One Hundred Years Of Solitude By Gabriel Garcia Marquez

The Lonely, Good Company of Books by Richard Rodriguez is an excerpt from HUNGER OF MEMORY: THE EDUCATION OF RICHARD RODRIGUEZ by Richard Rodriguez. The Lonely, Good Company of Books was published in 1982. Rodriguez is a Hispanic from San Francisco, California. He struggled with learning to read in English even though both of his parents spoke English and Spanish. Throughout the whole excerpt, Rodriguez talks about his struggles and his efforts in reading books that were tough. He criticizes the school system in the way that it does not help students with reading.

Laura Hillenbrand is an America author of magazine articles and books. Hillenbrand was born in May 5, 1967, in Fairfax, Virginia. She has written only two books Seabiscuit a New York Times bestseller, and Unbroken, both non-fictions. She is considering one of the best American writers. Her New York Times Article, “A Sudden Illness” won the 2004 National magazine award, and she has also won twice the Eclipse Award, one of the highest journalist honor. Her most recent book Unbroken tells the inspiring story of Louie Zamperini, the son of Italian immigrants.

Sympathy between humans stretches a far distance, but for other beings more extraordinary compassion is thrown away at the first sight of difference. Between the two supernatural beings in Gabriel Marquez’s “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings”, one gets more kindness and awe from the ordinary people because of her human origins; while the other supernatural being, an old man with wings, is mistreated. The differences between the two being’s origins portray human nature and its detriments. That is the human nature Marquez portrays in the villagers treatment of the two paranormal beings. Treatment of supernatural beings by humans depends on an explanation of their origin and how they came about.

This way of writing is based on the “rational view of reality” versus the “acceptance of the supernatural” (Moore). Magical realism is usually associated with contemporary Latin American fiction but it is also seen in the writings of authors from different countries (Lodge 114). The unexplained fantasy in these works is used to depict “historical convulsions and … wrenching personal upheavals” that can not be otherwise described adequately in a realistic fashion (Lodge 114). One of the best known magical realism novels is Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude. The best known magical realism short story author however, is Jorge Luis Borges. Although Latin American literature was predominantly written by males in the past, it is becoming more diverse now with the voices of females, homosexuals, and Jews.

How can anyone be prepared, physically or mentally, for the challenges faced as a prisoner of war? In the novel, Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand, Louie Zamperini faces a rough childhood and rigorous athletic career that in many ways conditioned him for the hurdles he would have to jump later in life. His childhood as a delinquent and training as an Olympic athlete were deciding factors in his will to survive and overcome.

When writing the introduction to Fahrenheit 451, author Neil Gaiman stated that “ideas--written ideas--are special. They are the way we transmit our stories and our thoughts from one generation to the next. If we lose them, we lose our shared history”. Gaiman is absolutely correct; especially because what he is saying heavily applies to books. Books are a critical aspect in shaping humanity as a whole, they create and share a network of creative ideas, history, and overall entertainment; to lose books would be like losing patches of humankind’s history. Creativity, history, feelings and thoughts: all of the aspects that make us human...gone. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury illustrates the story of a man named Guy Montag who struggles to live in a futuristic dystopian society where censorship through book burning is prominent. Throughout Fahrenheit 451, Bradbury uses multiple motifs to emphasize a certain idea or convey a message to the reader better. A motif is a recurring subject, theme, idea, or even a physical object that appears in literature. Ray Bradbury’s hostile tone towards technology gives meaning to the reader by depicting the message that technology has the power to completely detach people from their genuine emotions, as well as urge readers to not get too attached to technology because it separates them from relationships in real life.

Human behaviors are recurring themes in many written works. These behaviors vary depending on the point the author is trying to make. In “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” Gabriel Garcia Marquez aims to reveal the impact of certain human behaviors. The behaviors Marquez uses are patience versus impatience, and judgment.

The book that I read for my IRP and will reviewing is Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. This book was published by Ballantine Publishing group books in october 1953. Ray Bradbury felt that this 179 page book is a masterpiece.and knew this book would become popular.

One of the points that is consistently brought up in Toni Morrison’s Paradise is that of the all black town “Ruby”. Paradise uses the setting of Oklahoma to discuss how many black towns are shaped by past history and religion. While the town in this novel is fictional, there have been real all black towns in the United States, and it seems that these towns influenced many aspects of the town Ruby, which is why it is so easy to imagine that the story could actually be real. Many authors have written in general about the novel, and specifically about the town within it.

I ask you for a man’s head… and I do so with a heart at ease… Never as strongly as today have I felt this painful duty made easier, lighter, clearer by the certain knowledge of a sacred imperative and by the horror I feel when I look into a man’s face and all I see is a monster (Camus, 1988). “The stranger” by Albert Camus a creative and deep novel about a human being named Meursault who is a man that makes no normal assumptions about life. This novel deals with the issue of nonexistent belongingness in Algerian society. He is a man without social ambition, no beliefs in religion or meaning of life, and whose only desire is to live a simple life free of any meaning (Gnanasekaran, 2014). He is a man who is living on the earth with no purpose and is indifferent to everything that happens around him.

The Solitude of Self is a speech that was given by Elizabeth Cady Stanton, who was a leader of the women’s suffrage movement. This speech mainly discussed gender equality in every situation, including education and suffrage. Stanton clearly was opposed to the idea of inequality and believed that every person, man or woman, deserved to have the same rights.

   One Hundred Year of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia-Marquez projects itself among the most famous and ambitious works in the history of literature. Epic in scope, Marquez weaves autobiography, allegory and historical allusion to create a surprisingly coherent story line about his forebears, his descendants and ours.

In the novel, The Stranger by Albert Camus, Meursault the protagonist, becomes drawn into a “senseless” murder that has to face the absurdity of life and because of his actions, Meursault is presented as a danger due to his lack of “morality” to society. Meursault who is not able to take control of his life but respond to what life offers him believes in the simplicity of life. He tries to understand the living through logic and objectivity, which ultimately turns futile, as he himself cannot maintain proper control over his thoughts and emotions. From the interactions between Marie, to the murder of the Arab, and the meeting with the Chaplain, Meursault overcomes his indifferent views to form an opinion about what life really means. The central theme presented by Camus is how the threat of mortality becomes a catalyst for understanding the significance of life.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez has dealt with historical themes in several of his fictions, but in One Hundred Years of Solitude, the author makes a statement about history and the importance of historical consciousness. In this paper, the view of history expressed by Gabriel Garcia Marquez in One Hundred Years of Solitude will be the focus.

Garcia Marquez has said that "One Hundred Years of Solitude is not a history of Latin America, it is a metaphor for Latin America" (Dreifus 1983:1974). The historical themes include conquest and colonization, settlement and scientific discovery, civil wars, foreign economic intervention, technological change, and finally the decay and disappearance of a long-established way of life.