Mar 01, 2006 06:34 PM
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(Updated Mar 01, 2006 06:34 PM)
I would probably describe One Hundred Years of Solitude as a perverse portrait of human life. That doesn't mean its any less true than the so-called human life we experience on a daily basis.
The novel details the life of the Buendia family in the presumably Latin American town of Macondo. By the time the novel is done, one gets the eerie feeling that Macondo was probably a watershed in the emergence of society and culture if only because it proves the pointlessness of them all. Marquez infuses a strong sense of fantasy into the daily life of the inhabitants. There are Arab traders, Italian pianola instructors and a wandering tribe of indians who thrill the residents with 'wonderful' inventions most of which we accept as commonplace today. It also helps that the story isnt exactly moored in any paritcular era. We can all identify it with to a point and the rest we attribute to time.
Over time, the Buendia family grows, flourishes and is doomed and a succession of descendants move across its pages. The characters were too numerous for me to keep track of, so I gave up and instead concentrated on what was happening rather than who was who. I suppose given the cyclical way the pendulum of fate swings around them, it doesn't matter either. All human life is the same is a point the Marquez rubs in pretty hard. Love, passion, lust and hunger all play equal roles in the rise and the eventual downfall of the Buendia family. This is not a boring saga novel. The characters, generation after generation, come across as real albeit flawed people rather than caricatures or assorted repeats. I couldnt help but be amazed at Marquez's cheeky confident assertion that the same fate befalls us all. We are but a hair's breadth away from being subject to the same greed, madness and desperation were it not for the artifices of society and manners and all the other chains we impose or have imposed on us. The Buendia family is primitive in that sense but also a lot purer-directly responsible for their making or unmaking. There are also a few well placed digs at the notion of a government and employment as opposed to subsistence. Marquez is a very garrulous writer but one who draws you into the story and shows you around. There are some very lyrical passages that I simply loved for the far-reaching but true statements that Marquez makes about love, betrayal, desperation and angst. Though I read it in spurts over a month, when I finished, I was sorry it was over.
