Monday, June 2, 2008
One Hundred Years of Solitude I
A place for your initial confusion and questions...a helpful hint for reading this book: photocopy the family tree that appears in the beginning of the book and use it for your bookmark. Since this book starts in media res (in the middle of the action, not at the beginning), pay attention not just to where you are, but to when..
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I'm kinda on the fence about whether Melquiades and the gypsies visiting Macondo is a good thing or a bad thing. On one hand Melquiades does expose Jose Arcadio Buendia and the villagers to the technological advances of the world, however I feel that the new technology has corrupted what seems like the perfect society more than it actually helped it. This can be supported by how Jose Arcadio was once "a kind of a youthful patriach... who collaborated with everyone, even in physical work, for the welfare of society"(8) but changes in "a man lazy in appearance, careless in his dress, with a wild beard"(9) Could Macondo symbolize a utopian society or conformity (as the community as a whole worked together for a common goal and the village was equal in every way possible) and Melquiades symbolize temptation and curiosity of the unknown?
Also on another note I found this quote to be particularly interesting and would like to know what others thought about it, "A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead under the ground"(13).
I agree with Paul's observation of Jose Arcadio Buendia's changed of personality. Some of my thoughts were similar; Jose Arcadio Buendia demontrates to be a man who doesn't trust many people, "...not believe in the honesty of gypsies"(2) leaving him at a disadvantage by trading valuable things that his wife and him needed for just ideas that he has created in his mind. This somehow foreshadows Jose Arcadio Buendia's future; a dreamer who only believes in himself and most likely will end up losing many more valuable things because of his distrust towards others. Buendia rathers trust the "new technology" than the wisdom of those around him.
Jose Arcadio Buendia is some what of a hypocritical man. He himself preaches about how there is to be no government or instruction in the city of Macondo yet, he is the one who goes to Don Apolinar Moscote and tells him basically that if he wants to live like "any other ordinary citizen"(56),then he would have to do what Jose Arcadio Bundia said or bascially that he would kill him. Here shows the power hungary side of Jose Buendia Arcadio. Although there is no rules in Macondo he feels the need to silently claim himself as the leader. This also feeds off of Mels idea becasue it shows his lack of trust in anyone else, right away he was defensive of the newcomer. He felt as though his own status in the community was threatened.
To comment on Paul's quote i think it is a way to mark ones territory. Ursula had said that they "had a son" (13) there, and that was why they would not leave. However had they left, there would have been no evidence of their exsistence there and that would show no belonging to that place. When someone is buried and under the ground there is evidence that they had inhabitated that area for sometime. There is no evidence of a birth but the body under ground is evidence to say that they belonged.
I think that Melquiades visiting the city of Macondo was a bad thing because, like everyone else said, it changed Jose Arcadio Buendia. He becomes crazy over these new inventions that that gypsies bring to Macondo and spends most of his time in a lab. He also starts to show favoritism to his younger son Aureliano because of his interests in technology, while the eldest son Jose Arcadio is neglected.
I feel that the father, Jose Arcadio Buendia ignoring his eldest son led to Jose Arcadio fooling around with Pilar for comfort that he did not recieve from his father and then running away to avoid the responsibility of his actions. The gypsies could have been a role in the rift in this relationship because these two men did not share the same interests of inventions and technology that the gypsies brought to the city of Macondo.
To comment on the quote "A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead under the ground", I think that the people of Macondo believe that when someone dies their body becomes one with the soil and their soul lives through the nature. That would be the only way someone could "belong" to a place because their bodies would not be able to move from place to place but they are confined to the ground that they have been buried in.
In the novel, On Hundred Years of solitude, Jose Arcadio Buendia's imaginative ambitions and Melquiades need to supply these ambitions would be the definite example of how one reads the several incidents where Melqiuades would sell his his tools to him, and every time that transaction follows it, would deprive the family of a vital need,which in short would be summarized as a chain of deprivation for one's personal gain how Meqiuades would sell Jose Arcadio Buendia his new technolgical tools, for his own profit, Jose Arcadio Buendia would then take funds and livestock from his own family to gain wealth form the magnets(2) and power from the magnifying glass(2-3)and claim each would help the family or the country. This whole narrative can be described as "the vampire narrative" when one consumes one character's life force in a economical, emotional,and/or physical way. Melqiades would tempt Jose Arcadio Buendia, Then Jose Arcadio Buendia would take from Ursula and the children.
And to get more specific about Paul's question on the quote on pg.
13, "A person does not belong to a place until there is a someone dead under the ground"(13)could be interpreted in two ways for example ,most people in patriotic diction would sepak of their forefathers and ancestors dying in war for one's country or in legacy of a family it can also infer how family would mourn one's death in the land, like a rite of ancestory. Or it is the premonitor thinking of a moment of clairvoyance of a tragic future to come, that of which includes Aureliano.
In "One Hundred Years of Solitude", Jose Arcadio Buendia to me is like this ruler to everyone in Macando. He preaches to others that government controllers should not be tolerated. For example on page 56, Jose Arcadio Buendia exclaims to Don Apolinar Moscote, a man trying to take some what of a government in Macando, that he will not be taken seriously in the towns, that what he said meant nothing to the people that he so brought together and helped for so long. What I don't understand is if Jose Arcadio Buendia wants everyone in Macando to be free, than why doesn't he let the people choose if they want to be ruled by a government or not?
Another comment that I wanted to leave would be the marriage situations. Everyone in Macando is so eager to marry one another. An example would be a very strange marriage, that I thought to be very impossible. Would be the marriage of Aureliano Buendia and Remedios Moscote. When married she had not even reached her women hood yet. However, everyone consented the marriage and was alright with the fact that Auerliano Buendia was over his thirty's. Furthermore many of the marriages in Macando seemed very questionable to me. Like the marriage of Jose Arcadio and Rebeca. They were not quit related by blood per say but raised as siblings. I really think that they way everyone in Macando relates to one another is by marriage, it brings merriment in many strange ways.
I would like to agree with analu about Jose Arcadio Buendia's control of Macondo. It was odd that he would push out Don Apolinar Moscote's government but he didn't ask the town what form of government they wanted. Perhaps it is because it was Jose Arcadio Buendia's idea to leave Riohacha after the death of Prudencio Aguilar that he feels he must be in charge. His friends found the journey exciting and followed him until they settled Macondo, so maybe Jose Arcadio Buendia feels that he must continue to lead the others.
Also, marriages in Macondo do seem bizarre. People marrying their cousins and supposed relatives was, I believe, a common thing in that time period. Although I did find it odd that after obsessing over Remedios and finally marrying her, Aureliano wasn't nearly as upset about her death as I thought he would be, "The death of Remedios had not produced the despair that he had feared. It was, rather, a dull feeling of rage that gradually dissolved in a solitary and passive frustration similar to the one he had felt during the time he was resigned to living without a woman" (94). It just seemed odd that he wasn't emotionally distraught about Remedios' death. Though he doesn't seem to have much emotion at all to begin with.
I agree with Paul’s statement about the change of the town. The death of Melquíades may represent/foreshadow that Macondo begins to lose its utopian status. According to José Arcadio Buendía, since the founding of the Macondo, “none of [the villagers] has died even of a natural death”(56). But after the burial of Melquíades, bad things begin to occur in the Buendía family. José Arcadio Buendía becomes crazy and Amaranta is furious that Rebeca gets to marry Pietro Crespi.
Another thing I find interesting is the traditions in the village. People believe that interbreeding will result in "the shame of breeding iguanas"(20) And Úrsula Iguarán actually worries about this belief. In my opinion, I think the relationship in Macondo will become one of the main ideas in this book.
I just wanted to pass on something that an AP kid before me told me: don't be afraid to ask for help. and then he/she (can't give it away) told me to go look at last year's blogs. so just to help you should totally check out www.clappsap.blogspot.com and check out our summer blogs from last year. See if your ideas are as original as they sound in your head :D
Alright! Its 2:37 in the morning, and a several hours after learning we had to do 3 blog post, have finished reading a third of "One Hundred Years of Solitude."
So, my thoughts of Jose Arcadio Buendia is that he is the town. It was said that he was the one who planned out the streets, it was his house whom everyone else's was modeled after, and it was he who always lead the pack. It seemed that the town followed his genius, no matter what it was. I did find it wonderful, however, that the "round world" was compared to an orange. Just saying, of all the things, nothing says Latino like an orange.
Anyways, what I found most interesting was his two sons. It seems that Jose Arcadio Buendia was split into two with Jose Arcadio and Aureliano Buendia. Jose is strong and fierce, but nowhere near as curious and as genius as his father, while Aureliano is. Just found the split of personality into his sons interesting.
Oh, and Paul, I am right there with you about the contamination of their utopia with the introduction of the gypsies. I think it was perfectly described that once they left their town, the men were filled with sorrow from the stench of blood and all the darkness covering them, and even when they got out, were angered to learn they were ironically surrounded by water.
I think it was at this point that I first truly noticed how Gabriel jumps around in his story telling. It was when he describes the ship there that he tell the death of Aureliano, just struck me as odd how Gabriel continually does this. Did anyone else pick up on that?
That is all.
hey everyone its carla
There is so much to talk about i cant choose one okay well first i would like to comment on Jose Arcadio Buendia he really is a leader. Mario had commented that he practically was the town. I agree its almost as if they made his character to sum up the town they live in. I would also like to comment on analus statement about the marrige of Aureliano Buendia and Remedios Moscote. I know that in times of the past old men marrying young women was a bit of a normalcy but im quite sure that at the time they married it wasnt even possible for her to have children. She herself was still technically a child. Also i dont understand how Remedios Moscote could truly be attracted and completly happy about marrying some one who had little to no womanly features. There is a large sense of pride in this book that i have noticed or a theme of pride which i feel could possibly be a tragic flaw for some characters in this novel.
Someone had told me that this book was going to be tedious to read. On the contrary, I found it really interesting, so interesting that I find myself almost at a lost for a discussion. I just want to read. I made some observations, though, that I would like to share.
The title, One Hundred Years of Solitude, attracted me. At first, I wondered why the title was what it was. The Buendia family not only was always crowded, they seemed to always have one another. However, as we read more and more, Marquez described each family member of the Buendia as being solitary in some way or another. For example, Jose Arcadio Sr. was alone in his love for science and technology, so much that it isolated him from his family. Further in the book, he was tied up to a chestnut tree to be alone, and to be forgotten by society. Amaranta, although loved by both Pietro and Colonel Gerinelda Marquez, secluded herself from their love for some reason or another. Arcadio, the son of Jose Arcadio Jr. and Pilar, "was a solitary child" (110). On page 111, Marquez described that Arcadio would weep in secret and that he never could successfully communicate with anyone. As a result, he had always sought to be alone. Ursula found herself being lonelier than ever when her sons rebel. Jose Arcadio Jr. ended up marrying Rebeca to her disgust. Amaranta led Pietro to his death, in which Ursula began to avoid that daughter of hers, too. Her husband's craziness left her alone to take care of the household.
So as a conclusion, the title appears to foreshadow the solitude of the generations of the Buendia family, no matter how many members there always are, with someone new always being accepted into the family.
Also, the book contains a lot of sexual tension also in the children of Ursula and Jose Arcadio Sr. Relating this back to How to Read Literature like a Professor, sex could symbolically suggest violence, differences, freedom, and possibilities in the future. Freedom definitely applied to Jose Arcadio Jr. when he sought to free himself by having sex with Pilar Tenera and then with a gypsy girl. Jose Arcadio Jr. also sought to make love to his sister, Rebeca, which could foreshadow violence, as he later got shot in the head.
The name Buendia in spanish means Good Day. Marquez definitely named the family ironically as after the first few chapters, the family faced shame, solitude, craziness, and death constantly.
Cynthia here.
Thank you Mary for pretty much thinking the same things I do about this novel so far. I also really enjoy this book. I find myself just reading and completely submersing myself in the lives of the people of Macondo.
To start off, i find it interesting how Marquez jumps around from idea to idea, as a few people pointed out already. In one paragraph he will write about how Rebeca and Jose Arcadio had sex and in the next he will write about the war that is going on.
I agree with Mary that there is definitly a lot of sexual tension in this novel. So many of the family members are intertwined in odd ways. Ursula and Jose Arcadio Buendia are distant cousins, Jose Arcadio married his almost-sister Rebeca, and both Jose Arcadio and his brother had sons by the same woman (Pilar Ternera).
In reguards to Amaranta refusing to marry Pietro Crespi and Gerineldo Marquez, I think that it has something to do with pride. Amaranta was certainly attracted to both men and was madly (no pun intended) in love with Pietro. Amaranta was willing to kill Rebeca for Pietro and once she could have him, she did not want him anymore. I guess I might be able to understand why Amaranta is this way because I can also be stubborn and proud sometimes, but Amaranta forces it, as some would say. She would take it to the point where she would make herself sick (throwing up, fevers).
Another thing I thought about while reading this novel was about the type of community that Macondo was. As some of you already mentioned, it seemed like a kind of utopia for a while. All the people of the town worked together to establish it under the guidance of Jose Aracadio Buendia. There was no government, no need for police or anything of the sort beacuse the people just naturally worked well together. That is, until Melquiades arrived with the gypsies. With the arrival of new technology, the town of Mcaondo began to modernize itself and almost become corrupt. The people had lived fine with their old ways and suddnely with new technology not only did the Buendia family suffer (because of Jose Arcadio Buendia's obsessions) but the town also changed. Soon there was the town leader Don Apolinar Moscote and the town priest, Father Nicanor.
As the twon began to evolve a war broke out. I must admit that I am still confused about exactly what was going on with the war. I understand that Aureliano became a Colonel and that he was a Liberal. His father-in-law was a conservative. it was a civil war of some sorts but I am still not sure aboutthe specifics. (So if anyone can clarify that for me, that would be greatly appreciated).
I also wanted to comment on the repetition of the line "as he faced the firing squad". That was how the novel began and it was used throughout when talking about Aureliano and eventually about Arcadio as well. This line shows how the novel difnitly does nto go in order. It jumps around from time period to time period as it will focus on just one character for a while (completely ignoring the lives of the rest) and then moving on to the next character in the same fashion.
In response to Cynthia noting the repetition of "As he faced the firing squad...", and how Marquez will focus on one character and then move on to another, I believe that he does this to emphasize that he is not simply retelling a story, but is giving the history of an entire family. The shift of focus from character to character is as natural as talking about any family would be. Not only is the family's development through time and written chronologically important to note, but it is also vital to the reader to understand each character and the various dynamic relationships between them. Such as Ursula with her husband, children, and grandchildren, Amaranta and Rebeca, Jose Arcadio Buendia and his sons, etc. They all intertwine with time like vines gradually growing on an old building.
This novel is unique in the sense that it doesn't focus on ONE protagonist and ONE plot or ONE goal, but is a series of mini-stories. This is more accurate to the family life outside of a novel. When a family is discussed verbally, its history isn't told in chronological order by factual information, but is often told from person to person, the essence of which Gabriel Garcia Marquez captures in this novel.
When I first started reading One Hundred Years of Solitude, I was a bit confused at first until I finally realized that Colonel Aureliano Buendia was having a flashback. As I was reading the previous blogs, I agreed with paul_in_a_nutshell when he says that the gypsies changed what seemed to be the perfect utopian village into corruption of some sort. It is true, Jose Arcadio Buendia was a man that everyone looked up to but then transformed into this lab monster.
Has anyone noticed that Jose Arcadio Buendia is a Christ figure? It could just be me...but to prove my point, I'll say this. Jose Arcadio Buendia is "a kind of a youthful patriarch...who collaborated with everyone, even in physical work, for the welfare of society" (8). He had people that looked up to him for advice and ideas (just like Jesus's disciples did). He was probably in his late 30s as the book began (just like Jesus was). At one point in the book, a group of men tie him to a chestnut tree and leave him there because the townspeople think that he has gone crazy, speaking in a foreign tongue, which happens to be Latin, while Ursula, still his wife, becomes like a mother to him as she feeds him and takes care of him (Jesus is crucified on the holy cross because the nonbelivers thought of him as a hoax, while Mary takes care of him). Is that enough to convince you all? I think I made my point.
I also agree with analu about the whole marriage affairs. There's incest going on all over the place, well, in the Buendia household that is. The mothers want their daughters to marry, to be able to live out on their own. I was surprised that Aureliano was attracted to a child who hasn't even gone through puberty yet...but then again...he has spent a majority of his time in the lab studying alchemy and closed away from society. Something akward and disorderly was bound to happen. The fact that the parents agreed with the marriage was beyond me...
I wondered what in the world the title could mean before I even started this book. But, as with most of you who mentioned it, the title is really what the book is sort of about. Solitude, at first I had to admit, I didn't know the meaning so I had to look it up. Then, I realized that it meant loneliness and many of the Buendias (those added to like Rebeca) spent their time in solitude at one point. Rebeca was a significant one because at times of despair, she would return to her native habits of eating dirt and the wall. Like Mary said, Jose Arcadio Buendia was so caught up in his scientific studies he stayed in the lab for quite some time, trying to discover things that he believed would improve conditions in Macondo.
The title, One Hundred Years of Solitude, is very intriguing and many events in the novel lead me to agree with Mary that many members of the Buendía family deal with their own incidences that cause them to feel isolated. I feel that José Arcadio Buendía began the trend by isolating himself from his family after he became involved in the wonders of science. He didn’t realize his ways until Ursula said he should start worrying about his sons instead of his inventions because they were “…running wild just like donkeys.” (14) Ursula’s statement foreshadowed later events in the novel because his children became involved in their own interests. Such as José Arcadio, who ran off with the gypsies and retuned to Macondo as a completely different person. Also Rebecca, someone who grew very close to the Buendía family would revert back to her old ways when things became too difficult, such as when the date for her wedding could not be decided on, she “…lost her bearings, completely demoralized, Rebecca began eating earth again.” (88) Both José Arcadio, Rebecca, and many other characters found other outlets in their lives that numbed the pain of dealing with certain problems, especially those that involved their family.
José Arcadio Buendía’s desire to research different things, such as religion or technology was brought about though good intension because he wanted to advance Macondo. He wanted to create a place “…where all one had to do was sprinkle some magic liquid on the ground and the plants would bear fruit whenever a man wished, and where all of instruments against pain were sold at bargain prices.” (14) Many of his discoveries would change the lives of the people in Macondo by making it easier for them to prosper, with more fruits and vegetables; they would attract people from other villages and be able to sell more goods. However, as Melquíades introduced more inventions to José Arcadio Buendía, he began to change and he reminded me of the character Okonkwo from Things Fall Apart by Achebe. Okonkwo and José Arcadio Buendía are very similar because their ambitions and goals to create better lives for themselves and for their families caused them to lose cite in the core values of their villages - unity and strength. Once those two elements were lost, wars, hatred, and animosity broke out amongst many people in the village.
I found it interesting to see how the drift from beginning united played out in Macondo because my perception of the Spanish culture involved people who truly valued the importance of taking care of those in their families and always putting them first and I feel that Ursula really tried to hold her family together though difficult times. Such as when she brought a change of clean cloths and a pistol to José Arcadio while he was in jail after he left unexpectedly to join the war and become involved in the Liberal Party. She also was excited to see José Arcadio when he returned from traveling with the gypsies, she “…flung her arms around his neck, shouting and weeping with joy,” instead of shunning him off because he left unexpectedly and retuned “… a bigger man … with needlework.” (106) Although Ursula did not accept José Arcadio and Rebecca’s wedding at first, she “consoled herself with her own lies” about their relationship in order to keep José Arcadio Buendía from becoming even more depressed from the news of José Arcadio’s return to Macondo, bringing with him “shame to [their] household.” (106) Even though Ursula did not always agree with her children’s decisions, she never seemed to completely give up on them, however, it seemed that the harder she tried to hold her family together, the easier it became for things to fall apart.
I also agree with because the death of Melquíades changed the atmosphere of Macondo because before he died, there had not been any deaths in the village. Since Melquíades said “…death followed him everywhere…” (5) it seemed inevitable that after he returned to Macondo death would soon strike in the village and soon after Melquíades died, the village seemed to die as well. Many deaths directly affected the Buendía family because Remedios, “…poisoned by her own blood…” (86) was the first to die and soon after her death, a brutal war against the Conservatives and the Liberals erupted, killing numerous people. Once Melquíades died, it seemed as if death became apart of their culture and people such as Colonel Aureliano Buendía and Colonel Marquez were more than willing to kill others to have their opinions heard. Despite their intentions, all of the people of Macondo appeared to drift away from the pride they took in not causing violence and not having anyone die in their village.
The book isn't written as an accurate description of a family history, it is much too vivid for that, even feeling fictitious at times. Yet, Marquez seems to have purosely done so, he seems to have written a book about the Buendia family that includes such startling even mythical situations that the reader simply accepts as true. For example, Aureliano's prophetic warnings and premonitions since the time he predicted the soup's fall- "just as soon as the child made his announcement, it began an unmistakeable movement toward the edge, as if impelled by some inner dynamism, and it fell and broke on the floor," (15). To further attest to the mystical aura of the book, Melquiades' claims of self-reincarnation, Jose Arcadio Buendia's hallucinations of Prudencio Aguilar, and a plague of insomnia that causes loss of memory. As Taylor noted, Marquez focuses on the people themselves (the characters) rather than their accurate chronological history. This supports the idea that Marquez created almost a mystical world yet one that isn't questioned for being so.
The characters themselves are quite complex and, as Mary noted, were all touched in some respect by isolation and desolation. In particular, I'd like to discuss Amaranta, who clearly suffers from a variety of nueroses. Unlike many of the other characters in the story, her own isolation and solitude appears to be self-induced, in that she refused two prospective husbands (both of whom she was in love with)- resulting in one's death. And unlike many of her family members, Amaranta is physically isolated rather than simply in an emotional capacity.
To conclude, describing to Moscote of his overbearing presence in Mocondo, Jose Arcadio Buendia "gave a detailed account of how they had founded the village, of how they had distributed the land, opened the roads, and introduced the improvements that necessity required without having bothered the government and without anyone having bothered them," (56). Buendia stresses the fact that the town itself proliferated without any interaction- in solitude. As Paul mentioned, it seemed to be the introduction of the gypsies into this edenic society that distrupted the natural order, and sullied the traditional morality. It is interesting then to note that in certain cases solitude is emphasized as being a positive rather than a negative.
-Tzivia
There is a lot going in the novel as Marquez tries to develop each of his many characters. Since the novel begins with Aureliano Buendia “as he [faces] the firing squad…remembering that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice” (1), I’ve been focusing more on his progression in the novel. What could his exposure to ice mean and why of all things that have occurred in his life did he remember that single event? Like all the men of the Buendia family, Aureliano seems to follow in their footsteps of first being successful and then suffering a tragic fate. He begins as a prosperous goldsmith but as soon as he reaches manhood, he not only marries a child, Remedios, but also becomes a colonel who loses all sentimentality. Marquez seems to be making a statement about manhood in general, about its savagery. Marquez’s message is put into words by Ursula who declares that “at first [the Buendia men] behave very well, they’re obedient and prompt and they don’t seem capable of killing a fly, but as soon as their beards appear they go to ruin.” (152) Unlike his brothers and father, his destruction does not come as a result of his own doing but rather because of the tragic fate he suffers. He loses his wife, of whom he is deeply in love with, he loses himself in the brutality of war, and he loses all sense of emotions as he have sex with numerous woman without truly loving any of them. In that sense he differs from the rest of the Buendia men. He is different in that his sufferings does not come as a result of the chase towards wild dreams like Jose Arcadio and Jose Arcadio Buendia but rather comes ironically as a result of his passion to bring justice to the town of Maconda. It can also be noted that he does not have a very strong physical presence throughout the first third of the novel as he is away at war for most of the time. His absence from Maconda led to its slow corruption by Jose Arcadio and further steers it away from the utopian society many of you have agreed the town to be at its founding. Aureliano is a character that epitomizes both goodness as he goes to war to fight for the ideals of liberals, but becomes corrupted to epitomize brutality instead as he ignores relationships to friends and family in his quest for power.
On another note, I also find the character of Ursula to be one of significance. She, unlike the men of the novel is the constant reminder of morality. Despite all the shame her family has brought about, and the devastating fate suffered by the men in her life, she is uncorrupted and strangely strong in her endurance of the tragedies she faces, from the losing of her husband to his mental illness to the losing of her sons and daughters to shame. Amongst all the madness and chaos of the novel, Ursula is a recurring symbol of hope for the continuance of life despite events that would draw anyone away from sanity. She has witness many falls and yet she herself is still standing in spite of it all. I completely agree with ashley8 in that Ursula is like the glue trying to hold the Buendia family together.
I find the incest in the novel to be quite disturbing. Marquez incorporates it continuously emphasizing on the lack of boundaries as well as condemning it as wrong. The Buendia family that readers get to know begins as a result of incest since “[Jose Arcadio Buendia and Ursula] were cousins.” (20) There seems to exist a curse that is passed down through the generations as incest repeats itself. Though the fear of having to bear children with such physical deformities as a “pig’s tail” was dominant in the mind of Ursula, it seems as though the deformity in the Buendia children cannot be seen physically. Their curse is that of the individual solitude they each experience as mary has mentioned.
While I was reading this book, I found myself getting really confused (partially because this is the first unrealistic fiction book I’ve read in a while) from the absence of sense of time. Rebeca, when she first enters to storyline, is only 11 years old, but then a couple of pages later she is getting ready to marry Pietro Crespi. However, I believe Marquez’s purpose for not giving us time frames is to show how time passes by when people are alone. For example, on page 53, “So busy was [Ursula] in her prosperous enterprises that one afternoon she looked distractedly toward the courtyard. . .and she saw two unknown and beautiful adolescent girls doing frame embroidery in the light of the sunset. They were Rebeca and Amaranta”. Ursula has been so caught up in her work; she has been away from her family, Marquez shows how fast time flies by when Ursula was in solitude.
One part I found interesting was on page 49, where Marquez writes, “[Melquiades] really had been through death, but he had returned because he could not bear the solitude. . .he decided to take refuge in that corner of the world which had still not been discovered by death. . .” The irony in this scene comes from how Melquiades believes that he can avoid solitude in a town that has never faced death, but every member of the Buendia family has felt solitude.
A part that I’m still puzzled by is how Amaranta put in so much effort to stop the wedding between Pietro Crespi and Rebeca, and when Pietro is available to her, she refuses him (leading to the poor fellow’s suicide). However, she goes into a state of depression after Pietro kills himself; I think it goes on to what Mary said about how the Buendia family’s actions lead to each other’s isolation and loneliness.
Hi all.
I loved Mario's, C-Rod's, and All-that-jazz 07's observation concerning the way that the story jumps around. This is evident from the first sentence: "Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Areliano Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice" (1), which then turns into a long, long flashback. Did you notice that the author always leaves "premature" information? On page 103, the author writes: "Colonel Aureliano....organized thirty two armed uprisings and lost them all. He had seventeen male children....before they were exterminated...he survived fourteen attempts on his life...and a firing squad." The author pretty much summarized his life neatly in one long paragraph, yet devotes innumerable pages going into minute detail. Though it kinda takes the suspense out of the story, the suspense is not why I was reading One Hundred Days of Solitude. I found myself drawn into the world that Marquez creates, especially the daily interactions. Maybe, as Mario notes, the storytelling style is what strikes out to the reader.
The narrator obviously "chronicles" the "history" of the Buendia family. However, like some readers here, I found myself with an element of disbelief. The apparition of Prudencio Aguilar is an example. Didn't Aguilar's kinsmen "[hold] a wake over the corpse" (22)? Shouldn't he be dead? Fortune cards are (somehow) accurate in this story.
Also, I picked up on the solitude theme that many here seem to have seen. I was intriged by Tzivia's idea that "solitude" could have positive and negative connotations: positive solitude indicating, in a sense, not being corrupted by outside influences and making one's own destiny without interference, while in the negative sense, solitude could connote loneliness, isolation, etc. Perhaps in naming his book with the idea of solitude, the author is using the word in both of its senses, both in describing the destiny of the isolated solitude of the town of Mocondo, and the isolation that the Buendia family experiences (from the first generation down to the second; each person is isolated in some way).
Finally, I just want to note that I was surprised by the amount of incest (and sex) in this book. It got so bad that the author had to write up a family tree (Ms. Clapp told us to use it as a bookmark) to determine who fathered who with whom. My question is: why incest? Why so much sleeping around? Ursula and Amaranta, when baptizing (which implies a connection with Christianity, which discourages incest and promiscuity)the 17 Aurelianos kind of take it matter-of-factly. Am I missing something about this society?
Hi guys.
Beginning my blog, I just wanted to mention how much I agree with stevie wonder ii on the fact that Gabriel Garcia Marquez reveals the future to us while telling us the story. I caught a few of these flashes to the future, one of them being at the start of the book when he writes "and as a proof of his admiration he made him a gift that was to have a profound influence on the future of the village: the laboratory of an alchemist" (5).
Also, I find one of the most interesting parts of this book being the fact that it is so interwoven with many different members of the family--making it so difficult to remember who's who. Commenting to mary’s blog, It all becomes ironic, because although the family is so large, so many of them end up being in solitude--not speaking with one another, such as Jose Arcadio and his wife Rebeca not being allowed to return home on p. 93. There is generation after generation of family members who are isolated from one another.
Continuing on, on p. 64 the writer states how Aureliano "wanted to stay beside" Remedios, "close to that voice that called him 'sir' with every question, showing the same respect that she gave her father." Okay, why would anyone want to have a relationship with someone who treats him or her like a parent? Agreeing with analu and nessa, the marriages that take place are strange.
Commenting on the writing of this book, I find it to be very poetic--it's very lovey dovey.
On p. 65,Gabriel Garcia Marquez writes:
"The house became full of love. Aureliano expressed it in poetry that had no beginning or end. He would write it on the harsh pieces of parchment that Melquiades gave him, on the bathroom walls on the skin of his arms, and in all of it Remedios would appear transfigured: Remedios in the soporific air of two in the afternoon, Remedios in the soft breath of the roses, Remedios in the water-clock secrets of the moths, Remedios in the steaming morning bread, Remedios everywhere and Remedios forever."
There is love, war, and isolation--all that's needed for what looks to be a compelling piece of work.
I found this book to be oddly interesting, despite the constant mix-ups with the names. Even using a copy of the family tree of the bookmark hasn’t aided me much, but more of a handicap in reading. Anyways…
The book had me intrigued at the very first line, and like Jenny, I found myself to be focusing more on Aureliano Buendia’s character development, since the very first line in the book talks about him “[facing] the firing squad…[remembering] that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice.” (1) While I still haven’t quite figured out the importance of the ice, I did realize a potential symbolic meaning it could have for the future of Macondo. His father, José Arcadio Buendía (JAB, for future references) dreamt of building all of the houses in Macondo out of ice, saying how it would gleam in the sun and always be cool. However, he doesn’t seem to realize that despite all of the wonderful properties of ice, he never realized the simplest aspect of the substance: it melts. This could potentially foreshadow the downfall of Macondo in the future, seeing as even in the first third of the book, the town is slowly slipping away from its seemingly utopia-like existence, and being drawn into the conflict of the world around them.You can see the similarity of what occurs in both One Hundred Years of Solitude and Things Fall Apart is that the outsiders ultimately bring the destruction of the old traditions, and by doing so brings about the change in the community, for better or worse.
Also, while I agree with the many above me who believe that Melquíades’s appearance wasn’t necessarily a good thing, I found it hard to dislike him despite of it. Melquíades to me seems oddly similar to an innocuous drug dealer: while he doesn’t mean to bring about the potential destruction of Macondo, just trying to work out a living by selling the strange wares, JAB becomes “addicted” in sorts to the technology of the outside world. Whereas JAB essentially represents the innocence of the old world and its traditions, once he meets Melquíades and takes his first hit of the supposed better technology of the world outside of Macondo, he changes from “a youthful patriarch” (8) to a “man lazy in appearance, careless in his dress, with a wild beard” (9).
As to the quote Paul found interesting earlier, "A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead under the ground"(13), I find that the quote is simply, yet artistically written in a way to emphasize human nature in some odd way. The fact is, while you can move from place to place and not truly calls it your home, the moment someone you love is buried there, you become attached to it because essentially, the spirit of the deceased remains there. By placing someone you care about in the earth there, you would find that not being near would be leaving their memory behind in a way, by leaving their body behind.
My gosh. This book is off the wall. And since it is off the wall, it is a very calculated off the wall, which it makes it very dense. There's so many things going on in this book; it's really overwhelming.
Firstly, I'd like to point to page 132, when Ursala shouts, "Holy Mother of God!" Before she exclaims her surprise, blood had somehow traveled through the streets of Maconda to Ursala's feet. The blood, of course, had to drip with much care in such a way "as not to stain the rugs" of her mother's house, even though dripping blood used to be in the jurisdiction of gravity. The trail even had the wisdom to take a "right angle at Buendia's house." The point is to prove, like tzivia said, that the things that are told aren't exactly reality. It is even declared at the beginning that Macondo is a non-existent place. So, it would probably help to understand the novel if it were read symbolically.
This led me to the conclusion that Amaranta, who has a strange knack of torturing her lovers with games, is the author's personification of love. Love drove her to the extreme of poisoning to grotesque death of Remedios, and to the seduction and strange rejection of Pietro (perhaps the fruit of vengeance inspired by her love when he was with Rebeca?). For the most part, Amaranta's stories have been so far about how she has been affected by her love for this, or her cunning schemes to avenge her broken love that, or her self-torture after denying her own love for someone else.
Just to add to nessa's astute observation about the similarity of Jose Arcadio Buendia and Jesus Christ, I think Melquiades would, by extension of this symbolism, be like God. After all, he hands Jose Arcadio Buendia centuries of old knowledge for alchemy, and even says that he dies many times. What puzzles me is when Melquiades dies (with a solitary vulture standing on his stomach, which is a whole other topic) and Jose Arcadio Buendia promptly obliterates everything Melquiades ever gave to him, and then goes insane.
Speaking of going insane, can someone hand me a paper that neatly explains everything in this book?
Kayla here,
I hope this post isn't horrible. I read the whole book during a vacation, and it never occurred to me to make note on what I wanted to comment about.
Firstly, the names all confused the heck out of me, I'm not going to lie. I made constant reference to the family tree while reading, but it was still very difficult to figure out if it was Jose Arcadio who married Rebecca, or was it Colonel Aureliano? I'm so bad with names. So that was a big time stealer.
I totally agree with Paul about the gypsies visit being both a good and bad thing. Although it brings life to the village, it also brings death and anger. It pretty much led to the downfall of Jose Arcadio Buendia in the end. He was so obsessed with finding out the way things work. Marquez wrote "Jose Arcadio Buendia, whose unbridled imagination always went beyond the genius of nature and even beyond miracles and magic, thought that it would be possible to make use of that useless invention to extract gold from the bowels of the earth... For several months he worked hard to demonstrate the truth of his idea." (2) He saw what the gypsies did, and he saw so many other things that could be done with it. He talked later of building houses from ice, and tried to make weapons from glass. His imagination, bigger than he was, took him to new heights. But that intensity eventually led to a breakdown. He could have been so smart that he was just misunderstood, but even so, people hate what they cannot grasp. He ended up tied to a tree, living there until a few days before his death. But if Jose Arcadio Buendia had such an unbridled imagination, as it was described, his fate was probably already set. His imagination would have gotten the best of him one way or another, I believe.
I also wondered about the amount of incest, along with the links to Christianity as stevie wonder ii pointed out. Although I was mildly disgusted, I was also intrigued by the circle they were paving for themselves. Every act of incest led to a downfall of that couple. (Correct me if I’m wrong.) But at the same time, it was all done in such a loving way that if you could look past the initial horror, you instead find something sweet.
With Aureliano wanting to marry a mere child, I think he may have gotten two types of love confused somewhere along the lines. When he had first seen her, he wished to raise her as a daughter, and had that kind of love for her. But the more he thought about her, the more his thoughts changed from a father/ child love to a sexual love. As far as Amaranta goes, I think she was just too afraid to get married, or show her love. Plus, Pietro Crespi pretty much took her because he couldn’t get Rebecca. She was second best. Whether she saw that or not, I can’t really say. Perhaps her heart really was just too tender for the possible pains of marriage.
Hiya folks...
I wanna start right away saying that what amazes me the most is just the way that he tells this story. You can almost hear his voice, recounting these ridiculous, impossible, fantasies as if they legitimately occurred and he witnessed them. It just sounds so simple that when you read something that is 100% fiction, you think:
Of course. Why not? It's that simple.
It has me in a trance.
So far this book has been amazing. I would like to talk about that quote, "A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead underground." (13) This is obvious foreshadowing that we, as readers, will witness the death of a Buendia. This story begins with the formation of the town, and the beginning of a family. The have somewhat "claimed" this land for themselves and Macondo as their home. I believe that the first and last person to die in the town will, in fact, be a Buendia.
Moving on, the romance in this is insane! There are people marrying cousins, children, Pilar Ternera...
I believe she signifies something really huge. She is describes as incredibly skeevy, yet apparently she seems to be irresistible. This is also very important. Why? I don't know yet. BUT I SHALL.
until next time...
peace
Okay so to start off. These names have to go. I wish they were just a bit more, you know, NORMAL? That would probably help a lot.
Anyways, on to the book. First off I wanted to say that this book really must be read symbolically for the most part in order to fully understand. I completely agree with Kevien about Amaranta's symbolic meaning. Love always has twists and turns, and so does Amaranta's "love." It is as if the author is trying to have love speak as if it were human. It represents a sort off chaos that really intrigued me.
Also, I really wanted to comment on gypsyloo. That quote on page 13 really caught my attention as well. I think the statement is very true. I mean, it's not a home unless it is permanent. What other way is completely and utterly permanent besides death? Not much I would say. I do also believe it is foreshadowing as well.
This society is basically insane. As paul_in_a_nutshell said, the society was in a way, a perfect society. The love however, completely opposite. Everyone is dating everyone and it is quite unbelievable.
I would say that this is all organized chaos.
Hi everyone,
First off, I must say that what I was told about this book- from my brother, last year’s class and current AP Lits –is true: it is confusing yet intriguing. I have to agree with most of you in saying that the names do get confusing and that after a while you forget who is who…
Coming from Ms. Pettit’s Lang. and Comp. class last year, it just dumbfounded me to read about all the “inventions” the gypsies brought to Macondo, including flying carpets, ice and of all things false teeth. (Just kidding about the ice.) I was so used to non-fiction that reading about people coming back from the dead and talking to the living simply because they were “lonely in death” did not make sense to me at first. I asked myself whether the author meant this in a metaphorical way but came to the conclusion that no, this is in fact fiction.
Once I got over that hurdle, things became a lot clearer. Personally, I agree with paul_in_a_nutshell that Macondo is a Utopian society in a sense but do not think that it symbolizes conformity as he and other suggested. I would argue that if anything, Macondo symbolizes the opposite as the founders left government and tradition behind them to start a new life.
On a similar note, I would also disagree with valleygirl09 when she commented that Jose Arcardio Buendia was on a sort-of power trip and a hypocrite. Though he was recognized as the overall leader of the community- a position I believe he earned –I do not believe he went on a power trip as he merely gave a suggestion that the houses should be painted white and did not, as others did, mandate the color.
Also, to comment on bond_smoka’s comment that Jose Arcadio Buendia neglects his family by spending money on the inventions the gypsies brought (even his wife’s ancient coins), I would argue that his ambition is a bit more noble than being called neglect. I suppose I just see this book as more positive than others have. I believe his goal in trying to profit from the gypsies’ inventions was to benefit his family and his country… not to say that he wasn’t also doing it to satisfy his own curiosities.
Finaly, I would like to end on the topic most of us have commented on, Paul’s quote. “A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead under the ground"(13). I also saw this in a more positive way than others (call me an optimist I suppose). I believe that a family sticks together in situations and that the logic behind Ursula’s saying this is explained by the saying: “never leave a man behind.” Once a family member is buried in a place, he or she cannot move with the rest of the family and family harmony comes from the family living in that area, close to its departed love one. I believe this is why Rebecca came to the Buendia house carrying the bones of her family, for if they were buried, she would not have been able to move.
Those are my thoughts… what are yours?
At first, when hearing about Melquides, it reminded me of "Things Fall Apart", how an outside group corrupts the society of a content group. When Melquides comes back with the antidote, it shows that he is interfering in the fate of Macondo.
Rebeca, when she first came into the story, my first impressions of her was that she could bring down the Buendia family because she was "weird". She ate dirt and whitewash and carried her parents bones around. When Visitacion saw that she had insomnia, that would effect the whole town.
Starting out, i thought that there was a person that will be experiencing 100 years in solitude, but as i continue to read, the realize that Macondo itself is experiencing it. Immediately after reading about the insomnia plague, my thought was that Macondo will eventually be forgotten as well.
I absolutely despise Amaranta's character. She threatened to kill Rebeca and even planned poisoning her as a last resort so that she could marry Crespi, but when Rebeca marries Jose Arcadio instead, Crespi eventually asks Amranta to marry him, but she denies, which leads to his suicide.
I agree with Angela's "poor fellow" remark. Crespi has been a friendly supporter of the Buendia family and gets rejected by both girls in the family. Why would Rebeca marry Jose Arcadio anyways?! She was heads- over- heels in love with Crespi, and all after wanting to have sex with Jose Arcadio, leaves Crespi for the pleasure. And Amaranta, she was madly in love with Crespi, too, but why deny him?! She probably got bored of him because nothing pleasurable happened between them. But i would disagree with Cynthia on her having too much pride.
I agree with Stephen when he says that he was surprised at the incest and sex in this story. Aureliano in the beginning of the story had no woman in his life, after the death of his child wife, which was also surprising and gross to me, he becomes a colonel and has 17 children with 17 different women, not including the son that Pilar Ternera bore. Jose Arcadio had frequent "visit"s with Pilar Ternera and leaving her for a gypsy that was more attractive and probably gave him more pleasure. Then he eventually becomes a man whore. Arcadio, his son, wanted to have sex with his mother, although he didn't know that she was his mother. Aureliano Segundo and Jose Arcadio Segundo both had frequent sex with Petra Cotes. And how would she not know who was who?
The civil war in Macondo, unfortunately for me, was difficult to understand. All i know is that there is a Liberal and Consevative Party and they don't agree. Its just leading to the death of each family member.
And how did Jose Arcadio Buendia learn latin so quick?
I felt that Macondo actually started going downhill when Melquiades died and became the first person to die in Macondo. There was a quote that said, “A person does not belong to a place until there is someone dead under the ground.” (13) I think that because he died, they all belong there, so they should all die there, which probably foreshadows the fall of Macondo.
So I realized again that there could be a person that’s going to experience the solitude. Now I think its Ursula because after the house became empty because of the war and marriage, Ursula began visiting her husband again from under the tree to talk to him. She says, “Look at the empty house, our children scattered all over the world, and the two of us alone again, the same as the beginning.” (106) It wasn’t her and her husband anymore though, it was just her, because he was useless now. All he could do was blurt out words in Latin, which she didn’t understand and he would die soon.
First off to respond to gypsyloo's comment about Pilar Ternera, I also think that she signifies something huge, although I'm not sure what it is yet. However, her name in Spanish reminds me of Terra Nera which means black earth. We'll see....
Everyone has pretty much agreed that the gypsies helped/bascially caused the fall of Macondo. However, I also think some of that blame should be put on the organized religion that came into the town. Before the priest arrives to build the church, shame practically didn't exist, such as when Jose Arcadio married his sister, stealing her away from her fiancee, and at the end saying, "I don't care if she's my sister." And when Macondo tries to get back it's innocence is when things really won't turn back.
With that said, I don't agree with Lilly when she says that a person is going to experience 100 years of solitude. To me, it seems like the Beundia family is going to experience it, starting with the fall of Jose Arcadio I.
The way in which Marquez incorporates magic into reality is probably my favorite part so far. In so many ways, I find these supposedly unreal magical items to be so much like many of the technology we have today in our own society. With all the inventions Melquaides brings into Macondo, especially Jose Arcadio Buendia, civilization rapidly advances. These people have a thirst to want more, constantly wondering what would happen if this or that happens that may eventually lead to evolution in how everyone lives. In many ways, the people in Macondo were afraid of loosing what they had achieved and what they worked so hard to discover, that’s why when the insomnia plague hit the village, “the most fearsome part of the sickness of insomnia was not the impossibility of sleep…but its inexorable evolution toward a more crucial manifestation: a loss of memory (45). This connects the reader to the story, any person is terrified of loosing one’s own past and present, all the memories that make who we are; to loose this is almost equivalent to becoming nothing. This strategy of connecting the reader to the story is similar to Things Fall Apart, the reader connects with Okonkwo through emotion as well.
Another interesting point that I discovered in this book is how the author depicts Jose Arcadio Buendia as a figure like Jesus. I see Nessa and Kevin have already talked about it so heres some evidence. He does this when he states, "the men on the expedition felt overwhelmed by their most ancient memories in that paradise of dampness and silence, going back to before original sin, as their books sank into pools of steaming oil and their machetes destroyed bloody lilies and golden salamanders...sleepwalks through a universe of grief, lighted only by the tenuous reflection of luminous insects and their lungs were overwhelmed by a suffocating smell of blood…."It's all right," Jose Arcadio Buendia would say. 'The main thing is not to lose our bearing.'....he kept on guiding his men toward the invisible north so that they would be able to get out of that enchanted region," (11) to emphasize the terrible conditions, gloom, and darkness the rest of his crew faced and the strong guidance and determination Jose had to get his crew out of this area and into a brighter, more promising area. He even references sin and then states, "When they woke up, with the sun already high in the sky, they were speechless with fascination" to emphasize that Jose may have led them to arrive to heaven.
Thank's Ms. Clapp for this great read!
A connection that i can make with this novel is that, i love fiction and practically all the novels I've read in the past were fiction. But the fiction that Marquez writes is unlike anything I've read before. I honestly find myself saying "Impossible" the majority of the time as I read. And I've noticed that a gypsyloo also mentioned the same word "impossible" for some of the strange things the characters can do or events that happen.
I noted this on a post it note in the novel that a lot of the vocabulary is quite difficult. And Ms. Clapp mentioned this the day she gave 100 Years to us. But i understand that some of the words are pulled out of the dictionary because the book was translated into English. So not understanding words half of the time is okay. But it's also a positive that some of the words are difficult because one could always go to dictionary.com or even the dictionary and look them up.
dictionary.com preferred.
Marquez's writing style pulls me into what he's saying. For example,
"[Jose Aracadio Buendia] spent many several days as if he were bewithed, softly repeating to himself a string of fearful conjectures without giving credit to his own understanding. Finally, one Tuesday in December, at lunchtime, all at once he released the whole weight of his torment. The children would remember for the rest of their lives the august solemnity with which their father, devastated by his prolonged vigil and by the wrath of his imagination, revealed his discovery to them: 'The earth is round, like an orange."
Being engulfed by the words above and then to the very end given a sentence like "the earth is round, like an orange" was both humorous and a shock because i was expecting a more dramatic statement...
But i will mention again that this book is fantastical and fiction has reached massive overload. People dying, coming back, it's crazy!
Good God, this book is confusing… Macondo dwellers should try and be a little more adventurous/original with their names, no? You should hear me attempting to explain this book to my friend… “So Jose marries Ursula… then Jose marries Rebeca… Colonel Aureliano and his 18 Aurelianos head to war where Aureliano dies!!” HUH, right? LOL
Anyways, I hear (or read) everyone blaming the gypsies for helping Macondo fall apart… but I would rather blame the villagers of Macondo instead. The way I see it is that Macondo is like a family. And the only way to destroy a family is if you are successful at weakening the family. If the family is a strong, united family however, the slow destruction of the outsiders towards the family is impossible. Macondo, though, is not a strong village, and therefore the gypsies are able to seduce them and slowly weaken them.
I’m excited to see the development of the title in the book; I do notice that with every marriage (incest to the fullest… gross) there is a downfall. Perhaps this will go on for one hundred years…
Ursula is the strongest character; while her husband is the weakest. (I wonder what happened to this family for them to be condemned to see their family fall apart…) Even through loss and destruction Ursula maintains a sane head, and sticks firmly to her beliefs. Jose Arcadio Buendia however, is easily swept into the beliefs and teachings of the outsiders, the gypsies. Perhaps because he is the head of the family and he does wrong by allowing the teachings of the gypsies to over take him this is what leads to the corruption of his family.
By the way.. Procrastination is terrible. Don’t try it. Ugh!
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