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Setting: The novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude, takes place in Columbia during the time period from 1850 to 1950. The story is set in one main location, the fictional town of Macondo. Throughout the story, we learn the full history of the town, from its formation, to its eventual destruction. One of the main locations in this town, and one that the story frequently centers around, is the Buendia house. A large portion of the story takes place in this house, as it is home of the main characters, the Buendia family. Several rooms, such as the Meliquades’ room, are important parts of the story, and serve as locations that characters often visit. We follow the Buendia family as they live out their lives in Macondo. Besides Macondo, the story …show more content…
The story follows seven generations of the family, as they live in Macondo, from its foundation, to its destruction.
First Generation:
Prevalent characters in the first generation are Jose Arcadio Buendia, and Ursula Iguaran. Jose Arcadio Buendia is an inquisitive man, and the founder of Macondo. He eventually ends up dying after going insane due to his pursuit of knowledge. Ursula is Jose’s wife, as well as his cousin. She helps found Macondo, and dies at the age of 120.
Second Generation:
Important characters in the second generation are Jose Arcadio, Colonel Aureliano Buendia, Amaranta, and Rebeca. Jose Arcadio, and Colonel Aureliano are both sons of Jose Arcadio Buendia, while Amaranta is his daughter. Jose Arcadio is stubborn, and eventually leaves Macondo for a traveller girl named Remedios Moscote. Colonel Aureliano is a vicious fighter, as well as a good leader, demonstrated by the fact that he fights on both sides of the civil war. Amaranta is Jose Arcadio Buendia’s third child, and is one of his two daughters. She grows to hate her adopted sister Rebeca, due to the fact that both of them fall in love with the same person. Rebeca is Jose Arcadio Buendia’s adopted daughter. Though she initially falls in love with the same person as her sister, Amaranta, she later falls for her adoptive brother Jose
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Remedios the Beauty, Jose Arcadio Segundo, and Aureliano Segundo are the three children of Arcadio and Santa Sofia de la Piedad. Remedios the Beauty is exceptionally beautiful, and blissfully ignorant. She does not die, but instead ascends to the heavens. Jose Arcadio Segundo and Aureliano Segundo are brothers, though their personalities clash greatly. Jose Arcadio Segundo is quiet, and plays a major part in the banana plantation strike, being the only survivor of the massacre. Meanwhile, Aureliano Segundo is more headstrong and hasty. He is married to Fernanda del Carpio, though he loves Petra Cotes. He dies at the same time as his twin, Jose Arcadio Segundo does. Finally, Fernanda del Carpio is Aureliano Segundo’s wife. However, in spite of this, she detests him. She was born in a different city, but moved to Macondo when she married to Aureliano Segundo. She dies late in the novel, lamenting about her cursed
In the novel “How the Garcia Girls Lost their Accents”, Julie Alvarez gives the reader multiple accounts that narrate the difficulties of four sisters growing up in unfamiliar lands. The Garcia girls are Carla, Sandra, Yolanda and Sofia, and Alvarez speaks the most through Yolanda 's narrative. The sisters were born in the Dominican Republic and were exiled to the United States as children with their loving mother and traditional father. Papi Garcia grew up during an era where women were not supposed to be left alone which transformed him into a protective father and moving to a new life raised his fatherly instincts to a greater height. The novel starts in 1989, with the Garcia girls as American adults. The novel starts to flow backwards
Grande introduces to the audience various characters that cross Juana 's path to either alter or assist her on her journey to find her father. Through those individuals, Grande offers a strong comparison of female characters who follow the norms, versus those that challenge gender roles that
The relationships between mothers and daughters is a topic that authors often call upon to tell a story. It is an important part of every culture, which makes the topic relatable to any reader who picks the book up. Junot Diaz understood the universality of mother/daughter relationships and incorporated it in his novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. Although the book is mainly about Oscar, an overweight Dominican boy from New Jersey and his quest for love, the book also spends a lot of time exploring the relationships between Oscar’s sister Lola and their mother Beli and Beli’s relationship with her mother figure La Inca. Junot Diaz does not write mother/daughter relationships in an honest way and focuses on the conflict in the relationships
it is unmistakable that life situations inspired Juan Rulfo to write this story. He like no other person had a greater understanding of how to portray the theme of family especially missing a father as a role model, death, survival and revenge. Moreover, through the use of local Mexican language it furthermore developed the society in which peasants had to live during the post-revolution. Additionally Juan Rulfo tries to add all five senses in the story forming magical realism and a vivid picture that the readers can understand. Overall, the readers learn a lot about peasant’s approach to life after revolution that the main drive was
The founder of Macondo, Jose Arcadio Buendia, is the first great solitary. He becomes so obsessed with his own search for truth that he neglects his family and ultimately loses all touch with outer reality. His wife, Ursula, is perhaps the greatest of the antisolitary figures, the person who more than anyone else holds the family and the house together. She takes in a foster child and later insists on rearing the bastard children of her sons and grandsons. Her whole life is devoted to strengthening social bonds.
In William Deresiewicz’s essay, “The End of Solitude,” he describes how technology has made it impossible to be alone. Media, social networking sites, television have so much influence on our mind that our lives revolve around these things. Everyone wants to be recognized, famed and wants to be appreciated by others such that being alone isn’t appealing to them. William Deresiewicz argues that being alone is a vital part of life and everybody should try to achieve that solitude in their lives, but with technology it has become impossible to be alone when we have technology in our pockets. He suggests that solitude is very important to hear God and to hear our inner selves. He compares the eras Romanticism, Modernism and
Arredondo exposed Luisa as a dynamic character because during the story the readers can see the changes that her personality had over the time. At the beginning of the story the reader can see how Luisa takes care of her uncle with devotion and love, but after they married she considered it as a disgusting duty. Ines Arredondo described Luisa as woman who has the power of “purify everything” (81), but after suffering the physical abuse of her uncle, all her innocence disappear. She was an innocent girl that was reserving herself for marriage. However, after married her uncle, she started seen the things in a different way. Now, she thinks of herself as “the vilest of harlot” (87). The way that the author exposes Luisa is like happy young lady that thanks to the circumstances enter to a deep depression that changes her life and she “was not able to go back to who I [she] was”
The setting was never clearly stated in the story, and the process of putting it together here will involved some spoiler for the plot. So far the only
Maria Luna - Antonio’s mother. A kind woman who’s one dream is to see her youngest son become a priest. She is obsessed with his education and pushes him to learn about the culture of her family, the Lunas.
Diaz writes “In those long days-before delincuencia and bank failures, before Diaspora- the Cabrals were numbered among the High of the Land “(211). The Cabral’s held a high place in society, but it was not until Abelard Cabral upset Trujillo that he was sentenced to the curse of Trujillo’s reign. The power of Trujillo is so strong that it ruined not only Abelard Cabral’s life, but also his wife and three daughters’ lives as well. His two daughters died abruptly and Beli suffered later in life with her love. Trujillo’s power is able to affect Beli because she knows nothing about her history.
The rooms where the action of a story takes place are also very important. Some the rooms used in the book are bedrooms, the dining room, the parlor, and the enclosed garden patio. The first room we see inside of this old house is the garden patio. This room is interesting because the smell from the patio is always associated with the title character. Felipe looks for her in this garden; he smells the patio plants in her hair. Symbolically, the garden can be associated with the mind, with the unconscious, or it may give you clues to your own inner state. The plants, flowers, and fruit found in the garden may also enhance t...
Throughout One Hundred Years of Solitude, the idea of a predetermined fate is accepted as natural. After all time reoccurs and sometimes seeing into the future can be as simple as remembering something in the past. In chapter 8 however a prediction of the future has an effect on it. This novel presents power throughout and this is more thoroughly exemplified in the final pages when the destruction of Maconda is brought about by Aureliano's (II)
Most novels are structured linearly. Events occur chronologically, and one can map the novel's exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and denouement. One Hundred Years of Solitude is also linear in its broad outlines (Bell-Villida 98). The plot of the novel is simple: Jose Arcadio Buendia marries his cousin Ursula, they found Macondo, the family grows, declines, and is eventually blown off the face of the earth by a hurricane. There is a beginning, and time moves the story to a total, apocalyptic conclusion (117).
The novel begins with geographic isolation. Jose Arcadio Buendia shouts, "God damn it! Macondo is surrounded by water on all sides!" Whether it is, in truth, an island is irrelevant. The town believed itself to be cut off from the rest of the world. In addition, Jose Arcadio Buendia and Ursula are looking for solitude. The founding of Macondo was a result of escaping Jose Arcadio Buendia's murder of Prudencio Aguilar. Aguilar's ghost haunted them, eventually forcing them to retreat.
Traditional gender roles exist in Gabriel Garcia Marquez’ novel One Hundred Years of Solitude, but traditional distribution of power between the genders does not. In analyzing each character and their life, it’s easy to see how Marquez presented each in terms of his own view on gender constructs. Marquez portrays femininity and masculinity very differently. But why would Marquez choose to make such a clear distinction between the roles of each gender? Marquez sees women as spiritual and overpowered by traditional standards, and men doomed by their own obsessions. Men are wily and therefore vulnerable, whereas women are dignified and durable, and survive for much longer.