqued my curiosity. I just might give it a try.
Mj, this book has always been in my top 10 favorite novels at all times. :)
It is interesting that you gave it 5 stars. Honestly, although GGM is my favorite writer, I find it really difficult to get into this novel. I have read like a hundred pages of it but almost understood nothing. lol! Well maybe it wasn't my proper time back then. But I promise that I will start all over again and finish this novel with 100% understanding some time in the future. :) And I can't wait to be able to rate it 5 too! :)