One Hundred Years of Solitude
Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Published 1967
Columbian Novel
The Well-Educated Mind Novels
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
This is the end of week one of the One Hundred Years of Solitude Read-along, hosted by Silvia Cachia and myself. Have you completed the first four chapters? What are your impressions so far?
This is my second reading. While my first experience was reserved, this time I am treasuring it as pleasurable and entertaining. It is a simple and rapid read, not loaded down with heavy themes or long-winded emotional narration. Yet, it is not a typical novel, often jumping into the future and back into the past. Has anyone else found this challenging?
What about keeping the characters straight -- especially when same names are used for multiple people? This is still a frustration for me. Given that this story is focused on multiple generations of the Buendía family, a family tree visual or map may be helpful. I like the ones with images or illustrations instead of only names. It helps to put a face with a name. By the way, has anyone noticed that the surname Buendía means good day?
REVIEW OF CH. 1 - 4
Chapter One: The story began and then immediately jumped into the past, to Col. Aureliano's youth, as he remembered his former days. His father, José Arcadio Buendía, and mother, Ursula, had two sons, Aureliano and José Arcadio II. Buendía was not a present father. He was fascinated by knowledge and spent hours experimenting, while Ursula was a strong character, who challenged her husband and grounded her family. Aureliano was mystifying, but José II was strong and much like his father.
Chapter Two: Going back further to the beginning of the history of the Buendía family and the founding of Macondo, the experience was similar to the retelling of the first man and woman in the Garden of Eden. It was like the beginning of time; however, readers know there is a whole world beyond Macondo, but the gypsies are the only connection the people of Macondo seem to have with civilization and the rest of the world.
Ursula and Buendía were cousins and afraid of having deformed offspring; therefore, she had avoided her husband until he won a cockfight and his opponent mocked him. Buendía killed the man, ultimately solving the matter with his wife. The ghost of the dead man haunted them until Ursula and Buendía left their home and, along with some friends, traveled for two years until they settled down and founded the town Macondo.
As an adult, José Arcadio impregnated a woman named Pilar, then abandoned her and his future child, and left Macondo with the gypsies. Ursula searched for him for five years but never found him; however, she did find the route her husband had been searching for out of Macondo.
Chapter Three: Pilar gave birth to a son and named him José Arcadio, but was referred to as Arcadio so as not to be confused with his father or grandfather. The Buendía family adopted a young orphan girl named Rebeca. She had insomnia, which spread throughout the town and eventually developed into anemia, so that people lost their memories, which was a terrible thing. However, the gypsy, Melquiades, found a cure using a daguerreotype, a kind of camera that made photographs.
Then, Don Apolinar Moscote moved into town and set up a magistrate, ordering everyone to paint his house a particular color. José Arcadio Buendía ran him out of town, but Moscote returned with soldiers. Buendía agreed Moscote could remain the magistrate, but only if people could paint their houses the color they like and that the soldiers leave, which he agreed to.
Moscote also had a very young daughter, Remedios, whom Aureliano fell in love with.
Chapter Four: OK...following are my actual margin notes for chapter four:
Aureliano slept with Pilar (the one José impregnated). Amaranta (third child of Buendía and Ursula) and Rebeca (who eats dirt) fell in love with Pietro (the Italian piano guy). They are lovesick. Pietro wants to marry the dirt-eater, while Amaranta vows revenge. (So soap opera-ish!)
Meanwhile, Aureliano will marry Remedios, who is still in diapers. Gypsy, Melquiades died. Pilar is pregnant with Aureliano's baby. Buendía goes mad because he is obsessed about knowledge. He is tied to a tree in hopes that he will calm down, but he remains until the end of his life.
WEEK ONE WRAP UP
I sure did leave out a lot! This is only the tip of the iceberg. So much is happening -- some of which is comical, though should be read without giggling. One thing I did not discuss is the historical timeline that coincides with the fictional story of Macondo. The time line is 1850 to 1950, and through chapter four, South America is experiencing Civil War. I will try to find an historical outline that matches with the fictional timeline of Macondo.
Other than that, I find this story reads a lot like a soap opera, but in an intriguing and interesting way. Be sure to share what you have been getting out of your reading, if you have joined us.
QUOTES ON SOLITUDE
Anxious for solitude, bitten by a virulent rancor against the world, one night he left his bed...to mingle in the tumult of the fair.
Then he gave himself over to that hand...not knowing what he was doing...and the bewildered anxiety to flee and at the same time stay forever in that exasperated silence and that fearful solitude.
He really had been through death, but he had returned because he could not bear the solitude.
He looked for her in her sisters' shop, behind the window shades in her house, in her fathers office, but he found her only in the image that saturated his private and terrible solitude.
FOR FUN
I love book covers. Book covers equal art. Here are 100 Covers of Gabriel García Márquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude (from 1967 to 2018). This one is my favorite ------>
MISCELLANEOUS
This is unrelated to better things like reading literature and talking about it...but I can't ignore this anymore: the world has been turned upside down because of this stupid virus. It has been a major disruption, and the way the world and individuals are responding has been irritating. (There was a run on toilet paper at our local Costco! No pun intended. My family was ready to go to Arizona for a Dodger game this weekend, and it looks like they are suspending spring training. It's utter madness!) Having said all that, I cannot help but think about you all, especially those in other regions hardest hit, and I want you all to be healthy. Take care of yourselves and don't get sick. Ever. OK? Praying this all passes soon so we can return to common sense.
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FIRST...COVID19 UPDATE FROM SO CAL, USA
What a week! It seems it was a completely different century when I last posted One Hundred Years of Solitude WEEK #1; and how ironic that the title consists of the word SOLITUDE. There are a few extrovert-types in my household who are climbing the walls because of all this "solitude."
By the way, I'm not one of them.
Monday, the state of California issued a "stay-at-home" edict, permitting essential businesses to remain open, while requiring others to close to the public. A lot of folks have been laid off, while some are able to work from home. Basically, our economy has tanked. How are we going to take care of all these people, many who are financially unprepared for this? Nor do I know how long some will be able to contend with this long-term isolation.
On the grocery front, I continue to add items I still cannot find no matter where we go: eggs, rice, pasta, and chicken breast, which are staples in our house, and everyone else, obviously. (I knew we should have raised hens!) My husband told me he found a store today that received a shipment of flour, but the employee didn't want to unbox it yet, and my husband didn't want to wait 20 minutes when she expected to shelve it. So...I told him to see if they had pancake mix or Bisquick. In these times, one is forced to be resourceful. And I'm fine with that.
Finally, after five days of no gym, no dance classes, no piano lessons (we homeschool, so we didn't need to change routine for school), we decided to go OUTSIDE today! Yes, we got into our van and went to the Mojave Riverwalk. The kids rode bikes or rollerbladed, and we even met some friends who were out doing the same with their kids. It was finally a beautiful day. It felt like a little bit of sanity. So many people were using the riverwalk, and everyone said hello and good morning. Humans! It was a relief to have some connection with the outside world. Not surprisingly, we introverts need people connections, even if it is in passing.
REVIEW OF CH. 5 - 7
Chapter 5: Aureliano and Remedios were married. Father Nicanor Reyna remained in Macondo because he believed the people were living in sin and needed religion. Pietro and Rebeca's wedding was postponed because his mother died (but that was a lie). Amaranta poisoned Remedios, who subsequently died; hence, Aureliano plunged back into solitary work. It was discovered that José Arcadio Buendia was not mad, as assumed, and he could speak Latin.
Later José Arcadio (the son) returned to Macondo and shared his wild adventures and also married Rebeca -- you snooze you lose, Pietro! So Pietro asked Amaranta to marry him. And for the next three chapters, Macondo became immersed in elections, corruption, politics, violence, murder, and war between the Liberals and Conservatives. (Sounds so familiar.)
Chapter 6: Col. Aureliano went to war for the liberal resistance. He also fathered seventeen kids. Arcadio (José's and Pilnar's kid) was in charge of the village during the rebellion, and he was cruel and overbearing...and creepy. He tried to sleep with his own mother, but she staved him off by sending him a virgin, which obviously worked because they had three children together.
Ursula wasn't having any of Arcadio's crap; she challenged him and basically took over the town. She found her husband, JAB, peaceful and decided to release him from his tree-arrest. Meanwhile, Pietro proposed to Amaranta, who rejected him; he, therefore, committed suicide. Arcadio surrendered and the resistance was ended. His last wish is for his daughter to be named Ursula. He was executed.
Chapter 7: So the Libs lost the war, and Aureliano was captured then freed by José. Aureliano planned a second uprising, then failed and was abandoned by the government. But he captured Macondo anyway, until he realized his rebellion was based on his pride. José died, and his wife Rebeca became a hermit. Did she really murder him? It seemed obvious, but no one knew the truth. His blood traveled all over Macondo. Almost restless. What's worse? The town thought about "seasoning him with pepper, cumin seeds, and laurel leaves and boiling him for a whole day over a slow fire..." Very concerning. Finally, JAB was visited by the ghost of the dead guy back in chapter two, and then died peacefully; tiny yellow flowers rained down on Macondo.
WEEK TWO WRAP UP
Again, this past week's reading centered mainly on the conflict of Civil War between the brothers, and ended with the death of the patriarch, who wasn't very present or effective, especially spending much of his parental life tied to a tree. I'm still looking for that timeline of real world history compared with that of Macondo's history, but I did find a timeline of characters. Someone took the time to create this.
QUOTES ON SOLITUDE
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.
As soon as they took the body out, Rebeca closed the doors of her house and buried herself alive, covered with a thick crust of disdain that no earthly temptation was ever able to break.
I'll be back next Friday when I check in with my third review of One Hundred Years (chapters 8 through 11). Are you reading along, reading ahead, or dragging behind? How are you doing with the novel? And how are things in your part of the world? Are you in solitude? Keep us posted. And stay well!
***
I sure hope I am right in my summaries. These are my marginal notes that I record while I read, and I have to return to them and try and make sense of them. But are there any incorrect understandings to One Hundred Years of Solitude?
REVIEW OF CH. 8 - 11
Chapter 8: I was wrong! War was not over. In fact, war and rumors of war continued. There was so much war, it had hardened many hearts. In fact, there was so much hardness of heart, many characters retreated into solitude. As a result of alienation, immorality was encouraged. For example, A.J., who deserted the rebel army, pursued an incestuous relationship with his Auntie Amaranta.
Meanwhile, José Moncada, a compassionate official, became the mayor of Macondo. Ursula resisted aging. Twins were born to Santa Sofia de la Piedad and Arcadio: Aureliano II and José II, as well as a daughter, Remedios "the Beauty." And A.J. was determined to make an honest woman of his Amaranta, but he should have known she would never marry any man, least of all her nephew.
Col. Aureliano had 17 sons with 17 different women, and then led "the most prolonged, radical, and bloody rebellion of all those he had started up till then." Ursula had this to say about her sons:
They're all alike. At first they 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.
A.J. was shot and bled to death. General Moncada entered the war to defend Macondo against Col. Aureliano, but was captured and executed by Aureliano, who's heart, as I said earlier, had been hardened by war.
Chapter 9:
Col. Márquez became the new military leader of Macondo. As the war spread, it became more clear that war was empty and served no purpose. Meanwhile, Col. Aureliano was drunk with his own power and lost the use of good judgment. He knew "that all we're fighting for is power." Soon Col. Márquez was also condemned to death. Ursula was angry with her son, threatened him, and told him,
It's the same as if you'd been born with the tail of a pig.
That night Col. Aureliano had a change of heart. He had spent twenty years at war, and his children hardly knew him. So he agreed to a peace treaty and went home to seclusion. I think he needed time to assimilate after all those years of war. He needed time to get his memories back.
Chapter 10:
This chapter focused on Aureliano II and his life. There is a lot of back and forth.
Aureliano II married Fernanda. They named their son José Arcadio. Ursula was frustrated with the repetition of names and thought it a "tragic sign."
The story retraced the history of the twins, Aureliano II and José Arcadio II. One wanted to see an execution and the other was curious about the locked room. Ursula permitted her great grandson to enter the room, and there he had meetings with the ghost of Melquíades.
Aureliano II recognized him at once, because that hereditary memory had been transmitted from generation to generation and had come to him through the memory of his grandfather.
When they grew up, the twins shared the same woman, Petra Cotes. Eventually, J.A. II quit his sexual escapades with Petra, but Aureliano II continued. Their wild sex life has an affect on Aureliano's farm animals, multiplying them and making him very wealthy.
Poor Ursula was disgusted by the immoral behavior of everyone, and begged:
Dear Lord, make us poor again the way we were when we founded this town so that you will not collect for this squandering in the other life.Then I'm a little unclear of what happened next: A carnival came to Macondo and Remedios the Beauty was crowned the most beautiful woman ever. And the Conservatives opened fire on the Liberals during the celebration, and a bunch of people died. Six months after the massacre, Aureliano II married Fernanda, whom I told you about at the beginning of the chapter.
Chapter 11:
Fernanda and Aureliano had a poor start to their marriage because she had a complicated upbringing. Well, and Aureliano continued his affair with Petra, and Fernanda found out. She had difficulty being accepted by the Buendia family. Nonetheless, she and Aureliano II had two children: José III and Meme, short for Remedios.
A celebration was set to acknowledge the peace treaty from chapter 10, but Col. Aureliano did not participate because he believed the treaty was a mistake. But his 17 sons, all named Aureliano, showed up to the celebration, and one of them, Triste, looked for a house to rent. He discovered an abandoned house, but there was a woman living in it. It was Rebeca! She was totally ruined and not worth discussing.
Macondo was growing and expanding, and Triste decided the town needed a railroad. So...he built one.
WEEK THREE WRAP UP
I'm beginning to see themes that I did not the first time. Besides solitude, memory is an essential theme. The need for memories, the loss of memories, and the purpose of memories are present throughout. There is also something very cyclical about One Hundred Years. Besides the repetition of names and behaviors or personalities through the generations, we can see through Ursula, the strongest and most well grounded character, when she called Col. Aureliano's repetitive work "an exasperating vicious circle." (Just like their generations.)
QUOTES ON SOLITUDE
He was seeking consolation for his abrupt solitude, for his premature adolescence with women who smelled of dead flowers, whom he idealized in the darkness and changed into Amaranta by means of the anxious efforts of his imagination.
They brought children of all ages, all colors, but all males and all with the look of solitude that left no doubt as to the relationship.
...overcome by the unbearable weight of her own obstinacy, Amaranta locked herself in her bedroom to weep over her solitude unto death after giving her final answer to her tenacious suitor: Let's forget about each other forever...
Lost in the solitude of his immense power, he began to lose direction.
REVIEW OF CH. 12 - 14
Chapter 12: The people of Macondo were fascinated by the new inventions that came to town via the new railroad, but they did not know what to make of the theater. They were apprehensive about it because acting was similar to the illusions presented by the gypsies that used to visit. Reality was truth, but illusions were lies.
Macondo was changing for the worst, especially when foreigners came, built a wall, and grew banana trees; they also brought prostitutes and other scandalous behavior like gambling, shooting galleries, and fortunetellers.
Meanwhile, Remedios the Beauty was in her own world and didn't notice that she had an affect on everyone else around her. She later floated away, never to be seen again.
Col. A.B. realized that the foreigners growing bananas were a bunch of white guys, and they had taken over the government of Macondo. When he thought he could put the thought of war behind him, he was called to arms again; he planned to enlist all 17 of his sons, until all but one of them was murdered. Because they were all marked with ashes on their foreheads, Col. A.B. blamed religion.
Chapter 13:
This chapter was mostly about Ursula and how she represented the progressive breakdown of time. She lost her sight, but was keen with her other senses and had a better understanding of her family. She could see with her memory. She knew that her son Col. A.B. never loved anyone and was incapable of love because of his sinful pride. Her daughter Amaranta was not really cold hearted, but actually afraid of being loved.
Fernanda became more controlling. Her husband, Aureliano II, moved back in with his lover, Petra, who was a party animal. He almost killed himself with his reckless behavior, and he returned to his wife, part time, either to slow down or to keep up appearances.
Finally, Col. A.B. had a weird dream and died standing up in the backyard under the same tree his father died.
Chapter 14:
Fernanda and Aureliano II had another baby girl, Amaranta Ursula. Meme came home after finishing school. She learned about her father's "side wife" and actually agreed with him for living two lives. In fact, Meme was a lot like Petra...a wild child. During one of her drunken nights, she woke with a splitting headache and drowning in vomit. Fernanda did not understand, but Ursula, who was now completely blind, gave an exact diagnosis:
As far as I can see, that's the same thing that happens to drunken people.
Amaranta was visited by death and told to make her shroud. When she realized she was going to die, she asked if anyone wanted her to take mail to the dead, and she received a whole bag full of letters.
Meanwhile, Meme fell in love with Mauricio Babylonia. When she was with him, yellow butterflies enveloped her. Well, Pilar Ternera told Meme all about sex and birth control and abortion. Meme began fooling around with Mauricio. When Fernanda found out, she locked Meme in the house.
One night, Mauricio attempted to sneak into the back room to see Meme, and guards that Fernanda requested to protect her chickens she claimed were being stolen shot him in his spine. "Mauricio died of old age in solitude...."
WEEK FOUR WRAP UP
There is a day or week in spring that comes along when little painted lady butterflies come through my yard. They flutter in a northwesterly direction, rather quickly. My property must be directly in their path. They fly over my house and dip into my yard, and then they are gone. They come by batches, for several hours in the late afternoon, when it is really warm. They are coming now as I write this. And it makes me laugh...are Meme and her lover nearby? I don't think I can ever not think of them whenever I see a butterfly.
Yes, the Buendia family is really growing on me. How about you?
QUOTES ON SOLITUDE
In the impenetrable solitude of decrepitude she had such clairvoyance as she examined the most insignificant happenings in the family that for the first time she saw clearly the truths that her busy life in former times had prevented her from seeing.
Her life was spent in weaving her shroud. It might have been said that she wove during the day and unwove during the night, and not with any hope of defeating solitude in that way, but quite the contrary, in order to nurture it.
She lost her mind over him. She could not sleep and she lost her appetite and sank so deeply into solitude that even her father became an annoyance.
REVIEW OF CH. 15 - 17
Chapter 15: Meme was distraught after Mauricio was shot; and, Fernanda sent her to live in a convent, where she later died, but not before giving birth to a baby boy named Aureliano. The nuns brought the baby to Fernanda, and she kept the baby hidden for years, telling everyone she found him inside a basket, like Moses. But she really wanted to drown the baby.
José Arcadio encouraged his workers at the "Banana Republic" to strike because they were required to work on Sundays and were not paid in cash. Ursula worried,
It's as if the world were repeating itself.
The army attempted to establish order through martial law, but the workers organized and caused chaos. When the workers and their families assembled in the square to discuss the problems, they were gunned down, including women and children. Later the bodies were loaded onto the train to be removed; but José Arcadio, who was wounded, escaped alive.
The government lied about the workers going home and instead abandoned the plantation. José Arcadio hid out in Melquíades room for a while, and four years of rain began to fall on Macondo.
Chapter 16:
So, it rained and rained and rained. Aureliano II was stuck at Fernanda's house during the rain, while Petra was worried because all of Aureliano's animals were drowning. When he went back to Petra, he realized he had nothing more to do with her, and he returned to Fernanda where things got worse.
For two and a half pages, in one dragged out sentence, Fernanda complained to her husband about everything in her life, sending Aureliano into a massive violent rage.
The rain finally stopped, but the damage to Macondo was done.
Chapter 17:
Ursula thought she would die as soon as the rains ended, but instead was able to get her house in order. She spent time with her great-great grandchildren until she lost her senses completely. Finally she died on Good Friday, which is today for me. She was 120 years old!
Then came a heat wave, which put the people into a stupor and made them lazy. The gypsies revisited the town with all of their inventions as they did in the beginning.
Rebeca died. She was a mess. Something was wrong with Fernanda's health, but she refused to go to a real physical doctor. Aureliano II became a loner, and José Arcadio developed a pain in his throat, which he thought was caused by Fernanda doing witchcraft against him.
Finally both Aureliano II and José Arcadio II died on the same day, leaving everyone still confused over who was who.
WEEK FIVE WRAP UP
What a week! Felt like a month. The massacre of the banana plantation families was very disturbing. And the 2 1/2 pages of Fernanda's complaints do run in one marathon sentence. The only period came on the third page. Pretty amazing. My notes in these chapters from my previous reading included: "weird," "like a weird dream," "so weird," "sick," and even "I hate this dumb book." Maybe Márquez was wearing on me because his ideas are consistent from the beginning. But, as I said last week, the Buendía family is growing on me, and I was sad to see so much death now, especially Ursula, the wisdom of the family.
The spirit of her invincible heart guided her through the shadows.
QUOTES ON SOLITUDE
But Aureliano himself seemed to prefer the cloister of solitude and he did not show the least desire to know the world that began at the street door of the house.
4/17/20
Today is the six-year anniversary of the death of Gabriel García Márquez. This is my final review of One Hundred Years of Solitude.
REVIEW OF CH. 18 - 20
Chapter 18: Melquíades was fading away and anxious to transfer all of his knowledge to Aureliano Babilonia, who took up the obsessive quest of deciphering Melquíades' parchments.
Aureliano Segundo was a prisoner in his own home. He and Fernanda "did not share their solitude, but they continued living on their own..." In this chapter, Fernanda conveniently died.
Soon after, José Arcadio III returned from Rome, but he was no saint, nor did he ever become Pope. He lived a wild life.
A strange man arrived in Macondo; he was the only surviving son of Col. Aureliano, Aureliano Amador. Unfortunately, he was pursued by police and shot in the head.
One day, while José Arcadio III was hanging out with friends, they discovered the hidden gold that Ursula had buried and kept from the family; later, the friends returned, murdered JA III, and stole the gold anyway.
Chapter 19: Amaranta Ursula, the last child of Fernanda and Aureliano Segundo, returned to Macondo with her husband, Gaston, who had no intention of staying in Macondo. Like Ursula, Amaranta took charge and managed the house. She was a modern woman and had high expectations for Macondo.
Unfortunately, in this chapter, we found out what happened to the 3000 dead people on the train; they were thrown into the sea. (This event is modeled after a similar historical event and where we get the term Banana Republic.)
There was a lot of prostitution and brothels going on, as well, some of it supported by Pilar Ternera, the oldest person from Macondo.
And finally, Aureliano Babilonia fell in love with Amaranta Ursula, and they became inappropriately involved.
Chapter 20: Finally, Pilar Ternera died, while Macondo was falling into ruin and being forgotten...
even by the birds, where the dust and the heat had become so strong that it was difficult to breathe, secluded by solitude and love and by the solitude of love in a house where it was almost impossible to sleep...
The only happy ones were Amaranta Ursula and Aureliano Babilonia: "the most happy on the face of the earth."
Oh, and Gaston? He went back to Brussels. But Amaranta Ursula and Aureliano Babilonia...I'll let Marquez describe it:
both of them remained floating in an empty universe where the only everyday and eternal reality was love.
They preferred death to separation.
They married and expected a child. But remember, Fernanda lied about who little Aureliano was. This is where your brain has to do the math. What was the relationship between these two? For a while, he thought he was his wife's brother!
When their son was born, Amaranta recognized the resemblance of a "great Buendía...strong and willful like the José Arcadios...the open and clairvoyant eyes of the Aurelianos;" she believed he was "predisposed to begin the race again from the beginning and cleanse it of its pernicious vices and solitary calling, for he was the only one in a century who had been engendered with love."
When they looked him over, there it was: the tail of a pig! But they did not know the fear, nor did they remember the meaning, and so they thought nothing of it.
Amaranta Ursula died after giving birth to her son, Aureliano III. Distraught, Aureliano Babilonia ran off and got drunk. When he later remembered his son, it was too late. Baby Aureliano III was dead - the last Buendía to be born.
Since Aureliano Babilonia had been able to translate Melquíades parchments, he deciphered that it was all a prophecy about the history and fate of Macondo. In it, he learned that Amaranta Ursula was not his sister, but his aunt. And when he sought to know what would be his death, he did not realize that a violent hurricane was brewing in Macondo, one that would wipe its memory and the memory of the Buendía family from the face of the earth forever.
WEEK SIX WRAP UP
My brain hurts! Trying to keep all of those family relations straight when they couldn't keep things straight themselves. In the same breath, that last chapter came full circle and brought the Buendía family to a close; it was literally and figuratively amazing! It truly was a whirlwind.
Trivia: Did you know that on the day Márquez brought his manuscript to the publisher, a gust of wind ripped the pages either from his wife's hands or his, and they chased them in the street, retrieving each one and putting them back together in order again.
When I first read One Hundred Years of Solitude, in 2014, the year Gabriel García Márquez died, I disliked it very much, mainly because it was ambiguous and insanely frustrating. However, this second read has proved extremely profitable, as I have gained considerable appreciation for the story of One Hundred Years, the characters of Macondo, and the genre of magical realism.
I, too, like Brona, am ready to read Love in the Time of Cholera.
QUOTES ON SOLITUDE
Never a lament had been heard from that stealthy, impenetrable woman who had sown in the family the angelic seed of Remedios the Beauty and the mysterious solemnity of José Arcadio II; who dedicated a whole life of solitude and diligence to the rearing of children although she could barely remember whether they were her children or grandchildren...
She became human in her solitude.
...everything written on them was unrepeatable since time immemorial and forever more, because races condemned to one hundred years of solitude did not have a second opportunity on earth.
Thank you to my co-host, Silvia, for encouraging me to reread One Hundred Years and for putting together this read-along. Thank you all who have participated. If you did participate, drop a link in the comments and share your final review.
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