قبل أن أقول رأيي في الكتاب... أقول لمن نصحني به: سامحك الله على هذ النصحية.. أضعت مالي ووقتي فيما لا يفيد....
ثم أتعجب من أولئك الذين أعجبهم الكتاب بحيث وضعوا له خمس نجمات... بل وإن منهم من يقول إن الكتاب غير حياته... لا أدري هل كان هذا الكتاب الوحيد الذي قرأوه في حياتهم؟ هل غابت عنهم عيون الأدب؟ لا أدري ماذا حل بالذوق الأدبي للقراء العرب...
ومن ثم أقول للمترجم... هداك الله.. ضيعت وقتك وأوقاتنا في غير فائدة.. المصيبة أنه يعلق على ترجمته للكتاب فيقول إن هذه الرواية من أجمل ما قرأ!
لا أدري ما هو سر ولع كتاب أمريكا اللاتينية بالغجر والكيمياء وتحويل المعادن إلى ذهب وحجر الفلاسفة (آه من حجر الفلاسفة) والعرب ...
عندما قرأت "الخيميائي" لباولو كويلو صدمت صدمة عنيفة به لكنني أكملته إلى آخره... وهذا الكتاب يشبهه إلى حد كبير جدا...
يتنقل بك الكاتب بين الأحداث كما يتنقل الطائر وهو ينقر الحب عن الأرض....
المفروض أن تشدك الرواية لقراءتها لكنني لم أستطع أن أتجاوز الصفحة 49 من الكتاب...إذ تخيلت نفسي وأنا أقرأه كمن يمشي حافيا على الحصى في ساعة القيظ...
يكاد يكون لجميع الرجال في الرواية الاسم ذاته وهو "خوزيه أركاديو" بحيث يضطر الكاتب إلى التفرقة بينهم بترقيمهم : خوزيه الأول والحفيد والابن والجد وهكذا...
بالمختصر المفيد.. الكتاب سيء جدا بكل المعايير ..ولا أنصح به أجدا خصوصا من يمتلك ذوقا رفيعا في الأدب ومن ينتقي ما يقرأه بعناية...
تشتت وضياع... إباحية...وعلاقات محرمة (سفاح) بين الأقارب... ومضيعة كبيرة للوقت...
الحياة قصيرة لتضيعها في قراءة كتاب سيء كهذا.....

أنا بقرأ الرواية دي من قبل ما ابطل قراءة السنة دي.
و الحقيقة انا عملت أخطاء بشعة في قراءة رواية كبيرة زي دي بالذات اني حاولت ارجع للقراءة اكثر من مرة و قرأت منها اجزاء و سبتها.
أولًا الترجمة بالرغم من شهادة صديقي الأستاذ أحمد ان ترجمات سليمان العطار من أفضل الترجمات لأنه بيترجم بروية و بياخد وقته في الترجمة و بيترجم لوحده علي عكس أغلب ترجمات صالح علماني اللي هي ترجمات مكاتب ترجمة و الجودة بتختلف من جزء لجزء في نفس الكتاب.
الا اني برضه كنت بحاول الاقي اي أخطاء في الترجمة دي بسبب شك بعضهم في ترجمات سليمان العطار و ملقتش أي أخطاء مفيش اي حاجة مش واضحة، مفيش اي جزئية مش واضحة هي بتتكلم عن مين ، في رواية أغلب اللي فيها اسمهم أوريليانو أو خوسيه أركاديو انا كنت عارف في كل مرة من المقصود، مش بس كده ده انا كمان قرأتها يعتبر علي فترتين تقطتعهم فترة قصيرة، و مع ذلك عرفت دايمًا أرجعلها و أندمج في أحداثها و بشكل ما كنت فاكر أغلب الأحداث اللي قرأتها.
ثانيًا الريفيو لو ماركيز كتب الرواية دي بس و مكتبش اي حاجة تانية بعدها فهو يستحق عليها نوبل، دي تاني رواية واقعية سحرية تكتب في التاريخ يعتبر، بل قراءة الرواية دي بتدي رؤية أوضح للواقعية السحرية كمدرسة و ازاي تكتب بنفس الطريقة عن رواية بدرو بارامو لخوان رولفو بكثير، مع اني مش عارف الحقيقة هل لو بدأت بمائة عام من العزلة علي عكس بدايتي ببدرو بارامو كنت هعرف اندمج بها بنفس الشكل؟ لاني اتذكر ان بدرو بارامو كانت صعبة بالنسبة ليا بس يمكن لانها اول تجربة مع هذه المدرسة.
انا مش عارف ماركيز كتب الرواية دي علي مدار كام سنة و راجعها كام مرة، مع اني اعتقد إن أغلب الروائيين لا يراجعوا ما كتبوه بل بيكون معاهم حد بيراجع وراهم الأخطاء الإملائية، فتخيل معايا رواية 470 صفحة من القطع المتوسط، الكاتب متذكر أحداث صغيرة لحد آخر خمس صفحات في الرواية و بيدخلهم في سرده.
هنسيب فكرة ان الرواية مؤسسة للواقعية السحرية و هنسيب قدرة ماركيز في انه يخلي الرواية كلها كيان واحد بانه دايمًا فاكر أدق التفاصيل و كل الشخصيات اللي كتبها في الرواية مع انهم كثير جدًا، و استمراره في استخدامهم لحد آخر صفحة.
القصة 470 صفحة مسلية جدًا، مفيش لحظة ملل حكايات تتبعها حكايات تتبعها حكايات سرد متصل لا ينقطع، وجود الفواصل في الرواية ده رحمة بينا احنا، لكن دي رواية فعلًا مفيش فيها فترات انقطاع خالص، حتي لما بيقفز الأحداث ببعض الأيام لموت أحدهم بيرجع يحكي تاني عن أشخاص تانية لحد ما يوصل لحدث الموت ده و يقولك هما عملوا ايه وقت ما فلان مات.
آخر 300 صفحة تقريبًا من الرواية كانوا كلهم موت، بس في نفس الوقت كان فيهم حياة و كان فيهم استمرارية بس كان واضح دايمًا انها استمرارية في طريقها الي الزوال، اننا في وقت ما هينتهي الرواية بموت كل عائلة أورسولا و خوسيه أركاديو، بس النهاية مع انها كانت بنهاية العائلة الا انها تعتبر نهاية قرية ماكوندو زمان.
كنت بسأل نفسي طول الرواية مين اللي عايش مائة عام من العزلة هل هي العائلة اللي احنا بننتبع سيرتها، ولا القرية بذات نفسها.
و حتي بعد ما وصلوا قضبان القطار للقرية فضلت أسأل نفسي نفس السؤال لأن القرية ببساطة شديدة لم تتغير و فضلت منعزله علي نفسها.
و مش كل الناس غادروا القرية للرجوع لأوطانهم فيه ناس فضلت انها تموت في القرية حتي بعد موت أعمالهم.
الوصف كان خرافي، تخيل لما كاتب يوصف ست جميلة أي حد يشوفها بيفتتن بيها و تحس كانك شايفها و تعجبك كل تفاصيلها و انت كمان تفتتن بيها  بس هي بتموت و بتصعد للسماء في مشهد رائع، ده أكثر موت كنت ساخط عليه في الرواية، انا كنت عايز نحكي عن ريميديوس الجميلة 500 صفحة، الحقيقة لو فاكر بالظبط هي كانت في الصفحة الكام كنت رحت قرأت وصفها تاني.
أوريليانو الثاني بقي كان برنس الرواية الحقيقة واحد غني و بيزيد غني و قاعد ياكل و عايش في ملذات بس ، بس زي كل رجال الرواية لما بيبقي فيه أزمة بيبقوا قدها و ده اللي حصل لما خسر ثروته بسبب السيول قدر يجيب فلوس يأكل بيها بيته و يسفر ولاده يدرسوا.
أمارنتا دي عقربة الرواية مش هنتكلم عنها
الكولونيل أوريليانو بوين ديا بشكل ما كان شايل الرواية برضه لفترة كبيرة بحروبه و الإشاعات اللي بتطلع عنه من كل حته و هروبه من الموت أكثر من مرة.
صوفيا قديسة الرحمة جديرة جدًا باسمها هي كانت قبس من الرحمة في بيت أورسولا بتهتم بالجميع.
فرناندا محبتهاش خالص برضه الحقيقة هي بالنسبة ليا مكنتش شاطرة غير في التزمر و التشدد اللي لا يوجد منه فائدة ترجي.
أمارنتا أورسولا عسل حبيتها جدًا و حبيت علاقتها بأوريليانو جدًا و كنت عارف بلا شك قبل ما يتصلوا ببعض انهم قرايب محرمين بس مكنتش متذكر بالظبط في النقطة دي ايه صلة القرابة
حبيت برضه أوريليانو اللي قبل الأخير جدًا حسيته شبهي جدًا في عزلتي و حبه للكتب.
زعلت جدًا علي أوريليانو الأخير البيبي اللي نمل أكله
خوسيه أركاديو اللي كان المفروض انه بيتعلم في روما و ساب تعليمه اول ما وصل ده ابعدوه عني بدل ما اقتله تاني بشع زي امه
حبيت بيلار تيرنيرا و الأكثر منها حبيت بيترا كوتيس جدًا بالذات لحركة الجدعنه الغبية اللي عملتها في الآخر انها جوعت نفسها عشان تأكل أهل أوريليانو الثاني عشيقها.
و القنبلة بقي الأخيرة انا لسه مقتنع ان ربيكا هي اللي قتلت خوسيه أركاديو جوزها، وصف المشهد و تركه كلغز لم يعد الكاتب له ابدًا مخليني فعلًا مقتنع ان هي اللي قتلته، و هو لغز لاننا مش لاقيين دافع حقيقي، بس خوسيه اركاديو كان معروف بعلاقاته المتعدده بالنساء اللي بطلها لما اتجوز فهل عاد لهذه العلاقات، ولا هل هي قتلته من كثر ما كانت خايفه انه يرجع للعلاقات دي تاني اول ما تضيق بهم الاحوال و الفلوس، اللي مستغربله اكثر ان معرفش الحقيقة قراء قرأوا نفس الجزئية و وصلوا لنفس الاستنتاج و ده غريب جدًا لأن مباشرةًا قبل قتل خوسيه أركاديو بالنار، ماركيز وصف انها كانت ماهرة في التصويب و انها بتعرف تضرب نار.

رواية عجيبة، سرد بلا هدف، لا حبكة واضحة، وشخصيات أصابتني بالربكة والصداع
دعك طبعًا من كم العلاقات الشاذة المثيرة للغثيان على طول الـ115 صفحة التي قرأتها
حسن، أفضّل أن أكون جاهلًا لا يتذوق الأدب الرفيع، على أن أكون منافقًا فأتظاهر بغير حقيقتي.. لم تعجبني ولن أعيدها يومًا
31.03.2019

I must admit that this is the book I have spent the most time reading in, forever - nearly three months - and I have been deeply moved, filled with a sense of heaviness, and unable to put it down. I know that I am not well-read, and writing notes for such a novel may seem a bit presumptuous, but not writing would be a disservice to myself for reading such a good book. Fortunately, notes are just personal notes. Those who like this book will read it and move on, and those who haven't read it and are not interested, please stop here for now.

First of all, I am used to reading a book from the preface. If I remember correctly, this is the second book I have read without a preface. No preface means no guidance from the author, and you have to rely on your own understanding to understand the novel. I felt a little bizarre, but for the sake of the name of the novel, I decided to give it a try.

Many critics say that this is a magnum opus, an epitome of Latin America's century-long history. A magnum opus? That's for sure. An epitome? I don't know much about Latin American history, except that some of the development history can be compared, but more is not so tragic, right? The first 50 pages - I almost read them over and over again, the similar names of the Buendía family made me dizzy. It took me almost a whole day to read the first 50 pages. Many times, I had to go back and forth to see who this person was, and more often than not, I had to go back to the previous pages to figure it out. However, the suffocating plot did not allow me to relax my emotions in the slightest.

Guess what, this is what concluded from my reading: The first member of the family was tied to a tree, and the last was eaten by ants. Yes, that is it.

So how should we view the Buendia family? They had some really smart and talented people. They were brave, hardworking, and good-looking. They were strong and didn't give up easily. They could charm anyone.

But even though they were great, they only lasted a little over 100 years. Then they were gone, like the wind. It's strange, but I don't feel sad about it.

The next question is how should we approach this novel One Hundred Years of Solitude? I didn't feel super excited or sad while reading it. It was like watching water flow. The story jumped around a lot, and it was hard to follow sometimes. But I just kept reading. It was like a nap. I didn't do anything, just read.

But it was weird because I felt happy while reading this sad story. It's like knowing you will get old and die, but still smiling.

This book is about being alone, but it's also about love. Everyone in the book is trying to not be lonely. They do different things, but they all want the same thing.

People often say they feel lonely in big cities. But we are always alone. We are alone when we are born, and we are alone when we die. We are alone with our thoughts and feelings.

But being alone doesn't have to be bad. It can help us understand ourselves better. It can make us stronger. It can help us appreciate the good things in life.

So, we should not fight loneliness. We need to accept it. It's part of life. And maybe, just maybe, it can help us live a better life.

4.2 / 5 stars

Years are passing by but time stands still – such is a perception of solitude… Such is a feeling created by One Hundred Years of Solitude novel…
A myth, legend, fable, allegory, chronicle, epopee, saga, fairytale – call it as you please but magical realism applied by Gabriel García Márquez to his narration encompasses all those.

Remedios the Beauty was proclaimed queen. Úrsula, who shuddered at the disquieting beauty of her great-granddaughter, could not prevent the choice. Until then she had succeeded in keeping her off the streets unless it was to go to mass with Amaranta, but she made her cover her face with a black shawl. The most impious men, those who would disguise themselves as priests to say sacrilegious masses in Catarino’s store, would go to church with an aim to see, if only for an instant, the face of Remedios the Beauty, whose legendary good looks were spoken of with alarming excitement throughout the swamp. It was a long time before they were able to do so, and it would have been better for them if they never had, because most of them never recovered their peaceful habits of sleep. The man who made it possible, a foreigner, lost his serenity forever, became involved in the sloughs of abjection and misery, and years later was cut to pieces by a train after he had fallen asleep on the tracks. From the moment he was seen in the church, wearing a green velvet suit and an embroidered vest, no one doubted that he came from far away, perhaps from some distant city outside of the country, attracted by the magical fascination of Remedios the Beauty. He was so handsome, so elegant and dignified, with such presence, that Pietro Crespi would have been a mere fop beside him, and many women whispered with spiteful smiles that he was the one who really should have worn the shawl. He did not speak to anyone in Macondo. He appeared at dawn on Sunday like a prince in a fairy tale, riding a horse with silver stirrups and a velvet blanket, and he left town after mass.

Tempus fugit…
“One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever.
The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose.
The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits.” Ecclesiastes 1:4-6

I guarantee that 95% of you will hate this book, and at least 70% of you will hate it enough to not finish it, but I loved it. Guess I was just in the mood for it. Here's how it breaks down:

AMAZING THINGS: I can literally feel new wrinkles spreading across the surface of my brain when I read this guy. He's so wicked smart that there's no chance he's completely sane. His adjectives and descriptions are 100% PERFECT, and yet entirely nonsensical. After reading three chapters, it starts making sense... and that's when you realize you're probably crazy, too. And you are. We all are.

The magical realism style of the book is DELICIOUS. Sure, it's an epic tragedy following a long line of familial insanity, but that doesn't stop the people from eating dirt, coming back from the dead, spreading a plague of contagious insomnia, or enjoying a nice thunderstorm of yellow flowers. It's all presented in such a natural light that you think, "Of course. Of course he grows aquatic plants in his false teeth. Now why wouldn't he?"

This guy is the epitome of unique. Give me a single sentence, ANY SENTENCE the man has ever written, and I will recognize it. Nobody writes like him. (Also, his sentences average about 1,438 words each, so pretty much it's either him or Faulkner)

REASONS WHY MOST OF YOU WILL HATE THIS BOOK: I have to engage every ounce of my mental ability just to understand what the *@ is going on! Most people who read for relaxation and entertainment will want to send Marquez hate mail.

Also, there are approximately 20 main characters and about 4 names that they all share. I realize that's probably realistic in Hispanic cultures of the era, but SERIOUSLY, by the time you get to the sixth character named Aureliano, you'll have to draw yourself a diagram. Not even the classic Russians suffer from as much name-confusion as this guy.

On an uber-disturbing note, Marquez has once again (as he did in Love in the Time of Cholera) written a grown man having sex with a girl as young as 9... which is pretty much #1 on my list of "Things That Make You Go EWW!!!" He makes Lolita look like Polyanna on the virtue chart! (Note to authors: You give ONE of your characters a unique, but disgusting characteristic and it's good writing. Give it to more than one, and we start thinking we're reading your psychological profile, ya creep!)

If you feel like pushing your brain to its max, read it. The man did win the Nobel after all, it's amazing. But get ready to work harder to understand something than you ever have before in your life. And may God be with you.

FAVORITE QUOTES: (coincidentally also the shortest ones in the book)

She had the rare virtue of never existing completely except at the opportune moment.

He soon acquired the forlorn look that one sees in vegetarians.

Children inherit their parents' madness.

He really had been through death, but he had returned because he could not bear the solitude.

The air was so damp that fish could have come in through the doors and swum out the windows.

He was unable to bear in his soul the crushing weight of so much past.

It's enough for me to be sure that you and I exist at this moment.

A person doesn't die when he should but when he can.

I imagine these people looking and saying, "Yes, but what does it mean?" As literary critics everywhere cringe or roll over in their clichéd graves I approach this text and review the same way. One Hundred Years of Solitude... beautiful, intriguing... but what does it mean? And does it have to mean anything?

Oscar Wilde: "All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their peril." And what about those who skip across the surface, like a stone? Able only to make so many hops before sinking, blinded by the mud, disoriented by the current to the bottom? What are we?

This was (is) a beautiful book. Like Guernica. Like Dali.

  

It's religious, and political, and sexual. ... and confusing. And as long as I haven't over-used it already - beautiful.

It's the literary Big Fish and I'm sure people will and have debated what it means, and authorial intent and it won the Nobel Prize for crying out loud, but maybe it's to display on a prominent house wall and be debated.

It's easy to get a handle on the broad and general themes - history is cyclical - not progressive, progress is a myth (and "progress" is evil), go after love, be careful not to let memories or nostalgia bow you down, seek knowledge, the world is mysterious and doesn't always make sense, don't be intimidated of anybody - especially of your past self or selves.

Beyond that it's just conjecture.

The story begins with Jose Arcadio Buendia -the patriarch - and the founding of Macondo. It follows the lineage of his descendants - many living mythically long lives and bringing in enchanted aspects. The dead live, return from the future, invent and disappear - but not in a machine of the gods way - it's more dream-like.

The lineage frustrated me. In order to illustrate his point on the circular view of history, there were 4 Joses, 22 Aurelianos, 5 Arcadios, a couple Ursulas and Remedioses to boot. And Pilar Ternera found herself grandmother or great grandmother to far too many kids. Even with the family tree in the front of the book, it was difficult to tell which Arcadio or Jose or Aureliano was which - especially given the fact that so many of the characters lived past 100. (Or even past 145.)

The book was intriguing. I loved the tidbits that came back into play throughout the book - the ash on the heads of the Aurelianos, Melquiades stopping by for a chat - that's what made it for me.

Like I said, I don't think this was a book to "get." But if you do "get it," don't cliff note it to me. I like it the way it is in my mind.

He naufragado en un mar de páginas entre Arcadios y Aurelianos sin saber muy bien quién era quién, a mi hija casi le cambio el nombre por Alba Amaranta y hasta he perdonado la vida a las malditas hormigas que invaden mi baño.
Pero qué maravilla.

Nada de lo que escriba va a estar a la altura de este gran libro (bueno, de este y de ninguno), lleno de párrafos descomunales de prácticamente tres páginas, la prosa de Márquez te atrapa, te sumerge en un siglo de soledad que parece una superstición sobre la familia Buendía. Desde el primer José Arcadio hasta el último Aureliano, te cuenta las andanzas de toda una generación. Y cuando llegas a la última página te sientes como un Buendía más, completamente sola. Sola, pero satisfecha por haber disfrutado de una magnífica historia.

Mr. Márquez, or may I call you Gabriel?, how you dream and with your dreams carry us with you through an epic world so magical, so delicious that I can forget my old pains. Old realities take over and remind me that the past is here with us, years pass and time stands still, and the perception is of solitude mixed with love. Yes, I found your tale mesmerizingly beautiful – what is more, it is a story of overpowering and eternal love! How could I not be enthralled?
n  

'Intrigued by that enigma, he dug so deeply into her sentiments that in search of interest he found love, because by trying to make her love him he ended up falling in love with her.'

n
Is that how you conceived this hundred years in your mind?
n  

'Thus they went on living in a reality that was slipping away, momentarily captured by words, but which would escape irremediably when they forgot the values of the written letters.'

n
Is this a fable or simple memories that came back to you? You tell us of a love story, or many as the years go by, and it leaves us spellbound. Is it a myth you remembered? As I read your One Hundred Years of Solitude my brain forgot to breathe and I almost died. 'He really had been through death, but he had returned because he could not bear the solitude.' You might seem sometimes nonsensical, but your feelings permeate through the pages and infect us so deliciously. Do you think we are a little crazy together to love so much this way of dreaming? Familial insanity; endearing love; out of this world moments as when your people eat mud, or your thunderstorms are made up of yellow flowers. For me the idea of mass forgetfulness was particularly unique:
n  

'In all the houses keys to memorizing objects and feelings had been written. But the system demanded so much vigilance and moral strength that many succumbed to the spell of an imaginary reality, one invented by themselves, which was less practical for them but more comforting.'

n
And you present it all in a way so natural and light that we have to believe you believe in it all. 'Of course. Of course he grows aquatic plants in his false teeth. Now why wouldn't he?' If you could imagine the epitome of unique, I would say it was your writing. I know, not all uncommon writings are delightful, amazing like yours. Not all are as beautiful.
n  

'Thinking that it would console him, she took a piece of charcoal and erased the innumerable loves that he still owed her for, and she voluntarily brought up her own most solitary sadnesses so as not to leave him alone in his weeping.'

n
Sure, it's an epic tragedy following a long line of familial insanity. But even you could not stop from creating people suffering a spreading plague of contagious insomnia, but above all of loving eternally. It's all presented in such a natural light that we may think: does Macambo exist somewhere? Do you believe that we could find it if we searched for it? Maybe simply through our imagination, just like you did it.
n  

'He sank into the rocking chair, the same one in which Rebecca had sat during the early days of the house to give embroidery lessons, and in which Amaranta had played Chinese checkers with Colonel Gerineldo Marquez, and in which Amarana Ursula had sewn the tiny clothing for the child, and in that flash of lucidity he became aware that he was unable to bear in his soul the crushing weight of so much past.'

n
Yes, Gabriel, I loved all the memories of honor, magic, high hopes, love, death, revolution, futility and sadness you created for us. There may not be a happy ending, but there are love and hope despite the sufferings. 'Death really did not matter to him but life did, and therefore the sensation he felt when they gave their decision was not a feeling of fear but of nostalgia.'
____

"Sometimes great books have deleterious consequences for other writers, creating footsteps that can’t be walked in, shade the sun can’t penetrate, expectations that have no grounds. Gabriel García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude crushed the hopes of scores of young Colombian writers, and the spread of magic realism was not exactly beneficent, since it takes a magician to work magic and because rabbits don’t hide in just anybody’s hat."

– William H Gass, in the essay 'Influence' from A Temple of Texts.

This is a book of such terrible and heartbreaking beauty that I'm still reeling from the impact! Books like Nightwood & One Hundred Years of Solitude are proof that greatness shdn't be judged by size alone. This tale is perfect cause in it Márquez finally found the "right tone"–

...the tone that I eventually used in One Hundred Years of Solitude. It was based on the way my grandmother used to tell her stories. She told things that sounded supernatural and fantastic, but she told them with complete naturalness. When I finally discovered the tone I had to use, I sat down for eighteen months and worked every day.*

The mythical Macondo could be any place on earth where mankind was promised paradise but destroyed it as only man could.

Although Márquis said that he only wrote this as a book about incest, it's quite clear that it is a metaphor for the political & social history of Colombia rather broadly of Latin America's colonial past & its tentative march towards modernity as most events described herein are based on facts: Márquez’s native town of Aracataca as the inspiration for the fictional Macondo, the long & bloody civil war roiling South America 1850 onwards, the political assasinations, the arrival of the railways & the cinema, the cruel exploitation of Colombia by the American United Fruit Company, & the horrific massacre of the protesting workers by the Colombian military at the behest of the foreign imperialists, are some of the instances.

"García Márquez’s masterpiece, however, appeals not just to Latin American experiences, but to larger questions about human nature. It is, in the end, a novel as much about specific social and historical circumstances—disguised by fiction and fantasy—as about the possibility of love and the sadness of alienation and solitude."

Just as Rushdie described the waning years of the British Empire & then a free India's tryst with destiny through the Sinai family in Midnight's Children ( a book inspired by this book!), the narrative here is told through the meteoric rise & rise & subsequent decline & fall of the House of Buendias — the first family of Macondo who become a symbol of the culture & the country.
Like the famous first families around the world – the Kennedys, the Perons, the Gandhis, the Bhuttos – their charisma carries their curse:

The charismatic patriarch José Aureliano Buendia, who starts with such dreams & promise, like so many of his descendants, eventually resigns himself:
"We shall never get anywhere. . . . We'll rot our lives away here without the benefits of science". (19)
His descendants all inherit the same difficulty, and thus all eventually succumb to the power of nostalgia, to opting out of their historical reality, which they have never really understood clearly. They cope with their failure by an inner withdrawal...Loneliness in Macondo and among the Buendias is not an accidental condition, something that could be alleviated by better communications or more friends, and it is not the metaphysical loneliness of existentialists, a stage shared by all men. It is a particular vocation, a shape of character that is inherited, certainly, but also chosen, a doom that looks inevitable but is freely endorsed. The Buendias seek out their solitude, enclose themselves in it as if it were their shroud. As a result they become yet another emblem of the unreality.**

What's in a name? A lot, it seems!

The theme of a circular time is emphasised again & again through many devices - The multi-generational Buendia family keep giving the same ancestral names over & over to the children of the family, any attempt to break away from this practice is thwarted. The reduction in names' length means reduction in other ways as well – the boys are less of men - more dissolute, purposeless & solitary. The Buendias put the D back in dysfunctional : incest, adultery, debauchery, self-centeredness & excesses of all sorts abound. By having the same names they are condemned to repeat the mistakes of their earlier namesakes - first as farce then as tragedy; their ineffectual repetitive behaviour symbolised in the futile thirty-two armed uprisings & the little gold fishes of Colonel Aureliano Buendia.

The narrative plays out like a Greek tragedy – The characters seem fated to act out their lives as if there were no other way – for example, the seventeen boys of Colonel Aureliano, with the Ash Wednesday cross on their foreheads, are sitting ducks for political vendetta. The Biblical allusions are woven throughout – The Paradise discovered & lost, the deluge & plagues & finally Macondo is so deep in sins that like Sodom & Gomorrah, it has to be destroyed. The ending is heartbreaking but it couldn't have ended any other way. But if you read closely, there is a ray of hope!

I can't recommend this book enough - the epic scope of its narrative, the Magical Realism that became a standard for others writing in this genre, the deeply flawed but oh so human & memorable characters & Márquez's exquisite & at times hypnotic prose will keep you glued to this profoundly sad & disturbing tale.

A note regarding spoilers

Readers who are finicky about their spoiler alerts shd avoid this book – after every few pages the omniscient narrator gleefully announces the gruesome deaths that will befall the various members of the Buendia family, not to mention the back & forth in narrative time, the predictions & foreshadowing galore.
Point is, spoiler alerts are for ninnies – Adults just get on with it!

(*) Paris Review - The Art of Fiction No. 69, Gabriel Garcia Marquez

http://www.theparisreview.org/intervi...

(**) A must read:
Lecture on One Hundred Years of Solitude
http://records.viu.ca/~johnstoi/intro...

This too:

Memory and Prophecy, Illusion and Reality Are Mixed and Made to Look the Same
http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/06/15...

I'd like to think this book defies description, but I lie. It's pretty much an epic 5 generation story of a mythical Colombian town rife with magical realism. There's a lot of walking dead, dead stored in bags, dead bleeding on the streets, and the not quite dead of a peep that lives for over 500 years. Never mind the magic carpets or the thousands of people with the same damn name. It's a family that will damn well reuse a loved name over and over because they loved the originals so damn much.

Huh. Well, as long as I've now given up on tracking them except by their place in time and the events, I rolled with it and listened to the ever-growing complexity of the cyclical tales written simply and passionately, feeling like the town is the MC, from its founding (birth), it's part in the civil war (troubled teens), and it's modernity (this came out in 1967, so just assume there's lots of passionate free-love sex (in marriage)).

Here's the thing about preconceptions. I never looked up what the novel was about, so I based it entirely on the book cover and the freaking title. So what did I think as I read this?

Where's the freaking solitude!!!!!????

Sigh. This novel is FULL OF PEOPLE, people. I mean, lordy, they're everywhere and in everyone's faces. I kept looking forward to the science-minded and scholarly peeps because they, at least, wanted a little time alone! It was tiring for me to keep up with so many damn people! (except, of course, in a flowing tapestry of sensation and recurring themes, of course. That part was actually damn pleasing.)

Did I study and draw diagrams to keep track of everything in this novel? Hell no. I considered it, but in the end, I didn't care enough to do much other than take it all in with huge gulps, burping every once in a while, but determined to drink every last drop.

It was good, dammit. The writing was smooth as silk and managed to accomplish so much so economically, that I see why it's considered a classic. Will I ever try this one again?

No. Likely not. I don't like admitting that a novel tired me out. :)

It is the only book that I consider essential, even if you only begin it. Legend says that within it, you can see the solitude in which you live.

It is the pinnacle of magic realism, but I believe in it more than in any "Bible".