The Wise Mail Going To Rome By Gabriel Garcia Márquez

Whether or not the values of religion are actually true or not is still up to debate. There are many viable arguments claiming that religion is not real, and there are many viable arguments claiming that religion is real. However, in the story news tends to spread quicker than the mail going to Rome. A very important document being mailed questioning if he is an angel is much slower than the rumor spreading that he is. Gabriel Garcia Márquez uses the religious elements to suggest that gossip can be more powerful than religion when trying to prove something.

The wise neighbor woman speaks about how the main is an angel. She is wise. Therefore, it’s understandable that the townsfolk believe her. She appears to know more than a priest, who is supposed to be a specialist on this subject. Nobody knows what an angel is supposed to look like. Upon further inspection of the old man in the mud, the wise neighbor woman claims “He’s an angel” (Márquez 273). The wise neighbor woman also claims that mothballs “were the food prescribed for angels” (Márquez 274). We can see the wisdom of the wise neighbor woman being blindly followed when “they tried to make him eat mothballs” (Márquez 274). She knows so much about angels, although Father Gozaga seems to not know anything about them, even though he is a religious authority in the town. However, the wise neighbor woman doesn’t know everything about angels, because later in the story the narrator states “not even the wise neighbor woman had been able to tell them what to do with dead angels” (Márquez 276). This can be interpreted to say that angels, if they do exist, do not die. Also, that the wise woman’s gossip is more powerful than the beliefs of religion.

Father Gozaga has no idea what an ...

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...e powerful than religion. This is especially because the wise neighbor woman’s words of wisdom are taken as facts. However, these facts have no evidence to support them. Furthermore, nobody has any idea what an angel look like, what it eats, or even what language it speaks. Father Gozaga and the wise neighbor woman seem to know about angels, because the townsfolk come to them for information about the man with wings. The news traveling to Rome is very slow in returning, and when it returns, there isn’t even factual information helping to prove whether the man with wings is an angel or not. Proving that the man is an angel doesn’t seem to be too important to religious leaders, although the rumor that there is an angel in the town is bringing people from all over. Gossip spreads news and opinion quicker than religion does, especially when dealing with the uneducated.