Sunday, July 27, 2014

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez


100 Years of Solitude - One of the best classic literature! 

I've been eyeing this book for quite some time. At first I thought of buying it as it's been under the recommended book list to read from many book store. However, I ended up buying 'Love in the Time of Cholera'. But I was lucky enough finding this book in the library and before reading this thick book of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, I started off with his four short story books, which from there, I managed to learn his style of writing and typical things that I had to adopt, such as: to recognize the Spanish names that can be used repeatedly over and over again under the different generations, the three words names that you have to think refers to which character in the story, the relationship between one person and another, and so on.

Characters in the One Hundred Years of Solitude

Look at the above family tree chart! 'Jose Arcadio' is used by four persons from different generations and 'Aureliano' is used five times. 'Amaranta', 'Ursula', and 'Remedios' are used twice each.

Basically, this book describes the story of the everyone inside the family tree above. From one couple (Jose Arcadio Buendia with Ursula Iguaran), it develops into many generations. It consists of 420 pages and it took me two weeks to finally finish reading it :)

I had quite a hard time when it came into the middle part of the book when it described the war time but it ended smoothly and made the whole thing interesting to read. I had to refer the family tree chart for many many times to see their relations again and again. But I'm proud of myself that I am finally able to read such a 'classic' story that I used to give up before even started.

It describes such a long history of the family, over 100 years, and many family members due to one or many reasons chose to lead a life of solitude and sometimes it made me wonder what life means to each of us as a human being and no matter what we do, at the end of the day, we will all die and leave this world.

There are lots of twists and turns in the story and the forbidden love that they shouldn't have. Overall, it's really a nice story to go through and at the mean time I'll take a break from his book and read another one as I found it quite heavy and had to stop reading every half an hour :D

4 comments:

rm said...

Wow, such round of applause for completing this book!

I should pick it from where I left last. But again I think I should not waste my time on books I don't love such as this. Sorry Gabriel garcia Marquez :P.

But I loved Love in the Time of Cholera :).

Overcome Life said...

Thank you for your comment! :)

Actually this isn't as bad as you think Rekha. But perhaps, it isn't just your type of book :) It requires time to read tough, which at first I thought I need 100 Years to finish hehehe..... ^^

Himalayan Tenzin said...

I think this is the book which won Gabo the nobel laureate for literature. Is it, madam Rima?

Though I didn't read the book, I read his book, Love in The Time of Cholera, thrice. I am thinking of reading it again.

I am glad that you are also loving him now. ;-)I expect another revision of his other books from you.

Overcome Life said...

Kuzu Sonam! Thank you for reading and leaving your comment despite being busy preparing for your next semester. Yes, it is! This book had made him receiving many universal awards and these awards set the stage for Gabo to receive the Nobel Prize for literature.

If have a chance, you should try reading this book Sonam. As for me, let me rest for a while before I read his other books including Love in the Time of Cholera :)

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