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Collected Stories
Collected here are twenty-six of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's most brilliant and enchanting short stories, presented in the chronological order of their publication in Spanish from three volumes: Eyes of a Blue Dog, Big Mama's Funeral, and The Incredible and Sad Tale of lnnocent Eréndira and Her Heartless Grandmother.
Combining mysticism, history, and humor, the stories in this collection span more than two decades, illuminating the development of Marquez's prose and exhibiting the themes of family, poverty, and death that resound throughout his fiction.
Combining mysticism, history, and humor, the stories in this collection span more than two decades, illuminating the development of Marquez's prose and exhibiting the themes of family, poverty, and death that resound throughout his fiction.
352 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 1983
About the author
Gabriel García Márquez
990 books42.5k followersGabriel José de la Concordia García Márquez was a Colombian novelist, short-story writer, screenwriter and journalist. García Márquez, familiarly known as "Gabo" in his native country, was considered one of the most significant authors of the 20th century. In 1982, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.
He studied at the University of Bogotá and later worked as a reporter for the Colombian newspaper El Espectador and as a foreign correspondent in Rome, Paris, Barcelona, Caracas, and New York. He wrote many acclaimed non-fiction works and short stories, but is best-known for his novels, such as One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967) and Love in the Time of Cholera (1985). His works have achieved significant critical acclaim and widespread commercial success, most notably for popularizing a literary style labeled as magical realism, which uses magical elements and events in order to explain real experiences. Some of his works are set in a fictional village called Macondo, and most of them express the theme of solitude.
Having previously written shorter fiction and screenplays, García Márquez sequestered himself away in his Mexico City home for an extended period of time to complete his novel Cien años de soledad, or One Hundred Years of Solitude, published in 1967. The author drew international acclaim for the work, which ultimately sold tens of millions of copies worldwide. García Márquez is credited with helping introduce an array of readers to magical realism, a genre that combines more conventional storytelling forms with vivid, layers of fantasy.
Another one of his novels, El amor en los tiempos del cólera (1985), or Love in the Time of Cholera, drew a large global audience as well. The work was partially based on his parents' courtship and was adapted into a 2007 film starring Javier Bardem. García Márquez wrote seven novels during his life, with additional titles that include El general en su laberinto (1989), or The General in His Labyrinth, and Del amor y otros demonios (1994), or Of Love and Other Demons.
(Arabic: جابرييل جارسيا ماركيز) (Hebrew: גבריאל גארסיה מרקס) (Ukrainian: Ґабріель Ґарсія Маркес) (Belarussian: Габрыель Гарсія Маркес) (Russian: Габриэль Гарсия Маркес)
He studied at the University of Bogotá and later worked as a reporter for the Colombian newspaper El Espectador and as a foreign correspondent in Rome, Paris, Barcelona, Caracas, and New York. He wrote many acclaimed non-fiction works and short stories, but is best-known for his novels, such as One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967) and Love in the Time of Cholera (1985). His works have achieved significant critical acclaim and widespread commercial success, most notably for popularizing a literary style labeled as magical realism, which uses magical elements and events in order to explain real experiences. Some of his works are set in a fictional village called Macondo, and most of them express the theme of solitude.
Having previously written shorter fiction and screenplays, García Márquez sequestered himself away in his Mexico City home for an extended period of time to complete his novel Cien años de soledad, or One Hundred Years of Solitude, published in 1967. The author drew international acclaim for the work, which ultimately sold tens of millions of copies worldwide. García Márquez is credited with helping introduce an array of readers to magical realism, a genre that combines more conventional storytelling forms with vivid, layers of fantasy.
Another one of his novels, El amor en los tiempos del cólera (1985), or Love in the Time of Cholera, drew a large global audience as well. The work was partially based on his parents' courtship and was adapted into a 2007 film starring Javier Bardem. García Márquez wrote seven novels during his life, with additional titles that include El general en su laberinto (1989), or The General in His Labyrinth, and Del amor y otros demonios (1994), or Of Love and Other Demons.
(Arabic: جابرييل جارسيا ماركيز) (Hebrew: גבריאל גארסיה מרקס) (Ukrainian: Ґабріель Ґарсія Маркес) (Belarussian: Габрыель Гарсія Маркес) (Russian: Габриэль Гарсия Маркес)
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June 29, 2022
my becoming-a-genius project, part 22!
the background:
i have decided to become a genius.
to accomplish this, i'm going to work my way through the collected stories of various authors, reading + reviewing 1 story every day until i get bored / lose every single follower / am struck down by a vengeful deity.
i took like a 2 month break from this project because i decided to deal with my reading slump (and then spent 2 months forcing myself to read and ignoring it), and i'm happy to be back!!!
also i want to read some marquez but i'm intimidated by the copy of one hundred years of solitude i've had for, well, a hundred years, so this seems like a good compromise.
PROJECT 1: THE COMPLETE STORIES BY FLANNERY O'CONNOR
PROJECT 2: HER BODY AND OTHER PARTIES BY CARMEN MARIA MACHADO
PROJECT 3: 18 BEST STORIES BY EDGAR ALLAN POE
PROJECT 4: THE LOTTERY AND OTHER STORIES BY SHIRLEY JACKSON
PROJECT 5: HOW LONG 'TIL BLACK FUTURE MONTH? BY N.K. JEMISIN
PROJECT 6: THE SHORT STORIES OF OSCAR WILDE
PROJECT 7: THE BLUE FAIRY BOOK BY ANDREW LANG
PROJECT 8: GRAND UNION: STORIES BY ZADIE SMITH
PROJECT 9: THE BEST OF ROALD DAHL
PROJECT 10: LOVE AND FREINDSHIP BY JANE AUSTEN
PROJECT 11: HOMESICK FOR ANOTHER WORLD BY OTTESSA MOSHFEGH
PROJECT 12: BAD FEMINIST BY ROXANE GAY
PROJECT 12.5: DIFFICULT WOMEN BY ROXANE GAY
PROJECT 13: THE SHORT NOVELS OF JOHN STEINBECK
PROJECT 14: FIRST PERSON SINGULAR BY HARUKI MURAKAMI
PROJECT 15: THE ORIGINAL FOLK AND FAIRY TALES OF THE BROTHERS GRIMM
PROJECT 16: A MANUAL FOR CLEANING WOMEN BY LUCIA BERLIN
PROJECT 17: SELECTED STORIES OF PHILIP K. DICK
PROJECT 18: HIGH LONESOME: SELECTED STORIES BY JOYCE CAROL OATES
PROJECT 19: THE SHORT STORIES OF ANTON CHEKHOV
PROJECT 20: COLLECTED STORIES OF COLETTE
PROJECT 21: JABBERWOCKY AND OTHER NONSENSE: COLLECTED POEMS BY LEWIS CARROLL
PROJECT 22: COLLECTED STORIES BY GABRIEL GARCIA MARQUEZ
DAY 1: THE THIRD RESIGNATION
this is like if someone rewrote an edgar allan poe story to be, like, better.
controversial maybe. but i am not sorry.
rating: 4
DAY 2: THE OTHER SIDE OF DEATH
back to back stories about being obsessed with death. honestly it seems like more content should be about this. we are maybe too okay with the state of our mortal coil as a society.
rating: 4.25
DAY 3: EVA IS INSIDE HER CAT
immediately insane and i love it.
a third death-obsessed story, but this one also about being a woman. these get better and better???
rating: 4.5
DAY 4: BITTERNESS FOR THREE SLEEPWALKERS
confession time: i DID google "bitterness for three sleepwalkers analysis" to see if i got it. and in return i have discovered a class that each had to do a PREZI (!!!) on a GGM story.
remember prezis???
rating: 4
DAY 5: DIALOGUE WITH THE MIRROR
relatable by title alone.
never mind. i've never looked in a mirror to see my dead brother looking back.
rating: 3
DAY 6: EYES OF A BLUE DOG
this is possibly the corniest last line of any short story ever. it reads like those reddit horror stories people post on twitter.
rating: 3
DAY 7: THE WOMAN WHO CAME AT SIX O'CLOCK
something you learn when you read a lot is that women are endlessly interesting, and men are, say, 8 times out of 10 very boring. even when it's an especially interesting woman, up to especially interesting things, if it has a male author and a male narrator...might be a bust.
rating: 3.5
DAY 8: NABO: THE BLACK MAN WHO MADE THE ANGELS WAIT
could tell by title alone this one wouldn't be my favorite.
rating: 3
DAY 9: SOMEONE HAS BEEN DISARRANGING THESE ROSES
now this title...this i like. this is giving alice's adventures in wonderland.
kind of spooky and fun, if you've ever wanted a weird little ghost friend haunting your room and messing with your stuff.
rating: 3.5
DAY 10: THE NIGHT OF THE CURLEWS
kind of have to hand it to a story for being no plot, just bad vibes.
rating: 3
DAY 11: MONOLOGUE OF ISABEL WATCHING IT RAIN IN MACONDO
a woman talking uninterrupted at length is my idea of a good time. fictional or otherwise.
also i am currently watching it rain, and am capable of saying a lot, so...this is going to be like an immersive 4D experience.
it's important to remember that we are all always just one weird thing away from complete breakdown.
rating: 3.75
DAY 12: TUESDAY SIESTA
tuesday goals.
nothing really happens here, which is cool. like this takes place mostly in a graveyard and it's by far the least spooky and death-obsessed story so far.
the tie between siesta and death is fun, and very subtle, relatively.
rating: 3.5
DAY 13: ONE OF THESE DAYS
getting political!
rating: 3.5
DAY 14: THERE ARE NO THIEVES IN THIS TOWN
feels like where the last section was about death, this one is about "the idea of a town."
rating: 3
DAY 15: BALTHAZAR'S MARVELOUS AFTERNOON
title is giving roald dahl. content is giving john steinbeck.
rating: 3.5
DAY 16: MONTIEL'S WIDOW
"Their letters were always happy, and one could see that they had been written in warm, well-lit places, and that the girls saw themselves reflected in many mirrors when they stopped to think." damn that's good.
this takes place in the same universe as the last one, which is fun.
rating: 3.5
DAY 17: ONE DAY AFTER SATURDAY
i do find myself consistently gripped by the stories in this section, even as they feel less...special? i don't know. plenty of days to think about it.
rating: 3.5
DAY 18: ARTIFICIAL ROSES
i love a short one. the analysis goes by quicker.
rating: 3.5
DAY 19: BIG MAMA'S FUNERAL
titular!!!
well, for the section.
the old ways do be dying and leaving garbage in their wake!
rating: 3.5
DAY 20: A VERY OLD MAN WITH ENORMOUS WINGS
part 3!! we're cruising right along.
i think i've read this one before. i have vague memories of analyzing why this story, which is filled with SAT words, would have the subtitle "a tale for children."
or maybe my brain is just giving me that false remembrance as a way to be b*tchy.
anyway this is kind of basic-curriculum fodder but it is good.
rating: 4
DAY 21: THE SEA OF LOST TIME
i love this title extremely.
this has everything i like: time, roses, the ocean, daily occurrences imbued with metaphorical significance.
rating: 4
DAY 22: THE HANDSOMEST DROWNED MAN IN THE WORLD
another alleged "tale for children." which is good because i have roughly 1/2 a brain cell to devote to this.
the first recorded case of a parasocial relationship.
rating: 3.5
DAY 23: DEATH CONSTANT BEYOND LOVE
another short one! thank heaven for small mercies. (these are like...all short, but there's gotta be a big one coming.)
view of woman starting to get supremely grating.
rating: 2
DAY 24: THE LAST VOYAGE OF THE GHOST SHIP
skipped a day. maybe 2 days. maybe 3 days. i am too tired to either figure it out or catch up. at least this story has ghosts in it (one of my top 5 favorite things).
cruel and unusual for my fatigue day to include a story that is ONE FIVE-PAGE SENTENCE LONG.
luckily it's stunningly written.
rating: 4.5
DAY 25: BLACAMAN THE GOOD, VENDOR OF MIRACLES
another cool and fun one...
i am also doomed to never catch up because the next is the last story and it's a hundred thousand million pages long and, in other words, absolutely no way am i doing that right now.
rating: 4
DAY 26: THE INCREDIBLE AND SAD TALE OF INNOCENT ERENDIRA AND HER HEARTLESS GRANDMOTHER
last day! and this story is somehow even longer than its title implies.
this story won me for the first 5 pages, then lost me for like 45, and then won me back in the last paragraph.
rating: 4
OVERALL
i don't feel like this was the best way to start with gabriel garcia marquez (not to contradict the nobel committee), but i did enjoy it, and it did make me even more excited (which is to say less intimidated) to get to a hundred years of solitude.
rating: 3.5
the background:
i have decided to become a genius.
to accomplish this, i'm going to work my way through the collected stories of various authors, reading + reviewing 1 story every day until i get bored / lose every single follower / am struck down by a vengeful deity.
i took like a 2 month break from this project because i decided to deal with my reading slump (and then spent 2 months forcing myself to read and ignoring it), and i'm happy to be back!!!
also i want to read some marquez but i'm intimidated by the copy of one hundred years of solitude i've had for, well, a hundred years, so this seems like a good compromise.
PROJECT 1: THE COMPLETE STORIES BY FLANNERY O'CONNOR
PROJECT 2: HER BODY AND OTHER PARTIES BY CARMEN MARIA MACHADO
PROJECT 3: 18 BEST STORIES BY EDGAR ALLAN POE
PROJECT 4: THE LOTTERY AND OTHER STORIES BY SHIRLEY JACKSON
PROJECT 5: HOW LONG 'TIL BLACK FUTURE MONTH? BY N.K. JEMISIN
PROJECT 6: THE SHORT STORIES OF OSCAR WILDE
PROJECT 7: THE BLUE FAIRY BOOK BY ANDREW LANG
PROJECT 8: GRAND UNION: STORIES BY ZADIE SMITH
PROJECT 9: THE BEST OF ROALD DAHL
PROJECT 10: LOVE AND FREINDSHIP BY JANE AUSTEN
PROJECT 11: HOMESICK FOR ANOTHER WORLD BY OTTESSA MOSHFEGH
PROJECT 12: BAD FEMINIST BY ROXANE GAY
PROJECT 12.5: DIFFICULT WOMEN BY ROXANE GAY
PROJECT 13: THE SHORT NOVELS OF JOHN STEINBECK
PROJECT 14: FIRST PERSON SINGULAR BY HARUKI MURAKAMI
PROJECT 15: THE ORIGINAL FOLK AND FAIRY TALES OF THE BROTHERS GRIMM
PROJECT 16: A MANUAL FOR CLEANING WOMEN BY LUCIA BERLIN
PROJECT 17: SELECTED STORIES OF PHILIP K. DICK
PROJECT 18: HIGH LONESOME: SELECTED STORIES BY JOYCE CAROL OATES
PROJECT 19: THE SHORT STORIES OF ANTON CHEKHOV
PROJECT 20: COLLECTED STORIES OF COLETTE
PROJECT 21: JABBERWOCKY AND OTHER NONSENSE: COLLECTED POEMS BY LEWIS CARROLL
PROJECT 22: COLLECTED STORIES BY GABRIEL GARCIA MARQUEZ
DAY 1: THE THIRD RESIGNATION
this is like if someone rewrote an edgar allan poe story to be, like, better.
controversial maybe. but i am not sorry.
rating: 4
DAY 2: THE OTHER SIDE OF DEATH
back to back stories about being obsessed with death. honestly it seems like more content should be about this. we are maybe too okay with the state of our mortal coil as a society.
rating: 4.25
DAY 3: EVA IS INSIDE HER CAT
immediately insane and i love it.
a third death-obsessed story, but this one also about being a woman. these get better and better???
rating: 4.5
DAY 4: BITTERNESS FOR THREE SLEEPWALKERS
confession time: i DID google "bitterness for three sleepwalkers analysis" to see if i got it. and in return i have discovered a class that each had to do a PREZI (!!!) on a GGM story.
remember prezis???
rating: 4
DAY 5: DIALOGUE WITH THE MIRROR
relatable by title alone.
never mind. i've never looked in a mirror to see my dead brother looking back.
rating: 3
DAY 6: EYES OF A BLUE DOG
this is possibly the corniest last line of any short story ever. it reads like those reddit horror stories people post on twitter.
rating: 3
DAY 7: THE WOMAN WHO CAME AT SIX O'CLOCK
something you learn when you read a lot is that women are endlessly interesting, and men are, say, 8 times out of 10 very boring. even when it's an especially interesting woman, up to especially interesting things, if it has a male author and a male narrator...might be a bust.
rating: 3.5
DAY 8: NABO: THE BLACK MAN WHO MADE THE ANGELS WAIT
could tell by title alone this one wouldn't be my favorite.
rating: 3
DAY 9: SOMEONE HAS BEEN DISARRANGING THESE ROSES
now this title...this i like. this is giving alice's adventures in wonderland.
kind of spooky and fun, if you've ever wanted a weird little ghost friend haunting your room and messing with your stuff.
rating: 3.5
DAY 10: THE NIGHT OF THE CURLEWS
kind of have to hand it to a story for being no plot, just bad vibes.
rating: 3
DAY 11: MONOLOGUE OF ISABEL WATCHING IT RAIN IN MACONDO
a woman talking uninterrupted at length is my idea of a good time. fictional or otherwise.
also i am currently watching it rain, and am capable of saying a lot, so...this is going to be like an immersive 4D experience.
it's important to remember that we are all always just one weird thing away from complete breakdown.
rating: 3.75
DAY 12: TUESDAY SIESTA
tuesday goals.
nothing really happens here, which is cool. like this takes place mostly in a graveyard and it's by far the least spooky and death-obsessed story so far.
the tie between siesta and death is fun, and very subtle, relatively.
rating: 3.5
DAY 13: ONE OF THESE DAYS
getting political!
rating: 3.5
DAY 14: THERE ARE NO THIEVES IN THIS TOWN
feels like where the last section was about death, this one is about "the idea of a town."
rating: 3
DAY 15: BALTHAZAR'S MARVELOUS AFTERNOON
title is giving roald dahl. content is giving john steinbeck.
rating: 3.5
DAY 16: MONTIEL'S WIDOW
"Their letters were always happy, and one could see that they had been written in warm, well-lit places, and that the girls saw themselves reflected in many mirrors when they stopped to think." damn that's good.
this takes place in the same universe as the last one, which is fun.
rating: 3.5
DAY 17: ONE DAY AFTER SATURDAY
i do find myself consistently gripped by the stories in this section, even as they feel less...special? i don't know. plenty of days to think about it.
rating: 3.5
DAY 18: ARTIFICIAL ROSES
i love a short one. the analysis goes by quicker.
rating: 3.5
DAY 19: BIG MAMA'S FUNERAL
titular!!!
well, for the section.
the old ways do be dying and leaving garbage in their wake!
rating: 3.5
DAY 20: A VERY OLD MAN WITH ENORMOUS WINGS
part 3!! we're cruising right along.
i think i've read this one before. i have vague memories of analyzing why this story, which is filled with SAT words, would have the subtitle "a tale for children."
or maybe my brain is just giving me that false remembrance as a way to be b*tchy.
anyway this is kind of basic-curriculum fodder but it is good.
rating: 4
DAY 21: THE SEA OF LOST TIME
i love this title extremely.
this has everything i like: time, roses, the ocean, daily occurrences imbued with metaphorical significance.
rating: 4
DAY 22: THE HANDSOMEST DROWNED MAN IN THE WORLD
another alleged "tale for children." which is good because i have roughly 1/2 a brain cell to devote to this.
the first recorded case of a parasocial relationship.
rating: 3.5
DAY 23: DEATH CONSTANT BEYOND LOVE
another short one! thank heaven for small mercies. (these are like...all short, but there's gotta be a big one coming.)
view of woman starting to get supremely grating.
rating: 2
DAY 24: THE LAST VOYAGE OF THE GHOST SHIP
skipped a day. maybe 2 days. maybe 3 days. i am too tired to either figure it out or catch up. at least this story has ghosts in it (one of my top 5 favorite things).
cruel and unusual for my fatigue day to include a story that is ONE FIVE-PAGE SENTENCE LONG.
luckily it's stunningly written.
rating: 4.5
DAY 25: BLACAMAN THE GOOD, VENDOR OF MIRACLES
another cool and fun one...
i am also doomed to never catch up because the next is the last story and it's a hundred thousand million pages long and, in other words, absolutely no way am i doing that right now.
rating: 4
DAY 26: THE INCREDIBLE AND SAD TALE OF INNOCENT ERENDIRA AND HER HEARTLESS GRANDMOTHER
last day! and this story is somehow even longer than its title implies.
this story won me for the first 5 pages, then lost me for like 45, and then won me back in the last paragraph.
rating: 4
OVERALL
i don't feel like this was the best way to start with gabriel garcia marquez (not to contradict the nobel committee), but i did enjoy it, and it did make me even more excited (which is to say less intimidated) to get to a hundred years of solitude.
rating: 3.5
January 11, 2022
Though I've only thus far experienced two years in solitude, rather than the full one hundred, I felt it was time to treat myself to a Gabriel García Márquez pick-me-up (he is, after all, one of my top three literary idols).
But, alas, the stories herein were initially aimless and bereft of structure. I'll even go so far as to whisper it here... they really weren't very good at all.. : (
Rather than the silky smooth magical realism for which 'Gabo' is venerated, these were esoteric and Kafkaesque, but in a ham-fisted, experimental kind of way.
After scratching my head long enough to invite splinters, I did some research and discovered that the stories had been planted in chronological order.
A-ha! Thought I. So he was evidently finding his feet as he transitioned from journalist to author… That explains it! He was still scrabbling in the foothills on his ascent to greatness.
And soon enough, joy of all joys, the tales grew in artistry and stature. Here at last was the unquenchable creativity and authorial control that I'd come to expect from the Colombian maestro.
The sky above me burgeoned into the most handsome of blues and all was right with the world. A pretty nightingale flew down from a tree and perched upon my shoulder, at which point we launched into a tuneful duet that brought creatures running from the forest just to listen to us. So entranced were they by our intonation that they favoured us with rapturous applause as soon as the last word was sung.
"Hooray for Kevin and the sweet-sounding nightingale!" they cheered. "And hooray for Gabriel García Márquez and his wonderful collection of short stories!"
But, alas, the stories herein were initially aimless and bereft of structure. I'll even go so far as to whisper it here... they really weren't very good at all.. : (
Rather than the silky smooth magical realism for which 'Gabo' is venerated, these were esoteric and Kafkaesque, but in a ham-fisted, experimental kind of way.
After scratching my head long enough to invite splinters, I did some research and discovered that the stories had been planted in chronological order.
A-ha! Thought I. So he was evidently finding his feet as he transitioned from journalist to author… That explains it! He was still scrabbling in the foothills on his ascent to greatness.
And soon enough, joy of all joys, the tales grew in artistry and stature. Here at last was the unquenchable creativity and authorial control that I'd come to expect from the Colombian maestro.
The sky above me burgeoned into the most handsome of blues and all was right with the world. A pretty nightingale flew down from a tree and perched upon my shoulder, at which point we launched into a tuneful duet that brought creatures running from the forest just to listen to us. So entranced were they by our intonation that they favoured us with rapturous applause as soon as the last word was sung.
"Hooray for Kevin and the sweet-sounding nightingale!" they cheered. "And hooray for Gabriel García Márquez and his wonderful collection of short stories!"
March 20, 2019
Marquez is pure magic. It's been a long time since I've read him, except for the novella No One Writes to the Colonel two years back, so this was in effect a reintroduction to his work. And the enchantment has not faded.
Marquez resembles three of my favourite authors - William Faulkner, Franz Kafka and Ernest Hemingway. His decadent town of Macondo, where most of the stories happen in a connected universe, owes much to Faulkner's Yoknapatawpha County. And his prose, moving on in sentence after impressionistic sentence without a pause for breath so that you get lost in its cadence without caring for its meaning, is pure Faulkner. The heartbeat of his fictitious universe soon starts melding into that of the reader and he/ she sees, hears, smells, touches and tastes through the author's creations.
But unlike Faulkner, Marquez moves effortlessly into fantasy without advertising the fact: like Gregor Samsa in Kafka's The Metamorphosis, his characters can find themselves in any weird situation (in fact, Marquez has openly admitted Kafka's influence). They die, live, move across time and space, get transformed into ghosts and spirits and involved in myriad other weird situations in the space of a few pages.
But in some stories, the author suddenly drops all his flowery phrases and parabolic descriptions and goes for a hard-bitten narrative, where life and death walk the streets of the somnolent Latin American towns. Here, he resembles Hemingway with his spare prose and hard-hitting plotlines.
***
The book is a compendium of three collections: Eyes of a Blue Dog, Big Mama's Funeral and The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother. Of these, the first one contains mostly surrealist pieces which reads more like prose poems than stories (except for 'The Woman Who Came at Six O' Clock', a classic tale in the Hemingway mould, about a woman who may have committed a murder). My favourite from this collection is 'Monologue of Isobel Watching It Rain in Macondo', about a young woman whose sense of existence starts slowly dissolving in incessant rain. (I experienced it recently in Kerala!)
The title story, 'Big Mama's Funeral', is undoubtedly the star of the second collection. By delineating the death of a matriarch and its aftermath, it attains the level of the mythological: in this, it foreshadows The Autumn of the Patriarch, I felt. It also contains many Hemingway-esque tales ('Tuesday Siesta', 'There Are No Thieves in This Town', 'Balthazar's Marvelous Afternoon', 'One of These Days') - all filled with a sense of fatalism and quiet brutality.
The third collection contains two of my favourite fables - 'A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings', about an aged and destitute angel who falls down to earth and becomes a village curiosity; and 'The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World', about a corpse which becomes the icon of a fishing community. 'Innocent Erendira' is a frightening fairy tale about a young, prepubescent girl cruelly exploited by her grandmother, a rehash of the evil stepmother trope - but much more malignant. Every fairy tale motif is inverted here. Almost all the tales in this collection are surreal, and engrossing.
***
An exquisite collection.
P.S: A suggestion - if you are new to Marquez, don't try to "get" the stories. Most of the time, they may not make logical sense. Just get lost in the telling. You will enjoy it. ( If you don't, then maybe Marquez is not for you.)
Marquez resembles three of my favourite authors - William Faulkner, Franz Kafka and Ernest Hemingway. His decadent town of Macondo, where most of the stories happen in a connected universe, owes much to Faulkner's Yoknapatawpha County. And his prose, moving on in sentence after impressionistic sentence without a pause for breath so that you get lost in its cadence without caring for its meaning, is pure Faulkner. The heartbeat of his fictitious universe soon starts melding into that of the reader and he/ she sees, hears, smells, touches and tastes through the author's creations.
But unlike Faulkner, Marquez moves effortlessly into fantasy without advertising the fact: like Gregor Samsa in Kafka's The Metamorphosis, his characters can find themselves in any weird situation (in fact, Marquez has openly admitted Kafka's influence). They die, live, move across time and space, get transformed into ghosts and spirits and involved in myriad other weird situations in the space of a few pages.
But in some stories, the author suddenly drops all his flowery phrases and parabolic descriptions and goes for a hard-bitten narrative, where life and death walk the streets of the somnolent Latin American towns. Here, he resembles Hemingway with his spare prose and hard-hitting plotlines.
***
The book is a compendium of three collections: Eyes of a Blue Dog, Big Mama's Funeral and The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother. Of these, the first one contains mostly surrealist pieces which reads more like prose poems than stories (except for 'The Woman Who Came at Six O' Clock', a classic tale in the Hemingway mould, about a woman who may have committed a murder). My favourite from this collection is 'Monologue of Isobel Watching It Rain in Macondo', about a young woman whose sense of existence starts slowly dissolving in incessant rain. (I experienced it recently in Kerala!)
The title story, 'Big Mama's Funeral', is undoubtedly the star of the second collection. By delineating the death of a matriarch and its aftermath, it attains the level of the mythological: in this, it foreshadows The Autumn of the Patriarch, I felt. It also contains many Hemingway-esque tales ('Tuesday Siesta', 'There Are No Thieves in This Town', 'Balthazar's Marvelous Afternoon', 'One of These Days') - all filled with a sense of fatalism and quiet brutality.
The third collection contains two of my favourite fables - 'A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings', about an aged and destitute angel who falls down to earth and becomes a village curiosity; and 'The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World', about a corpse which becomes the icon of a fishing community. 'Innocent Erendira' is a frightening fairy tale about a young, prepubescent girl cruelly exploited by her grandmother, a rehash of the evil stepmother trope - but much more malignant. Every fairy tale motif is inverted here. Almost all the tales in this collection are surreal, and engrossing.
***
An exquisite collection.
P.S: A suggestion - if you are new to Marquez, don't try to "get" the stories. Most of the time, they may not make logical sense. Just get lost in the telling. You will enjoy it. ( If you don't, then maybe Marquez is not for you.)
August 18, 2021
قصص ماركيز كاملة بترجمة ولا أروع من صالح علماني رحمه الله
تتراوح القصص بين الجيدة والمتوسطة والممتازة
لكت تظل أقربها إلى قلبي هي
"رجل عجوز بجناحين كبيرين"
March 2, 2025
Opinión impopular
En realidad 2,5
Leer a Gabriel García Márquez es un gran desafío. Puede que sus obras sean aclamadas por el mundo entero y, que aquí, en Colombia, se haya convertido en el máximo referente de la literatura colombiana; sin embargo, sus libros no son tan sencillos para leer como parece, ni siquiera para lectores experimentados. Considero que aunque sus historias pueden llegar a ser profundas y mágicas, también pueden tornarse muy confusas para cualquier lector. El contexto de sus obras, estilo literario y singular prosa transforman la experiencia de leer a Gabo en un verdadero reto. Para leer y disfrutar a Gabo se requiere paciencia y mucha tolerancia a la frustración. Es un autor que puede producir bloqueos, causarte pereza por el realismo mágico, o simplemente hacerte sentir que no eres capaz de disfrutar y comprender un contenido escrito con excentricidad y ambigüedad. Diría que leer a Gabo es un reto para valientes o para aquellos que quieren probar a sí mismos su capacidad de superar cualquier reto. La experiencia puede llegar a ser genial, sí, pero no hay garantía que el próximo libro que leas del autor te genere buenas sensaciones. Sé que muchos aman a Gabo incluso llegando a la idolatría, pero yo, personalmente, pienso que es un autor difícil de comprender.
Ahora bien, esta recopilación de todos sus cuentos (Doce cuentos peregrinos no se incluye en la edición que leí porque es una versión de 1983 y en ese entonces no se había publicado), nos demuestra la faceta multifacética que tenía Gabo para escribir porque aquí encontramos cuentos oníricos, crudos, violentos, críticos, cínicos y cotidianos. Si tuviera que elegir una palabra para describir el común denominador de todos sus cuentos, simplemente no podría elegirla porque sus cuentos son muy diferentes entre sí, tanto por su temática, como por su composición. Aunque algunos cuentos no me gustaron, lo confieso, debo reconocer que es impresionante como escribía Gabo. Su riqueza léxica, su variedad de tonos y estilos, y la singularidad de sus ideas, crea una imagen en tu mente de un señor muy inteligente, con mucha información, que simplemente hacia lo que se le daba la gana con las palabras. Sí, difícil de comprender por momentos, por su tendencia a escribir como si para él los libros significasen un ejercicio avanzado de criptología; sin embargo, más allá de sus excentricidades, considero que su prosa es muy creativa y no la tiene ningún otro autor. Sinceramente, es para aplaudir su talento.
Mi problema con esta recopilación de cuentos es que, a pesar de que Gabo tiene habilidades espectaculares como escritor, no lo he disfrutado tanto como lo esperaba. No puedo negar que tiene cuentos buenos entre los que destaco Los funerales de la Mamá Grande, y La increíble y triste historia de la cándida Eréndira y de su abuela desalmada, pero muchos no son tan interesantes. De hecho, hay cuentos que te dejan pasmado, no por su profundidad, sino porque son inconclusos, aburridos y raros. Claramente, como eso no es lo que esperaba de Gabo entonces me sentí confundido y cavilaba: ¿Será que no leí bien? ¿Seré yo el problema? Pero no, yo no era el problema. El problema es que muchos de aquellos cuentos no me impactaron, ni me sorprendieron, ni mucho menos me emocionaron. Mi ego me exigió disfrutar obligatoria y forzosamente cada cuento porque tengo grabado en mi mente la creencia de que Gabo es un excelente escritor, pero mi conciencia gritó en muchos tramos su insatisfacción. Por tanto, mi experiencia la describo como una guerra sin sentido contra mi ego que irracionalmente pretendía que la realidad fuera conforme a sus expectativas. De Gabo disfruté mucho El amor en los tiempos del cólera porque su historia tiene un inicio, nudo y desenlace muy interesantes y evidentes. Lamentablemente, ese detalle no lo presentan muchos de estos cuentos porque empiezan y terminan en cualquier parte, como si solo fueran fragmentos de un proyecto inconcluso. Eso no me gustó.
A pesar de la guerra que libré he decidido terminar este libro para, acostumbrarme nuevamente, a las extrañezas y estilo de Gabo, ya que, mi verdadero objetivo, es aventurarme en el difícil reto llamado Cien años de soledad. Antes de embaucarme en esta empresa necesitaba ganar confianza, tomar experiencia y estar preparado para lo que pueda venir. Afortunadamente, en esta recopilación hay algunas historias de Macondo, pueblo ficticio creado por el autor donde se desarrolla el argumento de Cien años de soledad, por lo que aquellos fragmentos me han ayudado como reconocimiento del terreno en el que moraré en los próximos meses. Espero tener una buena experiencia.
En resumen, una recopilación que solo recomiendo para los fanáticos de Gabo. Este libro no es una buena elección si lo que buscas es conocer por primera vez al autor porque entonces, existe la posibilidad, de que tu aburrimiento y enojo provoque que este libro salga "misteriosamente" volando directo contra la pared de tu habitación. Gabo escribe muy bien, eso no tiene discusión, pero recomiendo sus historias con más extensión. Son más entretenidas, profundas y críticas. En cambio estos cuentos tienen poco de eso. Mi calificación de 2,5 refleja mi reconocimiento por la prosa del autor, pero mi insatisfacción personal por la gran mayoría de sus pequeños relatos. Querido Gabo, nos encontraremos en una próxima ocasión, espero disfrutar más de tu compañía para entonces.
En realidad 2,5
Leer a Gabriel García Márquez es un gran desafío. Puede que sus obras sean aclamadas por el mundo entero y, que aquí, en Colombia, se haya convertido en el máximo referente de la literatura colombiana; sin embargo, sus libros no son tan sencillos para leer como parece, ni siquiera para lectores experimentados. Considero que aunque sus historias pueden llegar a ser profundas y mágicas, también pueden tornarse muy confusas para cualquier lector. El contexto de sus obras, estilo literario y singular prosa transforman la experiencia de leer a Gabo en un verdadero reto. Para leer y disfrutar a Gabo se requiere paciencia y mucha tolerancia a la frustración. Es un autor que puede producir bloqueos, causarte pereza por el realismo mágico, o simplemente hacerte sentir que no eres capaz de disfrutar y comprender un contenido escrito con excentricidad y ambigüedad. Diría que leer a Gabo es un reto para valientes o para aquellos que quieren probar a sí mismos su capacidad de superar cualquier reto. La experiencia puede llegar a ser genial, sí, pero no hay garantía que el próximo libro que leas del autor te genere buenas sensaciones. Sé que muchos aman a Gabo incluso llegando a la idolatría, pero yo, personalmente, pienso que es un autor difícil de comprender.
Ahora bien, esta recopilación de todos sus cuentos (Doce cuentos peregrinos no se incluye en la edición que leí porque es una versión de 1983 y en ese entonces no se había publicado), nos demuestra la faceta multifacética que tenía Gabo para escribir porque aquí encontramos cuentos oníricos, crudos, violentos, críticos, cínicos y cotidianos. Si tuviera que elegir una palabra para describir el común denominador de todos sus cuentos, simplemente no podría elegirla porque sus cuentos son muy diferentes entre sí, tanto por su temática, como por su composición. Aunque algunos cuentos no me gustaron, lo confieso, debo reconocer que es impresionante como escribía Gabo. Su riqueza léxica, su variedad de tonos y estilos, y la singularidad de sus ideas, crea una imagen en tu mente de un señor muy inteligente, con mucha información, que simplemente hacia lo que se le daba la gana con las palabras. Sí, difícil de comprender por momentos, por su tendencia a escribir como si para él los libros significasen un ejercicio avanzado de criptología; sin embargo, más allá de sus excentricidades, considero que su prosa es muy creativa y no la tiene ningún otro autor. Sinceramente, es para aplaudir su talento.
Mi problema con esta recopilación de cuentos es que, a pesar de que Gabo tiene habilidades espectaculares como escritor, no lo he disfrutado tanto como lo esperaba. No puedo negar que tiene cuentos buenos entre los que destaco Los funerales de la Mamá Grande, y La increíble y triste historia de la cándida Eréndira y de su abuela desalmada, pero muchos no son tan interesantes. De hecho, hay cuentos que te dejan pasmado, no por su profundidad, sino porque son inconclusos, aburridos y raros. Claramente, como eso no es lo que esperaba de Gabo entonces me sentí confundido y cavilaba: ¿Será que no leí bien? ¿Seré yo el problema? Pero no, yo no era el problema. El problema es que muchos de aquellos cuentos no me impactaron, ni me sorprendieron, ni mucho menos me emocionaron. Mi ego me exigió disfrutar obligatoria y forzosamente cada cuento porque tengo grabado en mi mente la creencia de que Gabo es un excelente escritor, pero mi conciencia gritó en muchos tramos su insatisfacción. Por tanto, mi experiencia la describo como una guerra sin sentido contra mi ego que irracionalmente pretendía que la realidad fuera conforme a sus expectativas. De Gabo disfruté mucho El amor en los tiempos del cólera porque su historia tiene un inicio, nudo y desenlace muy interesantes y evidentes. Lamentablemente, ese detalle no lo presentan muchos de estos cuentos porque empiezan y terminan en cualquier parte, como si solo fueran fragmentos de un proyecto inconcluso. Eso no me gustó.
A pesar de la guerra que libré he decidido terminar este libro para, acostumbrarme nuevamente, a las extrañezas y estilo de Gabo, ya que, mi verdadero objetivo, es aventurarme en el difícil reto llamado Cien años de soledad. Antes de embaucarme en esta empresa necesitaba ganar confianza, tomar experiencia y estar preparado para lo que pueda venir. Afortunadamente, en esta recopilación hay algunas historias de Macondo, pueblo ficticio creado por el autor donde se desarrolla el argumento de Cien años de soledad, por lo que aquellos fragmentos me han ayudado como reconocimiento del terreno en el que moraré en los próximos meses. Espero tener una buena experiencia.
En resumen, una recopilación que solo recomiendo para los fanáticos de Gabo. Este libro no es una buena elección si lo que buscas es conocer por primera vez al autor porque entonces, existe la posibilidad, de que tu aburrimiento y enojo provoque que este libro salga "misteriosamente" volando directo contra la pared de tu habitación. Gabo escribe muy bien, eso no tiene discusión, pero recomiendo sus historias con más extensión. Son más entretenidas, profundas y críticas. En cambio estos cuentos tienen poco de eso. Mi calificación de 2,5 refleja mi reconocimiento por la prosa del autor, pero mi insatisfacción personal por la gran mayoría de sus pequeños relatos. Querido Gabo, nos encontraremos en una próxima ocasión, espero disfrutar más de tu compañía para entonces.
June 14, 2017
I am not a fan of short stories but Marques' are an enchanting exception.
August 28, 2023
I really enjoyed Love in the time of cholera but there was too much soul searching, too much avant-garde jazz and not enough lived life in these stories for me. That said, Marquez writes a beautiful sentence, has a poetic sensibility and a sharp powerful intelligence.
November 11, 2021
Daniel Salvidor Trueba de Clausen, the town book reviewer, lived ten steps from the town church in a small house of an ancient lineage with a door that was never locked. It was said that the town priest would set his watch to the reviewer's morning walks which he conducted with an accountant's regularity.
For many years he worked tirelessly at his craft, turning out book reviews with a machine that would tint the paper with the yellowed residue of old books as if his reviews were of some ancient vintage.
Around the time of his Gabriela Garcia Marquez book review, his habits became irregular, almost primitive, and so the town was thrown into a great confusion when the priest could no longer time his watch properly and sermons were held at ludicrous times based on the whims of a fickle timepiece rendered useless by the change in the mood of the town book reviewer.
Town gossip said that a woman was the cause.
The day of the fabled book review an oppressive heat settled on the town. Even the town whores settled on the patios for respite, unwilling to brave a deadly heat. On that day, de Clausen continued to work away at his review machine, typing the various keys that produced the words that would pass unholy judgment on the art of others.
That day, the priest wandered out of the church vaguely. His walk was unusually muddled. News that the illustrious book review would soon be finished passed from ear to ear, but the priest seemed unequal to the moment. Unaware how he should appear at de Clausen's family home, whether to sanctify the review as if the birth of a profit with Holy water and bread, or whether to call the town's mayor to arrange some small festivities for that evening, he arrived with nothing at all but his humble confusion.
Seated on de Clausen's porch he let the heat overtake him. As he unbuttoned his robe he realized that he had never been so hot in his life. One by one he removed his clothing until he was in his underwear. And still the sounds of the machine churning words would not stop. He lay his head down and enjoyed a moment of respite. The oppressive heat eventually broke in the dull purple of dusk.
As he woke, he reached to gather his clothing but realized with a shock that they were gone. In their place was the review with pages gilded in the yellow residue of ancient texts. As the priest looked up, he saw a man in a priestly robe leaving town by the main street on a horse with three of the town's most revered whores.
On the last line of the review was a note to the priest.
"I leave my review machine to you. May it bring you joys beyond imagination, Padre, in this review and the next."
Signed.
Daniel Salvidor Trueba de Clausen
Read the exciting conclusion here:
https://ghostsofnagasaki.wordpress.co...
For many years he worked tirelessly at his craft, turning out book reviews with a machine that would tint the paper with the yellowed residue of old books as if his reviews were of some ancient vintage.
Around the time of his Gabriela Garcia Marquez book review, his habits became irregular, almost primitive, and so the town was thrown into a great confusion when the priest could no longer time his watch properly and sermons were held at ludicrous times based on the whims of a fickle timepiece rendered useless by the change in the mood of the town book reviewer.
Town gossip said that a woman was the cause.
The day of the fabled book review an oppressive heat settled on the town. Even the town whores settled on the patios for respite, unwilling to brave a deadly heat. On that day, de Clausen continued to work away at his review machine, typing the various keys that produced the words that would pass unholy judgment on the art of others.
That day, the priest wandered out of the church vaguely. His walk was unusually muddled. News that the illustrious book review would soon be finished passed from ear to ear, but the priest seemed unequal to the moment. Unaware how he should appear at de Clausen's family home, whether to sanctify the review as if the birth of a profit with Holy water and bread, or whether to call the town's mayor to arrange some small festivities for that evening, he arrived with nothing at all but his humble confusion.
Seated on de Clausen's porch he let the heat overtake him. As he unbuttoned his robe he realized that he had never been so hot in his life. One by one he removed his clothing until he was in his underwear. And still the sounds of the machine churning words would not stop. He lay his head down and enjoyed a moment of respite. The oppressive heat eventually broke in the dull purple of dusk.
As he woke, he reached to gather his clothing but realized with a shock that they were gone. In their place was the review with pages gilded in the yellow residue of ancient texts. As the priest looked up, he saw a man in a priestly robe leaving town by the main street on a horse with three of the town's most revered whores.
On the last line of the review was a note to the priest.
"I leave my review machine to you. May it bring you joys beyond imagination, Padre, in this review and the next."
Signed.
Daniel Salvidor Trueba de Clausen
Read the exciting conclusion here:
https://ghostsofnagasaki.wordpress.co...
April 19, 2017
You have to stay with this collection for awhile before it starts to grow on you, for it is compiled in chronological order, and throws the spotlight on the evolution of this writer and his craft as he matures towards winning the Nobel Prize for Literature.
The 26-story collection is comprised of selections from three volumes of short stories that were published in the 1960’s and ‘70’s. The stories in the first volume, Eyes of Blue Dog, are the hardest to read as they are interior monologues and reminiscences with very little action or movement, the protagonists often pre-occupied with death. The characters feel and sense their world viscerally, and the titles bear little resemblance to the content of the pieces, and yet, given that the author was in his twenties when these stories were written, it foreshadows the literary maturity that was to develop later. We see some dialogue and movement appear in the later stories in this volume. There is a tendency to repeat lines like “The curlews pecked out our eyes” or “A horse kicked me in the head” to emphasise the direness of the characters’ situations. And when the Negro who sang in the park comes to take our protagonist away to “sing in the choir” we realize that the latter is dying; when the torrential rains run for days, floods the town and addles the mind, we are “shown” this by the townspeople seeing and smelling bodies from the graveyard floating in the streets - great imagery!
The second volume, Big Mama’s Funeral, is set in Macondo, Garcia Marquez’s fictional hometown and the one he immortalized in his novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude. The corrupt mayor, the rich industrialist, the thief and other characters like the Buendia family flit in and out of the stories playing different roles. The writer’s irony begins to appear in these stories: the widow of the rich man who believes her dead spouse was noble when he was a mass murderer, the artist who gets beaten up for exposing the rich man’s corrupt soul, the blind grandmother who “sees” everything in her granddaughter’s life. The author even has his take on the Wandering Jew story, a metaphor used throughout literature. The final story, from which this volume gets its title, is a grand metaphor to the death of the old way of life and the birth of the new one, the rule of the landed gentry giving way to democracy. It is also a story in which Garcia Marquez’s fiction, in this collection, transcends the micro view to take on the macro one.
The third volume, The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother, seems pre-occupied with taking the author’s vision down to the level of children. Two of the tales are subtitled “A Tale for Children,” and speak of strange people and ships that appear from out of the sea to teach us lessons. Yet, other pre-occupations, not necessarily juvenile in content, emerge: the dying and corrupt senator who sacrifices his reputation to feast on the body of a young girl, a theme that Garcia Marquez fully developed in his final novel, Memories of My Melancholy Whores; the balance of good and evil, both needing each other to survive. The final story from which the volume gets it’s name, is the longest in the entire collection, and its title says it all: poor Erendira the 14 year-old virgin is exploited to the fullest by her wicked grandmother and is indentured to the old whore for life. Despite the exaggerated situations that are typical of magic realism, some interesting truths emerge: smugglers do not interfere with the Church - wrong enemy to take on!; those who are abused and manipulated will abuse and manipulate; when one is focused on escape, one often leaves loved ones behind. The imagery is also magical: the wind is always howling outside Erendira’s tent as she travels the desert country selling her body, the wind of her misfortune, we think; the grandmother’s blood is green, with envy of her granddaughter’s youth and promise, we wonder: glass changes colour when the love-struck Ulises (Erendira’s lover) touches it, testament to seeing things with rose-tinted glasses, perhaps?
Although the geography we travel through in this collection is around coastal Colombia, our travels through human experience is far, wide and deep. This is a great collection to understand the evolution of a writer from his narrow beginnings to the expansive weave and heft he achieved in his later writing.
The 26-story collection is comprised of selections from three volumes of short stories that were published in the 1960’s and ‘70’s. The stories in the first volume, Eyes of Blue Dog, are the hardest to read as they are interior monologues and reminiscences with very little action or movement, the protagonists often pre-occupied with death. The characters feel and sense their world viscerally, and the titles bear little resemblance to the content of the pieces, and yet, given that the author was in his twenties when these stories were written, it foreshadows the literary maturity that was to develop later. We see some dialogue and movement appear in the later stories in this volume. There is a tendency to repeat lines like “The curlews pecked out our eyes” or “A horse kicked me in the head” to emphasise the direness of the characters’ situations. And when the Negro who sang in the park comes to take our protagonist away to “sing in the choir” we realize that the latter is dying; when the torrential rains run for days, floods the town and addles the mind, we are “shown” this by the townspeople seeing and smelling bodies from the graveyard floating in the streets - great imagery!
The second volume, Big Mama’s Funeral, is set in Macondo, Garcia Marquez’s fictional hometown and the one he immortalized in his novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude. The corrupt mayor, the rich industrialist, the thief and other characters like the Buendia family flit in and out of the stories playing different roles. The writer’s irony begins to appear in these stories: the widow of the rich man who believes her dead spouse was noble when he was a mass murderer, the artist who gets beaten up for exposing the rich man’s corrupt soul, the blind grandmother who “sees” everything in her granddaughter’s life. The author even has his take on the Wandering Jew story, a metaphor used throughout literature. The final story, from which this volume gets its title, is a grand metaphor to the death of the old way of life and the birth of the new one, the rule of the landed gentry giving way to democracy. It is also a story in which Garcia Marquez’s fiction, in this collection, transcends the micro view to take on the macro one.
The third volume, The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother, seems pre-occupied with taking the author’s vision down to the level of children. Two of the tales are subtitled “A Tale for Children,” and speak of strange people and ships that appear from out of the sea to teach us lessons. Yet, other pre-occupations, not necessarily juvenile in content, emerge: the dying and corrupt senator who sacrifices his reputation to feast on the body of a young girl, a theme that Garcia Marquez fully developed in his final novel, Memories of My Melancholy Whores; the balance of good and evil, both needing each other to survive. The final story from which the volume gets it’s name, is the longest in the entire collection, and its title says it all: poor Erendira the 14 year-old virgin is exploited to the fullest by her wicked grandmother and is indentured to the old whore for life. Despite the exaggerated situations that are typical of magic realism, some interesting truths emerge: smugglers do not interfere with the Church - wrong enemy to take on!; those who are abused and manipulated will abuse and manipulate; when one is focused on escape, one often leaves loved ones behind. The imagery is also magical: the wind is always howling outside Erendira’s tent as she travels the desert country selling her body, the wind of her misfortune, we think; the grandmother’s blood is green, with envy of her granddaughter’s youth and promise, we wonder: glass changes colour when the love-struck Ulises (Erendira’s lover) touches it, testament to seeing things with rose-tinted glasses, perhaps?
Although the geography we travel through in this collection is around coastal Colombia, our travels through human experience is far, wide and deep. This is a great collection to understand the evolution of a writer from his narrow beginnings to the expansive weave and heft he achieved in his later writing.
January 31, 2018
6. Collected Stories by Gabriel García Márquez
translators: Gregory Rabassa & J. S. Bernstein
published: 1984
format: 343 page paperback
acquired: December
read: Jan 18-25
rating: 4½
Márquez spent his youngest years away from his parents, living in the Columbia coastal town of Aracataca with his grandparents, who he explains were both great story tellers. His grandmother would mix in fanciful aspects to her stories without breaking her tone, as if she was telling all fact. He has explained these were huge influences on his writing. And it seems he was always writing.
This is my first step into Márquez. I will follow him in mostly a chronological manner, and this collection includes some of his earliest published work. The first story, The Third Resignation, was published in 1947 when Márquez was 20 years old. What this collection offers in an evolution in the writing of talented and creative story teller.
Eyes of a Blue Dog, the first collection, is weakest and yet the one I find I have the most to say about, because of how his writing changes from story to story. Several things are notable about the earliest stories, The Third Resignation, The Other Side of Death, and Eva is inside her cat. They have striking opening lines, with words like "sharp", and phrases like "cold, cutting, vertical noise", they are psychoanalytical, idea heavy, and rather dull to read, leaving this reader interested, but counting pages till the end. The Other Side of Death ends "in the other world, the mistaken and absurd world of rational creatures,” A phrase that is maybe revealing as to where Márquez was headed. These stories all have very different approaches, and strengths. In the title story a man has an intimate conversations with a woman in his dreams, one he can see, but can't touch, and who he completely forgets as soon as he wakes, even as she keeps telling him how to find her. It's an exploration of desire and relationships. It's a good story, but most notable because of different way to approaching what he is exploring. Whereas the most compelling story for me, the first one where I forgot to count the pages, was straight forward. Titled The Woman Who Came at Six O’Clock, it's only a conversation, a flirtatious and manipulative one between between a woman and a bar tender in an empty bar. There are five more stories after that, and I would say each one is just a much better story, much more readable, then the earlier ones, but still very imaginative. And, in each story, it seems he's getting closer to home.
Every story in Big Mama’s Funeral is well developed. One might say a maturing author developing into mastering his abilities. The stories are starting to feel like pieces of a larger worlds, like Márquez is just giving us a window and that he could keep going on and I wouldn't have minded. Most of these stories are very much his world in small town coastal Columbia, in Aracataca, which gets mentioned in the last story, the title story. Characters reoccur, the tone changes, and there is a heavy, if dark or darkly tinted, humor. In the title story the tone is hyper-formal. "...and for the third time in twenty centuries there was an hour of confusion, chagrin, and bustle in the limitless empire of Christendom...
The author of The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother is not experimenting so much as making his points through story telling. In the opening story, A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings, an angel falls into a town and becomes something like a zoo attraction. He doesn't speak and doesn't interact with anyone, just stoically bides his time until his wings heal and he wordlessly flies off. What is Márquez saying? The main sense in all these stories is of a fairy tale, but with all the dark elements, with wonderful characters, usually leaving us with a sense of how small they are in a strange wider world they will never understand. When the outside world comes, it seems everyone always ends up losing something to them, and when they branch out, the characters just disappear. Several of these are really quote terrific, and they all leave something to think about, even if it seems mostly through the authors restraint. He just has a way of writing up strange or fantastic events in the same flat fairy tale tone and it leaves the reader wondering.
So, a fun a collection and a good start for my tour through his work.
translators: Gregory Rabassa & J. S. Bernstein
published: 1984
format: 343 page paperback
acquired: December
read: Jan 18-25
rating: 4½
Original collections:
Eyes of a Blue Dog: stories 1947-1955, English translation 1968. Translated by Gregory Rabassa
Big Mama’s Funeral: stories 1962, English translation 1972. Translated by J. S. Bernstein
The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother: stories 1968-1972, English translation 1978. Translated by Gregory Rabassa
Márquez spent his youngest years away from his parents, living in the Columbia coastal town of Aracataca with his grandparents, who he explains were both great story tellers. His grandmother would mix in fanciful aspects to her stories without breaking her tone, as if she was telling all fact. He has explained these were huge influences on his writing. And it seems he was always writing.
This is my first step into Márquez. I will follow him in mostly a chronological manner, and this collection includes some of his earliest published work. The first story, The Third Resignation, was published in 1947 when Márquez was 20 years old. What this collection offers in an evolution in the writing of talented and creative story teller.
Eyes of a Blue Dog, the first collection, is weakest and yet the one I find I have the most to say about, because of how his writing changes from story to story. Several things are notable about the earliest stories, The Third Resignation, The Other Side of Death, and Eva is inside her cat. They have striking opening lines, with words like "sharp", and phrases like "cold, cutting, vertical noise", they are psychoanalytical, idea heavy, and rather dull to read, leaving this reader interested, but counting pages till the end. The Other Side of Death ends "in the other world, the mistaken and absurd world of rational creatures,” A phrase that is maybe revealing as to where Márquez was headed. These stories all have very different approaches, and strengths. In the title story a man has an intimate conversations with a woman in his dreams, one he can see, but can't touch, and who he completely forgets as soon as he wakes, even as she keeps telling him how to find her. It's an exploration of desire and relationships. It's a good story, but most notable because of different way to approaching what he is exploring. Whereas the most compelling story for me, the first one where I forgot to count the pages, was straight forward. Titled The Woman Who Came at Six O’Clock, it's only a conversation, a flirtatious and manipulative one between between a woman and a bar tender in an empty bar. There are five more stories after that, and I would say each one is just a much better story, much more readable, then the earlier ones, but still very imaginative. And, in each story, it seems he's getting closer to home.
Every story in Big Mama’s Funeral is well developed. One might say a maturing author developing into mastering his abilities. The stories are starting to feel like pieces of a larger worlds, like Márquez is just giving us a window and that he could keep going on and I wouldn't have minded. Most of these stories are very much his world in small town coastal Columbia, in Aracataca, which gets mentioned in the last story, the title story. Characters reoccur, the tone changes, and there is a heavy, if dark or darkly tinted, humor. In the title story the tone is hyper-formal. "...and for the third time in twenty centuries there was an hour of confusion, chagrin, and bustle in the limitless empire of Christendom...
The author of The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother is not experimenting so much as making his points through story telling. In the opening story, A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings, an angel falls into a town and becomes something like a zoo attraction. He doesn't speak and doesn't interact with anyone, just stoically bides his time until his wings heal and he wordlessly flies off. What is Márquez saying? The main sense in all these stories is of a fairy tale, but with all the dark elements, with wonderful characters, usually leaving us with a sense of how small they are in a strange wider world they will never understand. When the outside world comes, it seems everyone always ends up losing something to them, and when they branch out, the characters just disappear. Several of these are really quote terrific, and they all leave something to think about, even if it seems mostly through the authors restraint. He just has a way of writing up strange or fantastic events in the same flat fairy tale tone and it leaves the reader wondering.
So, a fun a collection and a good start for my tour through his work.
December 20, 2018
وسألني بعد ذلك ما الذي تفعله في الحياة ؟ ، فأجبته بأنني لا أعفل شيئاً سوي أنني أعيش ، لأن كل ما عدا ذلك لا يستحق أي عناء
،
مجموعة ضخمة وكبيرة ، لم يكن هناك بداً من تقسيمها حتي أقرأها دون شتات
فقسمتها إلي أربعة تلك ثلاث ، ومجموعة قصص متنوعة جعلتها بشكل عشوائي ، أما الثلاث فكانت تلك مراجعتهم :
اثنتا عشرة قصة قصيرة مهاجرة
ارنديرا البريئة وجدتها القاسية
الأم الكبيرة
،
الكثير من القصص إحترافية وممتعة ولا شك أن جارسيا يستطيع التواجد في أي ميدان أدبي ، وبعض القصص لم أفهمه بالطبع
أما الثمان قصص التي جعلتها لمراجعة هذا الجزأ فقد أعجبني منها علي الترتيب :
أجمل غريق في العالم
الرحلة الأخيرة للسفينة الشبح
مونولج إيزابيل
يتضح من آخر ثمان قصص أن جارسيا قد مهد السبيل لأسطورة ماكوندو قبل نشر مئة عام من العزلة بـ 12 سنة وأسطورة المطر الذي ينهمر ولا يتوقف في مونولوج إيزابيل ، ومهد لغرائبية الأمور في ماكوندو وواقعيته السحرية وكل تلك الأمور كانت واضحة في مونولوج إيزابيل
دائماً بحب جارسيا أن يتحدث عن مواضيع إنسانية مختلفة ، فوجدناها من جديد يصنع شخصية من أشخاصه تبحث عن إثبات الذات والوجود بأي شكل ، تلك الشخصية الأوريليانية في السفينة الشبح ، وتحدث كثيراً في الثمان قصص عن الموت والوحدة وأهتم جداً بتطويع الواقع للسحر ليخرج تلك الدرر الأدبية التي تمتعك أثناء قرائتها ، وكأنك تقرأها إلي الأبد
،
إلي اللقاء أيها الرفيق ، كانت رحلة ضخمة داخل عالمك القصصي ، وقريباً ألتقيك في رواية
،
مجموعة ضخمة وكبيرة ، لم يكن هناك بداً من تقسيمها حتي أقرأها دون شتات
فقسمتها إلي أربعة تلك ثلاث ، ومجموعة قصص متنوعة جعلتها بشكل عشوائي ، أما الثلاث فكانت تلك مراجعتهم :
اثنتا عشرة قصة قصيرة مهاجرة
ارنديرا البريئة وجدتها القاسية
الأم الكبيرة
،
الكثير من القصص إحترافية وممتعة ولا شك أن جارسيا يستطيع التواجد في أي ميدان أدبي ، وبعض القصص لم أفهمه بالطبع
أما الثمان قصص التي جعلتها لمراجعة هذا الجزأ فقد أعجبني منها علي الترتيب :
أجمل غريق في العالم
الرحلة الأخيرة للسفينة الشبح
مونولج إيزابيل
يتضح من آخر ثمان قصص أن جارسيا قد مهد السبيل لأسطورة ماكوندو قبل نشر مئة عام من العزلة بـ 12 سنة وأسطورة المطر الذي ينهمر ولا يتوقف في مونولوج إيزابيل ، ومهد لغرائبية الأمور في ماكوندو وواقعيته السحرية وكل تلك الأمور كانت واضحة في مونولوج إيزابيل
دائماً بحب جارسيا أن يتحدث عن مواضيع إنسانية مختلفة ، فوجدناها من جديد يصنع شخصية من أشخاصه تبحث عن إثبات الذات والوجود بأي شكل ، تلك الشخصية الأوريليانية في السفينة الشبح ، وتحدث كثيراً في الثمان قصص عن الموت والوحدة وأهتم جداً بتطويع الواقع للسحر ليخرج تلك الدرر الأدبية التي تمتعك أثناء قرائتها ، وكأنك تقرأها إلي الأبد
،
إلي اللقاء أيها الرفيق ، كانت رحلة ضخمة داخل عالمك القصصي ، وقريباً ألتقيك في رواية
February 20, 2023
روعة عجبني قصص كثير جدًا بالذات الثلاث مجموعات الأولي لأن عوالمهم كانت سحرية أكثر و القصص كانت مرتبطة ببعض بخيط رفيع جدًا
بس كان موجود!!
بس كان موجود!!
September 5, 2015
يحتوي الكتاب على أربع مجموعات قصصية -(عينا كلب أزرق)، (جنازة الأم الكبيرة)، (القصة الحزينة التي لا تصدق لإيرنديرا البريئة وجدتها القاسية) و(اثنتا عشرة قصة قصيرة مهاجرة)- مكتوبة حسب التسلسلل التاريخي..
لم تعجبني المجموعة الأولى..
الثانية كانت أفضل قليلاً..
أخر مجموعتين تستحقان القراءة، وتكشفان عظمة ماركيز كأديب أصيل..
لم تعجبني المجموعة الأولى..
الثانية كانت أفضل قليلاً..
أخر مجموعتين تستحقان القراءة، وتكشفان عظمة ماركيز كأديب أصيل..
June 28, 2009
Reading Gabriel Garcia Marquez is like coming home, a home crammed with the most wondrous oddities. Birds of wild plumage. Winds that scrape against sanity. Seas that overcome and drown you. But there's not a trace of cold heart-stopping fear. Marquez's realms are Sublime.
Collected Stories is a compilation of three collections: Eyes of A Blue Dog, Big Mama's Funeral, and The Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother. Respectively, each of these collections were originally published in: No One Writes to the Colonel and Other Stories, Leaf Storm and Other Stories, and Innocent Erendira and Other Stories, and I believe the difference between initial published collections and this compilation is that this text doesn't include the title novellas, save for "Innocent Erendira." Spanning work from 1947 to 1972, the first two stories of this compilation, from Eyes of a Blue Dog, are preoccupied with death. Though highly abstract, and, at the same time, visceral, the details twitch and flitter, making the skin crawl. Death elicits unease, yet this macabre obsession shows hints more toward a writer's meager canvas. The characters embody smallness of mind. An ego coddling itself? Much of the first collection is filled with amorphous plots and insulated characters. As the stories progress, and, as we move from one collection to another, we see Marquez step outside of his own neuroses and evolve as artist. His maturation is one of literature's greatest treasures. As the writer strengthens his style, the tales grow sophisticated with multiple characters, interaction, dialogue, and wild tangles of narrative.
Most often, on the first read, Marquez may be difficult to analyze for literal meaning. We simply can't. Our instinct may be to kick back and enjoy the imagery, the sound of the language and the accumulation of tones and hues. What Marquez may lack in characterization and narrative, he certainly makes up for in description and imagery of time and space. From "Monologue of Isabel":
From the collection Big Mama's Funeral, Marquez lends from Shakespeare in "There are no Thieves in this Town"; when husband and wife plot against their small home town in South America, they're soon torn asunder from guilt. The burden of masquerading as innocent proves too much for them. "One Day After Saturday" honors Woolf and Joyce. Marquez jumps from characters' thoughts and reveals how each are bound, in a small town, by a mysterious phenomena. We slip through them like wisps of air, feeling and knowing every individual breath and spirit. Marquez, in the spirit of the Modernists, challenges the singularity of existence. He affirms the beauty of fiction, the power of fiction, and the danger of stories in that we can find connection though we may feel estranged from even our closest loved ones.
Death is still prominent but holds more meaning in the last collection The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother. Instead of a single pitiful life hanging in the balance, towards the end of the collection, mortality signifies the ruin of a country, the decay of a culture, and the corruptness of a civilization. "The Sea of Roses" is utterly intoxicating. A story that will hold you. Hunger and death are close siblings, clambering for our attention. "The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World" an absolute gem, the imagery and characters are embedded into my artistic DNA. A Christ-like tale, but not really, in this story, a stranger washes up on shore, and the town people's hearts grow wider, their faith and compassion, stronger. Instead of focusing on the afflicted man who inspired hope, we turn our gaze to the people themselves and revel in their own strength and beauty, their fatally exquisite flaws, which mean more collectively than the death, or life, for that matter, of a single man. "The Last Voyage of the Ghost Ship," another homage to the Modernists of Woolf and Joyce, is complete stream-of-consciousness, no punctuation. Thoughts bleed into each other. Readers, take your time with this one and be sure to come up for air so you can marvel in this tale that will consume you. This work must be kin to another of Marquez's from the collection, Strange Pilgrims, "Light is Like Water" where young boys push the boundaries of imagination and rebel against the pedestrian adult world. "A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings" is another tale burned to memory. All I can say is if you haven't read it, or any of the tales from Innocent Erendira, then you haven't really known how wonderful literature can be.
As I read these tales, I grew hungry to learn their back stories. Where did Marquez get his characters? What snippets of conversations, snatches of songs and tidbits of heresy inspired these wonderful pieces of Art? Which ones were lifted from newspapers? Are the kernels of each from yarns his grandparents spun for him? How many are slips of childhood memories? Marquez's words are imprinted in the genetic makeup of all my writerly endeavors. I look to him as all life seeks bright rays of light.
Collected Stories is a compilation of three collections: Eyes of A Blue Dog, Big Mama's Funeral, and The Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother. Respectively, each of these collections were originally published in: No One Writes to the Colonel and Other Stories, Leaf Storm and Other Stories, and Innocent Erendira and Other Stories, and I believe the difference between initial published collections and this compilation is that this text doesn't include the title novellas, save for "Innocent Erendira." Spanning work from 1947 to 1972, the first two stories of this compilation, from Eyes of a Blue Dog, are preoccupied with death. Though highly abstract, and, at the same time, visceral, the details twitch and flitter, making the skin crawl. Death elicits unease, yet this macabre obsession shows hints more toward a writer's meager canvas. The characters embody smallness of mind. An ego coddling itself? Much of the first collection is filled with amorphous plots and insulated characters. As the stories progress, and, as we move from one collection to another, we see Marquez step outside of his own neuroses and evolve as artist. His maturation is one of literature's greatest treasures. As the writer strengthens his style, the tales grow sophisticated with multiple characters, interaction, dialogue, and wild tangles of narrative.
Most often, on the first read, Marquez may be difficult to analyze for literal meaning. We simply can't. Our instinct may be to kick back and enjoy the imagery, the sound of the language and the accumulation of tones and hues. What Marquez may lack in characterization and narrative, he certainly makes up for in description and imagery of time and space. From "Monologue of Isabel":
"the notion of time, upset since the day before, disappeared completely then there was no Thursday. What should have been Thursday was a physical, jelly-like substance thing that could have been parted with the hands in order to look into Friday" (100).
"Then it rained. And the sky was a gray, jellyfish-like substance that flapped its wings a hand away from our heads" (94).
From "The Other Side of Death", "Gently wrapped in the warm climate of a covered serenity, he felt the lightness of his artificial and daily death. He sank into a loving geography, into an easy, ideal world, a world like one drawn by a child, with no algebriac equations, with no living farewells, no force of gravity" (17).
From the collection Big Mama's Funeral, Marquez lends from Shakespeare in "There are no Thieves in this Town"; when husband and wife plot against their small home town in South America, they're soon torn asunder from guilt. The burden of masquerading as innocent proves too much for them. "One Day After Saturday" honors Woolf and Joyce. Marquez jumps from characters' thoughts and reveals how each are bound, in a small town, by a mysterious phenomena. We slip through them like wisps of air, feeling and knowing every individual breath and spirit. Marquez, in the spirit of the Modernists, challenges the singularity of existence. He affirms the beauty of fiction, the power of fiction, and the danger of stories in that we can find connection though we may feel estranged from even our closest loved ones.
Death is still prominent but holds more meaning in the last collection The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother. Instead of a single pitiful life hanging in the balance, towards the end of the collection, mortality signifies the ruin of a country, the decay of a culture, and the corruptness of a civilization. "The Sea of Roses" is utterly intoxicating. A story that will hold you. Hunger and death are close siblings, clambering for our attention. "The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World" an absolute gem, the imagery and characters are embedded into my artistic DNA. A Christ-like tale, but not really, in this story, a stranger washes up on shore, and the town people's hearts grow wider, their faith and compassion, stronger. Instead of focusing on the afflicted man who inspired hope, we turn our gaze to the people themselves and revel in their own strength and beauty, their fatally exquisite flaws, which mean more collectively than the death, or life, for that matter, of a single man. "The Last Voyage of the Ghost Ship," another homage to the Modernists of Woolf and Joyce, is complete stream-of-consciousness, no punctuation. Thoughts bleed into each other. Readers, take your time with this one and be sure to come up for air so you can marvel in this tale that will consume you. This work must be kin to another of Marquez's from the collection, Strange Pilgrims, "Light is Like Water" where young boys push the boundaries of imagination and rebel against the pedestrian adult world. "A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings" is another tale burned to memory. All I can say is if you haven't read it, or any of the tales from Innocent Erendira, then you haven't really known how wonderful literature can be.
As I read these tales, I grew hungry to learn their back stories. Where did Marquez get his characters? What snippets of conversations, snatches of songs and tidbits of heresy inspired these wonderful pieces of Art? Which ones were lifted from newspapers? Are the kernels of each from yarns his grandparents spun for him? How many are slips of childhood memories? Marquez's words are imprinted in the genetic makeup of all my writerly endeavors. I look to him as all life seeks bright rays of light.
October 8, 2018
بهدف الإطلاع على فن كتابة القصة القصيرة في أمريكا اللاتينية... إمتاز ماركيز بأسلوبه الخاص من حيث الكثافة والتوتر والبعد عن الحشو والحوارات الطويلة، كما يلاحظ أيضاً أن هناك رمزية عالية في قصصه قد تدفعك لإعادة قراءة القصة لسبر أغوارها... يعد ماركيز متمرداً على مبادئ القصة القصيرة فأسلوبه خارج في كثير من الأحيان عن النمط الذي نراه أو نتوقعه عند كتاب القصة وربما كان تمرده هذا سر تميزه... للأسف أن ماركيز لم ينظر لأسلوبه هذا ولم يضع له خطوطاً عريضة فقد تركه لتفسيرات من بعده وقد أصاب بعضهم وأخطأ آخرون ممن حملوا نصوصه ما لا تحتمل.. يسجل له بأنه صاحب مدرسة خاصة ولكن يؤخذ عليه بأنه لم يضع لها خططاً إدارية ناجحة لتطويرها وأخذها كنقطة إنطلاق لمن بعده...
September 17, 2022
Essential to those who have read his novels, these odd and beautiful stories show chronologically the slow development of his confidence and skill. Even his earliest writings, quirky meditations on death and what it means to be dead, are not as well fleshed out but still have passages that floor me and the imagination that awes me. Many of the stories add to the world of Macondo from One Hundred Years of Solitude, one of the greatest novels I have ever read.
September 17, 2013
Brilliant! Loved it. Will write more later.
___
Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Collected Stories.
I loved them! I really did.
I came in with no expectations...and was hit immediately by the jarring realization that this book falls entirely outside the realm of the genre of book I have been occupying myself with thus far. In a good way. What did the bus driver call it? Enchanted realism. (I can't remember). But whatever the official term for it is...the stories are poised as if set in reality, but with huge swathes of it are whimsical and mystical and fantastical...but conveyed as matter-of-factly as every day life.
I've come to realize...I love short stories. As much as the pace of them takes some getting used to. In the beginning of the book, the stories were completely separate and stood alone (though with a common thread of time and death and dreams running through). Some of the stories toward the end gave hints of a common story world - primary characters from one story would come up as tertiary characters in another. I liked both techniques! The former method kind of reminds me of Sum (yes, Eagleman), where a new world was invented from scratch at the start of every new chapter. The latter method gave the stories more continuity, and it was easier to let go of the characters from one, and transition to the next.
Also, the beauty of short stories (when done well) is that they convey so much meaning in so few words. Every line must be deeply intentional. Someone's entire character is encapsulated in a matter of sentences. Imagine if every line of every novel were so intentional! What would that be like? Now that I'm changing gears and swapping over to an Atwood novel, the style seems so tranquil and...meandering. Layers are slooowly being peeled away one...by one. It's a new thing for me to talk about the "pace" of a piece of writing, but it seems valid, doesn't it?
Anyways, here are some of my very favorite quotes, that will hopefully inspire you to read this book too:
"There was no one at the station...On the other side of the street, on the sidewalk shaded by the almond trees, only the pool hall was open. The town was floating in the heat" (101).
"The alcohol was leaving him, in concentric waves, and he assumed once more the weight, the volume, and the responsibility of his limbs" (113).
"The world had been sad since Tuesday. Sea and sky were a single ash-gray thing and the sands of the beach, which on March nights glimmered like powdered light, had become a stew of mud and rotten shellfish" (203).
"When they heard the music, distant but distinct, the people stopped chatting. They looked at one another and for a moment had nothing to say, for only then did they realize how old they had become since the last time they'd heard music" (217).
___
Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Collected Stories.
I loved them! I really did.
I came in with no expectations...and was hit immediately by the jarring realization that this book falls entirely outside the realm of the genre of book I have been occupying myself with thus far. In a good way. What did the bus driver call it? Enchanted realism. (I can't remember). But whatever the official term for it is...the stories are poised as if set in reality, but with huge swathes of it are whimsical and mystical and fantastical...but conveyed as matter-of-factly as every day life.
I've come to realize...I love short stories. As much as the pace of them takes some getting used to. In the beginning of the book, the stories were completely separate and stood alone (though with a common thread of time and death and dreams running through). Some of the stories toward the end gave hints of a common story world - primary characters from one story would come up as tertiary characters in another. I liked both techniques! The former method kind of reminds me of Sum (yes, Eagleman), where a new world was invented from scratch at the start of every new chapter. The latter method gave the stories more continuity, and it was easier to let go of the characters from one, and transition to the next.
Also, the beauty of short stories (when done well) is that they convey so much meaning in so few words. Every line must be deeply intentional. Someone's entire character is encapsulated in a matter of sentences. Imagine if every line of every novel were so intentional! What would that be like? Now that I'm changing gears and swapping over to an Atwood novel, the style seems so tranquil and...meandering. Layers are slooowly being peeled away one...by one. It's a new thing for me to talk about the "pace" of a piece of writing, but it seems valid, doesn't it?
Anyways, here are some of my very favorite quotes, that will hopefully inspire you to read this book too:
"There was no one at the station...On the other side of the street, on the sidewalk shaded by the almond trees, only the pool hall was open. The town was floating in the heat" (101).
"The alcohol was leaving him, in concentric waves, and he assumed once more the weight, the volume, and the responsibility of his limbs" (113).
"The world had been sad since Tuesday. Sea and sky were a single ash-gray thing and the sands of the beach, which on March nights glimmered like powdered light, had become a stew of mud and rotten shellfish" (203).
"When they heard the music, distant but distinct, the people stopped chatting. They looked at one another and for a moment had nothing to say, for only then did they realize how old they had become since the last time they'd heard music" (217).
January 31, 2012
القصص القصيرة الكاملة
يضم هذا الكتاب المجموعات القصصية التالية (عينا كلب أزرق)، (جنازة الأم الكبيرة)، (القصة الحزينة التي لا تصدق لإيرنديرا البريئة وجدتها القاسية) و(اثنتا عشرة قصة قصيرة مهاجرة).
افتتحت بهذا الكتاب العام الجديد، كنت آمل أن ماركيز سيمنحني دفعة جميلة، ولكن للأسف تجرعت الكتاب ببطء طيلة الشهر، لا أدري ما الذي حدث؟ هل كان مزاجي لا يتناسب مع الواقعية السحرية هذه الأيام؟ أم أن المجموعة ولأنها كتبت على مدى 34 عاماً جعلها ثقيلة، أرجح هذا الاحتمال، لأني استمتعت بالمجموعتين الأخيرتين أكثر مما فعلت مع الأوليين.
حيث غلب على المجموعة الأولى الأشباح، ولم يعجبني منها إلا قصة (المرأة التي تصل في السادسة)، من المجموعة الثالثة كانت قصة إيرنديرا وجدتها الأبرز، أما المجموعة الأخيرة فكانت هي الأبرز وخاصة قصص (طائرة الحسناء النائمة)، (جئت لأتكلم في الهاتف فقط)، (رعب آب) وهاتين القصتين نموذجين راقيين لأدب الرعب، (وأثر دمك على الثلج) قصة الحب التي فتنتني وآلمتني نهايتها.
يضم هذا الكتاب المجموعات القصصية التالية (عينا كلب أزرق)، (جنازة الأم الكبيرة)، (القصة الحزينة التي لا تصدق لإيرنديرا البريئة وجدتها القاسية) و(اثنتا عشرة قصة قصيرة مهاجرة).
افتتحت بهذا الكتاب العام الجديد، كنت آمل أن ماركيز سيمنحني دفعة جميلة، ولكن للأسف تجرعت الكتاب ببطء طيلة الشهر، لا أدري ما الذي حدث؟ هل كان مزاجي لا يتناسب مع الواقعية السحرية هذه الأيام؟ أم أن المجموعة ولأنها كتبت على مدى 34 عاماً جعلها ثقيلة، أرجح هذا الاحتمال، لأني استمتعت بالمجموعتين الأخيرتين أكثر مما فعلت مع الأوليين.
حيث غلب على المجموعة الأولى الأشباح، ولم يعجبني منها إلا قصة (المرأة التي تصل في السادسة)، من المجموعة الثالثة كانت قصة إيرنديرا وجدتها الأبرز، أما المجموعة الأخيرة فكانت هي الأبرز وخاصة قصص (طائرة الحسناء النائمة)، (جئت لأتكلم في الهاتف فقط)، (رعب آب) وهاتين القصتين نموذجين راقيين لأدب الرعب، (وأثر دمك على الثلج) قصة الحب التي فتنتني وآلمتني نهايتها.
May 13, 2014
Collected Stories contains twenty six short stories divided into three sections. The stories are in chronological order of their publication. You read Gabriel Marquez from his very early days to his more seasoned tenure as a writer.
Gabriel Marquez writings as a whole clearly improves over time, this collection proves this point. The earlier stories were nothing spectacular and as the collection grows so does Marquez and his writing.
I have enjoyed Gabriel Marquez in both short stories and novel length. He can be a bit redundant but when this man hits his stride at full speed there is no stopping him. This is a wonderful collection to introduce yourself to his writings or even as a refresher, maybe see just how his writing has evolved. Excellent sampler of Gabriel Marquez.
Gabriel Marquez writings as a whole clearly improves over time, this collection proves this point. The earlier stories were nothing spectacular and as the collection grows so does Marquez and his writing.
I have enjoyed Gabriel Marquez in both short stories and novel length. He can be a bit redundant but when this man hits his stride at full speed there is no stopping him. This is a wonderful collection to introduce yourself to his writings or even as a refresher, maybe see just how his writing has evolved. Excellent sampler of Gabriel Marquez.
August 21, 2021
this is hands down one of the most impressive short story collections I've ever read. it's taken me months to complete, coz I have read it only when I'm at my most Attentive which hasn't been much lately. but wow! what a literary masterpiece this collection was. a masterpiece.
June 15, 2007
So, first of all, I have been reading this off and on for about three years now and I finally decided about two weeks ago to give it a serious effort from the beginning. This is more than just an interesting collection of stories; it's a document of Marquez's growth as a writer. The first third of the book is frankly pretty terrible. It's filled with failed experiments in which Marquez grows closer to developing his signature magical realism, but these experiments instead come off as ghost stories that get bogged down in maudlin torpor. Then, something clicks. The next two thirds of the book are incredible. Marquez finds his voice and more importantly, he starts to serve the story. The characters go somewhere instead of stagnating in their own ghastliness. The stories themselves are richer and they say something. The three standouts are "A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings", "The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World" and "The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother".
June 27, 2016
لا يمكن ان تخسر أبدا وانت تقرا لماركيز
رحلة رائعة في عوالم ماركيز السحرية
نتبع فيها تطور اُسلوب ماركيز وتصاعده
تبدو القصص الاولى متأثرة بالجو الذي خلقه كافكا في السرد الحديث ثم يختط ماركيز لنفسه عالمه الإبداعي في القصص اللاحقة او ما سيسمى بالواقعية السحرية
وفي الجزء الأخير والأحدث من منجز ماركيز ( وخاصة في اثنتا عشر حكاية تائهة ) يبدو التوازن و التزاوج بين البدايات بأسئلتها المفتوحة والسوريالية ومرحلة الذروة بواقعيتها السحرية ..
اقتراحي الوحيد ان يقرا الكتاب من نهايته ليكون اكثر امتاعا وجذبا للقارئ العجول
رحلة رائعة في عوالم ماركيز السحرية
نتبع فيها تطور اُسلوب ماركيز وتصاعده
تبدو القصص الاولى متأثرة بالجو الذي خلقه كافكا في السرد الحديث ثم يختط ماركيز لنفسه عالمه الإبداعي في القصص اللاحقة او ما سيسمى بالواقعية السحرية
وفي الجزء الأخير والأحدث من منجز ماركيز ( وخاصة في اثنتا عشر حكاية تائهة ) يبدو التوازن و التزاوج بين البدايات بأسئلتها المفتوحة والسوريالية ومرحلة الذروة بواقعيتها السحرية ..
اقتراحي الوحيد ان يقرا الكتاب من نهايته ليكون اكثر امتاعا وجذبا للقارئ العجول
June 2, 2017
في حضرة ماركيز من جديد..
أفضل ما كتب في هذا الكتاب..هو أخر ما جاء به
تحديدا مجموعتي اثنتا عشر قصة قصيرة مهاجرة..والقصة العجيبة والحزينة لايرينديرا البريئة وجدتها القاسية..
أسوا ما يمكن أن تبدا به جاء في بداية الكتاب تجديدا مجموعة عينا كلب أزرق..مجموعة غرائبية بامتياز تناولت الموت بسريالية لم ترق لي أبدا..
..
ولكن أهم ما وضعتني هذه المجموعة أمامه هو أني لا أصلح لقراءة القصص القصيرة..ولست مغرمة بهذا اللون من الأدب أبدا .حتي ولو كان كاتبها العزيز ماركيز نفسه..رغم جودة العديد من القصص التي قرأتها في هذه المجموعة ..الا أني لم أندمج مع اي قصة منها باستثناء قصة ايرينديرا البريئة..ورحلة موفقة سيدي الرئيس..لطولهما النسبي بجانب جودة الكتابة أيضا...
لذا ربما سيكون هذا الكتاب هو نهاية قراءاتي للقصص القصيرة...حتي اشعار آخر..
أفضل ما كتب في هذا الكتاب..هو أخر ما جاء به
تحديدا مجموعتي اثنتا عشر قصة قصيرة مهاجرة..والقصة العجيبة والحزينة لايرينديرا البريئة وجدتها القاسية..
أسوا ما يمكن أن تبدا به جاء في بداية الكتاب تجديدا مجموعة عينا كلب أزرق..مجموعة غرائبية بامتياز تناولت الموت بسريالية لم ترق لي أبدا..
..
ولكن أهم ما وضعتني هذه المجموعة أمامه هو أني لا أصلح لقراءة القصص القصيرة..ولست مغرمة بهذا اللون من الأدب أبدا .حتي ولو كان كاتبها العزيز ماركيز نفسه..رغم جودة العديد من القصص التي قرأتها في هذه المجموعة ..الا أني لم أندمج مع اي قصة منها باستثناء قصة ايرينديرا البريئة..ورحلة موفقة سيدي الرئيس..لطولهما النسبي بجانب جودة الكتابة أيضا...
لذا ربما سيكون هذا الكتاب هو نهاية قراءاتي للقصص القصيرة...حتي اشعار آخر..
July 10, 2014
مجموعة قصص ماركيز القصيرة شبيهة لدرجة كبيرة برواياته حتى في إسهابها وتفاصيلها الكثيرة وطولها في حالة بعض القصص، لدرجة جعلتني أتذكر رواياته المذهلة.
وقبل تعليقي على القصص، أبدي حزني على الترجمة، على رغم كونها جيدة بعض الشئ إلا أن هناك الكثير من الأخطاء في ترجمة الكلمات لبعض القصص التي قرأتها بالانجليزية من قبل والتي أعرفها، لذلك لاحظت الكثير من الأخطاء وهذا سئ، لأن القصص جيدة فعلا!
بالعودة إلى القصص، أعجبني معظمها مثل:
"عينا كلب أزرق" وكيف أنها تدور في حلمي شخصين مختلفين على ما يبدو ويتقابلان في الحلم وربما في الواقع أيضاً دون أن يعرف ذلك
أو "الإذعان الثالث" المرعبة والتي تدور أحداثها من وجهة نظر شخص "ميت" قضى حياته بأكملها ممداً في تابوت.
و "جنازة الأم الكبرى" والتي شعرت كما لو أنها امتداد لرواية "مائة عام من العزلة" كما لو أنها فصلها الأخير أو ما شابه.
أما أطول القصص وأروعها هي "الحكاية العجيبة والحزينة لطيبة القلب إيرينديرا و جدتها القاسية"، وهذه ليست قصة قصيرة عادية. هي ملحمة فتاة ظلت تتبع جدتها القاسية وتنصاع لأوامرها لسبب لازلت أجهله، ولكن هذا ما أضفى على القصة روعتها.
أما في "جئت لأتصل بالتليفون فقط" فقط شعرت برعب ماريا، وبداية القصة كانت مبهرة، رغم أنني لم أفهم نهايتها جيداً.
وفوجئت من تصرف الأطفال في قصة "الصيف السعيد للسيدة فوربس" وأعجبتني قصة "رحلة طيبة يا سيدي الرئيس" للغاية!
أسلوب ماركيز ساحر ويجعلك تغرق في تفاصيل قصصه سواء أكانت عشر صفحات أم مائة صفحة. لم أمل منه يوماً، أعتقد أن فكرة أن أبدأ بأكبر أعماله "مائة عام من العزلة" نجحت في منحي تلك المناعة والقدرة على قرائته دون كلل أو ملل.
وقبل تعليقي على القصص، أبدي حزني على الترجمة، على رغم كونها جيدة بعض الشئ إلا أن هناك الكثير من الأخطاء في ترجمة الكلمات لبعض القصص التي قرأتها بالانجليزية من قبل والتي أعرفها، لذلك لاحظت الكثير من الأخطاء وهذا سئ، لأن القصص جيدة فعلا!
بالعودة إلى القصص، أعجبني معظمها مثل:
"عينا كلب أزرق" وكيف أنها تدور في حلمي شخصين مختلفين على ما يبدو ويتقابلان في الحلم وربما في الواقع أيضاً دون أن يعرف ذلك
أو "الإذعان الثالث" المرعبة والتي تدور أحداثها من وجهة نظر شخص "ميت" قضى حياته بأكملها ممداً في تابوت.
و "جنازة الأم الكبرى" والتي شعرت كما لو أنها امتداد لرواية "مائة عام من العزلة" كما لو أنها فصلها الأخير أو ما شابه.
أما أطول القصص وأروعها هي "الحكاية العجيبة والحزينة لطيبة القلب إيرينديرا و جدتها القاسية"، وهذه ليست قصة قصيرة عادية. هي ملحمة فتاة ظلت تتبع جدتها القاسية وتنصاع لأوامرها لسبب لازلت أجهله، ولكن هذا ما أضفى على القصة روعتها.
أما في "جئت لأتصل بالتليفون فقط" فقط شعرت برعب ماريا، وبداية القصة كانت مبهرة، رغم أنني لم أفهم نهايتها جيداً.
وفوجئت من تصرف الأطفال في قصة "الصيف السعيد للسيدة فوربس" وأعجبتني قصة "رحلة طيبة يا سيدي الرئيس" للغاية!
أسلوب ماركيز ساحر ويجعلك تغرق في تفاصيل قصصه سواء أكانت عشر صفحات أم مائة صفحة. لم أمل منه يوماً، أعتقد أن فكرة أن أبدأ بأكبر أعماله "مائة عام من العزلة" نجحت في منحي تلك المناعة والقدرة على قرائته دون كلل أو ملل.
August 10, 2010
عندما تقرأ لأديب عملاق مثل ماركيز فإن سقف طموحاتك يطاول السماء، لكنك تكون مهموما بعوامل أخرى كالترجمة، خصوصا وأن الروايات المكتوبة بغير الانجليزية لا تكون عادة مترجمة إلى العربية من لغتها الأم، وإنما تكون مترجمة من ترجمات أخرى وسيطة كالانجليزية و الفرنسية.
لكن هذا الكتاب مختلف، فقد اجتمعت فيه الترجمة الجيدة جدا - المباشرة و الأدبية - للمنوفي مع الأدب الأصيل الذهبي لماركيز مع غلاف جميل للفنانة فاطمة العرارجي، بالإضافة إلى طباعة جيدة و سعر زهيد للغاية.
الكتاب يضم اثنتا عشرة قصة قصيرة من الناحية الفنية، لكن كل قصة منها هي عصارة تجربة غنية و فكرة مذهلة. والرائع في أعمال ماركيز أنها في منتهى البساطة الشكلية – سهلة التناول و مشوقة – لكنها دسمة المعنى، فتشعر أن وراء كل قطعة معان مختلفة، فتعيد قراءتها مرارا بنفس المتعة و الدهشة الأولتين. ويتسم أسلوب ماركيز في هذه المجموعة بالسخرية اللاذعة، التي قد تدفعك للابتسام ووجهك مبلل بدموع المأساة المروية، وهذا جانب آخر من جوانب عظمته.
بهرتني ثلاث قصص تستحق النجوم الخمس: "جنازة الأم الكبرى" التي تصور مشاكل العالم الثالث المقموع و المقهور، "إيرينديرا وجدتها القاسية" التي تصور إذلال الإنسان المفزع للإنسان و ما يتبعه، "رحلة طيبة يا سيدي الرئيس" التي تظهر أن ضعف الإنسان واحد مهما علا شأنه.
يلي ذلك ثلاث قصص قيمتها بأربع نجمات: "قيلولة الثلاثاء"، "الموت الدائم قيما وراء الحب"، "جئت لأتصل بالتليفون فقط".
كتاب جميل يستحق القراءة.
لكن هذا الكتاب مختلف، فقد اجتمعت فيه الترجمة الجيدة جدا - المباشرة و الأدبية - للمنوفي مع الأدب الأصيل الذهبي لماركيز مع غلاف جميل للفنانة فاطمة العرارجي، بالإضافة إلى طباعة جيدة و سعر زهيد للغاية.
الكتاب يضم اثنتا عشرة قصة قصيرة من الناحية الفنية، لكن كل قصة منها هي عصارة تجربة غنية و فكرة مذهلة. والرائع في أعمال ماركيز أنها في منتهى البساطة الشكلية – سهلة التناول و مشوقة – لكنها دسمة المعنى، فتشعر أن وراء كل قطعة معان مختلفة، فتعيد قراءتها مرارا بنفس المتعة و الدهشة الأولتين. ويتسم أسلوب ماركيز في هذه المجموعة بالسخرية اللاذعة، التي قد تدفعك للابتسام ووجهك مبلل بدموع المأساة المروية، وهذا جانب آخر من جوانب عظمته.
بهرتني ثلاث قصص تستحق النجوم الخمس: "جنازة الأم الكبرى" التي تصور مشاكل العالم الثالث المقموع و المقهور، "إيرينديرا وجدتها القاسية" التي تصور إذلال الإنسان المفزع للإنسان و ما يتبعه، "رحلة طيبة يا سيدي الرئيس" التي تظهر أن ضعف الإنسان واحد مهما علا شأنه.
يلي ذلك ثلاث قصص قيمتها بأربع نجمات: "قيلولة الثلاثاء"، "الموت الدائم قيما وراء الحب"، "جئت لأتصل بالتليفون فقط".
كتاب جميل يستحق القراءة.
January 5, 2015
اولا الترجمة جيدة ويتناول الكتاب مختارات قصصية منتقاة بدقة عالية فأولا نجد قصص مثل : الصيف السعيد للسيدة فوربس , وهي اول قصة يجب أن تقرأها في هذا الكتاب. ثم ريح الشمال , وبعد ذلك لك الحرية , واخترت القصتين دون غيرهما لانهما يمثلان دفعة جيدة لقراءة كافة القصص ,على عكس ما بدأ به الكتاب , والذي يؤدي إلى فتور اهتمامك بالكتاب , حيث بدأ بقصة يا إما مملة , يا إما سيئة الترجمة , او بكل بساطة لم افهمها او اتذوقها .لذى وجب علي التنويه.
January 2, 2018
The bestest short stories from Marquez. Some just 5 pages long but packed with so much fervor and flavor.
Artificial Roses and The Sea of Lost Time were my favorites.
Artificial Roses and The Sea of Lost Time were my favorites.
December 13, 2018
Loved it.
September 16, 2025
Reading the Collected Stories of Gabriel García Márquez feels like wandering through an expanded universe of One Hundred Years of Solitude, and that’s by design. Many of the stories explicitly reference the town or characters from 100YS, and those that don’t explicitly say so feel like they are in Macondo anyway.
Some of these pieces were written 15–20 years before the novel, when Márquez was still sketching Macondo into being, and others came after, once his voice and prestige was at full power. Together they trace his evolution, showing both the early experiments and the later confidence. I read this with my online friend Derek, who particularly liked the later stories in the collection.
“Balthazar’s Marvelous Afternoon” turns the gift of a handmade birdcage into a meditation on pride, generosity, and futility…a small tragedy dressed as a triumph. And “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” reads like a parable cracked open, where the miraculous is met with both cruelty and wonder. A vulnerable portrayal of commoditized awe.
The prose is dazzling, but in bulk it is almost exhausting. Dense, rhythmic, sometimes relentless. One story is a single long sentence. Alright, Gabito, we get it, you are talented! Not every story is memorable, but the best of them are sublime (I feel like I’m running out of superlatives in my captions).
Some of these pieces were written 15–20 years before the novel, when Márquez was still sketching Macondo into being, and others came after, once his voice and prestige was at full power. Together they trace his evolution, showing both the early experiments and the later confidence. I read this with my online friend Derek, who particularly liked the later stories in the collection.
“Balthazar’s Marvelous Afternoon” turns the gift of a handmade birdcage into a meditation on pride, generosity, and futility…a small tragedy dressed as a triumph. And “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” reads like a parable cracked open, where the miraculous is met with both cruelty and wonder. A vulnerable portrayal of commoditized awe.
The prose is dazzling, but in bulk it is almost exhausting. Dense, rhythmic, sometimes relentless. One story is a single long sentence. Alright, Gabito, we get it, you are talented! Not every story is memorable, but the best of them are sublime (I feel like I’m running out of superlatives in my captions).
April 30, 2013
Overall this was an interesting read especially since I'm a fan of Marquez and relished seeing the evolution of his writing over time.
Though Marquez's voice was strong in the early stories, I'm not sure these more abstract attempts at magical realism represent his best work, though I suspect they served as a basis for his future writings and were a necessary step in his development as a writer. As a result, the first several stories weren't what I expected, yet still worth reading if only for the beautiful use of language and imagery. The last half of the book is much more in line with some other works that I've read and enjoyed, including Of Love and Other Demons and Memories of My Melancholy Whores.
Some of the best stories in this compilation of short stories included: The Woman Who Came at Six O'Clock, There Are No Thieves in the Town, The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World, Blackman the Good, Vendor of Miracles, and The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother.
Marquez is a genius at creating images using unexpected and odd pairings often mixing the senses to give the reader a fresh experience.
For example in Night of the Curlews he writes:
From the Monologue of Isabel Watching It Rain in Macondo:
A final example from Tuesday Siesta:
Marquez is also a master at describing his characters in a way that makes them come to life on the page and represents the antithesis of cliche.
From Balthazar's Marvelous Afternoon:
And
From Tuesday Siesta:
Finally and most importantly, his writing is passionate and has a seductive quality. His sex scenes are subtle and soft yet incredibly sexy.
From my favorite and last story in the book, The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira:
Excerpt contains a spoiler.
Though Marquez's voice was strong in the early stories, I'm not sure these more abstract attempts at magical realism represent his best work, though I suspect they served as a basis for his future writings and were a necessary step in his development as a writer. As a result, the first several stories weren't what I expected, yet still worth reading if only for the beautiful use of language and imagery. The last half of the book is much more in line with some other works that I've read and enjoyed, including Of Love and Other Demons and Memories of My Melancholy Whores.
Some of the best stories in this compilation of short stories included: The Woman Who Came at Six O'Clock, There Are No Thieves in the Town, The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World, Blackman the Good, Vendor of Miracles, and The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira and Her Heartless Grandmother.
Marquez is a genius at creating images using unexpected and odd pairings often mixing the senses to give the reader a fresh experience.
For example in Night of the Curlews he writes:
We caught the smell of sad women sitting and waiting. We felt the prolonged emptiness of the hall before us while we walked toward the door, before the other smell came out to greet us, the sour smell of the woman sitting by the door.
From the Monologue of Isabel Watching It Rain in Macondo:
At dawn on Thursday the smells stopped, the sense of distance was lost. The notion of time, upset since the day before, disappeared completely. The there was no Thursday. What should have been Thursday was a physical, jellylike thing that could have been parted with the hands in order to look into Friday.
A final example from Tuesday Siesta:
"God's will is inscrutable," said the Father.
But he said it without much conviction, partly because experience had made him a little skeptical and partly because of the heat.
Marquez is also a master at describing his characters in a way that makes them come to life on the page and represents the antithesis of cliche.
From Balthazar's Marvelous Afternoon:
He had two weeks' growth, short, hard and bristly hair like the mane of a mule, and the general expression of a frightened boy. But it was a false impression.
And
He was smoothly and delicately fat, like a woman who had been beautiful in her youth, and he had delicate hands. His voice seemed like that of a priest speaking Latin.
From Tuesday Siesta:
The woman seemed too old to be her mother, because of the blue veins on her eyelids and her small, soft, and shapeless body, in a dress cut like a cassock. She was riding with her spinal column braced firmly against the back of the seat, and held a peeling patent-leather hand-bag in her lap with both hands. She bore the conscientious serenity of someone accustomed to poverty.
Finally and most importantly, his writing is passionate and has a seductive quality. His sex scenes are subtle and soft yet incredibly sexy.
From my favorite and last story in the book, The Incredible and Sad Tale of Innocent Erendira:
Excerpt contains a spoiler.
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