Gabriel GarcÍa MÁrquez

Born: March 6, 1928
Aracataca, Colombia
Colombian novelist, short-story writer, and journalist

Gabriel García Márquez is a Colombian novelist, short-story writer, and journalist whose works have earned him the reputation of being one of the greatest living writers in Spain and Latin America.

Education and newspaper jobs

Born in Aracataca, Colombia, on March 6, 1928, Gabriel García Márquez was the oldest of Gabriel Eligio García and Luisa Santiaga Márquez Iguarán's twelve children. His father was a telegraph operator. The family was poor, and García Márquez spent the first eight years of his life with his maternal grandparents. They were the most important and influential people in his life, and he loved listening to them tell stories about Colombia's old days.

García Márquez received his early education from the Liceo Nacional of Zipaquirá, Colombia, from which he graduated in 1946. He then entered the University of Bogotá to study law. (He studied for several years but did not enjoy it and never finished.) He wrote his first story in 1947, and it was published in the newspaper El Espectador. Over the next few years he had several more stories published in newspapers. In 1948 civil war broke out in the country and García Márquez moved to Cartagena, Colombia, where he worked as a journalist for the newspaper El Universal. In 1950 he moved to Barranquilla, Colombia, where he wrote for El Heraldo. In 1954 he returned to Bogotá and worked at El Espectador while writing short stories on the side.

Early works

Between 1955 and 1960 several published works had begun to establish García Márquez's fame in the Spanish-speaking world. La hojarasca (1955), a short novel, is set in the made-up town of Macondo in the swampy coastal area of northeastern Colombia known as the Ciénaga. The story reflects the changes the twentieth century brought to the life of this sleepy country town. Much of García Márquez's work centers around funerals. In La hojarasca mourners who knew the dead man in life think about the past, each from his own point of view. Three different people—an old colonel, his daughter, and her son—tell their story. The dead man, a doctor and former friend of the colonel, had committed suicide. The narrators do not entirely explain what happened, but in the course of each story much of the past history of the village of Macondo is revealed. A strong feeling of doom fills the novel.

Macondo and the Buendía family were further developed in El coronel no tiene quien le escriba (1961; Nobody Writes to the Colonel and Other Stories ). The next collection of short stories, Los funerales de la Mama Grande (1962), strengthened García Márquez's growing reputation. The publication of Cien años de soledad (1967; One Hundred Years of Solitude ) created a stir when it sold over one hundred thousand copies in fifteen editions in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1969.

The story of Cien años de soledad describes the rise and fall of a village as seen in the lives of five generations of one family. It ends with flood and drought, which comes as the last living Buendía figures out the ancient predictions of doom and learns that "races condemned to 100 years of solitude did not have a second opportunity on earth." The family is meant to represent Colombia, and through extension, both South America and the rest of the world. Pablo Neruda (1904–1973), the famous Chilean poet, praised Cien años de soledad, and it is generally considered García Márquez's masterpiece.

Other works

García Márquez considered his next novel, El otono del patriarca (1975; The Autumn of the Patriarch ), "a perfect integration (combination) of journalism and literature." García Márquez continued to write novels, short stories, essays, and film scripts. In 1982 he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. In 1983 he wrote the film script Erendira, adapted from his 1972 novella (short novel) La increible y triste historia de la candida Erendira y su abuela desalmada (Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother ).

García Márquez's other famous novel, El amor en los tiempos del colera (Love in the Time of Cholera ) was written in 1985 (with an English translation published in 1988). This novel is an exploration of love and the relationship between aging, death, and decay. After Cholera he published the novels El general en su laber-into (1989; The General in His Labyrinth, 1990), Doce cuentos peregrinos (1992; Strange Pilgrims, 1993), and Of Love and Other Demons (1994).

García Márquez's fictional blend of history, politics, real social situations, and fantasy (something made up) has given rise to the term "magical realism." The use of magical realism was often imitated by other Latin American authors, especially Isabel Allende (1942–). García Márquez's need to tell a story drives his writing. In the July 1997 issue of Harper's, García Márquez writes, "The best story is not always the first one but rather the one that is told better."

Later years

In 1999 García Márquez returned to journalism with the purchase of Cambio, a weekly newspaper in Colombia. He rolled up his sleeves and went to work trying to improve both the paper's content and its sales. His duties ranged from interviewing heads of state and business leaders to editing copy and photographs. García Márquez told the New York Times that he wanted his paper's young reporters "to tell a story, to go back to the time when a reader could know what happened as if he were there himself."

Later that year García Márquez was diagnosed with cancer and disappeared from public life. Rumors began to circulate that he was dying, aided by a poem appearing on the Internet supposedly written by him as a sort of farewell. In December 2000 García Márquez gave an interview in which he denied writing the poem and said that he had been keeping a low profile because he was busy writing his autobiography (the story of one's own life), which he decided to do after learning that he had cancer. In March 2001 García Márquez announced that he would never set foot in Spain again unless a new European Union rule requiring Colombian citizens to obtain visas (identification documents permitting travel into foreign countries) before entering Spain was withdrawn.

For More Information

Bell-Villada, Gene H. García Márquez: The Man and His Work. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1990.

Dolan, Sean. Gabriel García Márquez. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1994.

Gabriel García Márquez

Gabriel García Márquez (born 1928) was a Colombian novelist, short-story writer, and journalist whose works earned him the reputation of being the greatest living writer of Castilian in Spain and Latin America.

Born in Aracata, Magdalena, Gabriel García Márquez received his early education and baccalaureate degree from the Liceo Nacional of Zipaquirá in 1946. That year he started working as a newspaper editor for El Universal in Cartagena. In 1948 he moved to Barranquilla, where he was editor of El Heraldo until 1952. Then he became editor of the liberal newspaper El Espectador in Bogotá during repressive eras of the conservative dictators Laureano Gómez and his successor, General Gustavo Rojas Pinilla.

Between 1955 and 1960 several short stories and a novella had begun to establish García Márquez's fame in the Spanish-speaking world. La hojarasca (1955), a short novel, is set, like his later works, in the mythical town of Macondo in the swampy coastal area of northeastern Colombia known as the Ciénaga. The story reflects the changes the 20th century wrought in the life of this sleepy country town. Much of García Márquez's work centers on funerals. In La hojarasca mourners who knew the dead man in life contemplate the past, each from his own point of view. In three monologues these persons—an old colonel, his daughter Isabel, and Isabel's son—tell their story. The dead man, a doctor and former friend of the colonel, had committed suicide. The narrators do not entirely explain the motives of the suicide, but in the course of each story much of the past history of the village of Macondo is revealed. A strong premonition of imminent, relentless, and inevitable doom for Macondo permeates the novel.

Macondo and the Buendía family were further developed in El coronel no tiene quien le escriba (1961; Nobody Writes to the Colonel and Other Stories). The next short stories, Los funerales de la Mama Grande (1962), strengthened the growing reputation of García Márquez. The publication of Cien años de soledad (1967; One Hundred Years of Solitude) constituted something of a literary phenomenon when it sold over 100,000 copies in 15 editions in Buenos Aires in 1969.

The story of Cien años de soledad depicts the rise and fall of a village as seen in the lives of five generations of one family—an almost biblical pentateuch—ending appropriately with flood and drought, climaxed by cyclonic winds of final destruction, which comes as the last living Buendía deciphers the ancient prophecies of doom and learns that "races condemned to 100 years of solitude did not have a second opportunity on earth." The setting of this novel is a microcosm for Colombia, and through extension, both South America and the rest of the world. Pablo Neruda, the most famous Chilean poet, called Cien años de soledad, "the greatest revelation in the Spanish language since the Don Quixote of Cervantes." This novel is generally considered García Márquez's masterpiece.

García Márquez considered his next novel, El otono del patriarca (1975; The Autumn of the Patriarch), "a perfect integration of journalism and literature." García Márquez continued to write novels, short stories, essays, and film scripts. In 1982 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature. In 1983, he wrote the film script Erendira adapted from his 1972 novella La increible y triste historia de la candida Erendira y su abuela desalmada (Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother). García Márquez's other famous novel, El amor en los tiempos del colera (Love in the Time of Cholera) was written in 1985 (with an English translation published in 1988). This novel is an exploration of the manifestations of love and the relationship between aging, death, and decay. After Cholera he published the novels Elgeneral en su laber into (1989; The General in His Labyrinth, 1990), Doce cuentos peregrinos (1992; Strange Pilgrims, 1993), and Love and Other Demons (1994).

García Márquez's fictional blend of history, politics, social realism, and fantasy has given rise to the term "magical realism." The use of magical realism was often imitated by other Latin American authors, most notably, Isabel Allende. His need to tell the story drives García Márquez's writing. In the July 1997 issue of Harper's, García Márquez writes, "the best story is not always the first one but rather the one that is told better." Because of his storytelling ability, García Márquez has assured himself a place in history as the greatest Latin American writer of the 20th century.

Further Reading

Critical interpretations of Gabriel García Márquez's work can be found in the series Contemporary Literary Criticism, Gale, Volume 2, 1974; Volume 3, 1975; Volume 8, 1978; Volume 10, 1979; Volume 15, 1980; Volume 27, 1984; Volume 47, 1988; and Volume 55, 1989. Interviews with García Márquez appeared in PMLA: Publications of the Modern Language Association, March 1989; Variety, March 25-31, 1996; World Policy Journal, Summer 1996; and Booklist, March 15, 1997. □

Gabriel García Márquez , 1928–, Colombian novelist, short-story writer, and journalist, b. Aracataca. Widely considered the greatest living Latin American master of narrative, García Márquez won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1982. He began his literary career while a law student in Barranquilla, publishing stories in local magazines. He left Colombia in the late 1950s and has since lived in many places, later in life mainly in Mexico City. Drawing on his own history and that of his family, town, and nation and reflecting the influence of writers such as Jorges Luis Borges , Miguel Angel Asturias , and Alejo Carpentier , his work focuses on the physical and moral travail of coastal Colombia, which is given universal meaning in his books.

His two masterpieces One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967, tr. 1970), his best-known work, and Love in the Time of Cholera (1985, tr. 1988), present his central themes of violence, solitude, and the overwhelming human need for love. García Márquez's style marks a high point in Latin American magic realism ; it is rich and lucid, mixing reality and fantasy. Among his other works are Leaf Storm and Other Stories (1955, tr. 1972), No One Writes to the Colonel and Other Stories (1958, tr. 1968), Innocent Erendira and Other Stories (1972, tr. 1978), The Autumn of the Patriarch (1975, tr. 1976), The General in His Labyrinth (1989, tr. 1990), Of Love and Other Demons (1994, tr. 1995), and Memories of My Melancholy Whores (2004, tr. 2005). His nonfiction work News of a Kidnapping (1996, tr. 1997) chronicles drug-related abductions in Colombia. Living to Tell the Tale (2002, tr. 2003) is the first of a projected three-volume autobiography.

Bibliography: See P. A. Mendoza, The Fragrance of Guava: Conversations with Gabriel Garcia Márquez (1982); biography by G. Martin (2009); I. Stavans, Gabriel García Márquez: The Early Years (2010); studies by G. R. McMurray, ed. (1987), B. McGuirle and R. A. Cardwell, ed. (1987), J. Ortega, ed. (1988), K. McNerney (1989), M. Wood (1990), H. Oberhelman (1991), M. Bell (1993), R. Fiddian, ed. (1995), J. Mellen (2000), C. Kline (2002), H. Bloom, ed. (rev. ed. 2007), and P. Swanson, ed. (2010).

García Márquez, Gabriel (1928– ), Colombian novelist, whose magic realist works, including his most famous novel Cien años de soledad (1967; One Hundred Years of Solitude, 1970), have greatly influenced the younger generation of English novelists. Other works include Crónica de una muerte anunciada (1981; Chronicle of a Death Foretold, 1982); El amor en los tiempos de cólera (1988; Love in the Time of Cholera, 1988); and Doce cuentos peregrinos (1992; Strange Pilgrims, 1993). A collection of stories, published in English as Of Love and Other Demons, appeared in 1995.

García Márquez, Gabriel (1928– ) Colombian novelist. His popular novel One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967) achieves a unique combination of realism, lyricism and mythical fantasy, making it a central text of magic realism. Later works include The Autumn of the Patriarch (1975), Love in the Time of Cholera (1985), and The General in his Labyrinth (1989). He received the 1982 Nobel Prize in literature.

Gabriel García Márquez see García Márquez, Gabriel .

Márquez, Gabriel García See García Márquez