Dying for Love in Of Love and Other Demons by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

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Dying for Love in "Of Love and Other Demons" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Based on part of the XVIII century, when the prevalent times of the Spanish Inquisition dominated the powers of the society and the people was ruled by an orthodox way of thinking, Gabriel Garcia Marquez gives birth to "Of Love and Other Demons". According to The American Heritage Dictionary, Inquisition was a former Roman Catholic tribunal established to suppress heresy. The term Heresy originally meant a belief that one arrived at by oneself (Greek hairesis, "choosing for oneself"), and it is any religious doctrine opposed to the dogma of a particular church, especially a doctrine held by a person professing faith in the teachings of that church. Surrounded by many cities, such as Lima, Portobelo and Veracruz, "Of Love and Other Demons" takes place in Cartagena-Colombia, a small city on an island formed by shallow extension of the harbor, and surrounded by a 12 meters (40 ft) thick wall. This city still is a cultural relic, which nowadays preserves some of the stone-built structures characteristic of the era. "Of Love and Other Demons" reflects how differences in cultures affect people's thoughts as well as what effects it may cause to the society when ruled by a major power. Garcia Marquez, winner of the Nobel of Literature of 1982, has a certain kind of power over the readers. He involves them in a very visual and fantastic space, where the expressiveness and dominance of the language makes the reader stay on his or her way to the end of the story. In a place such as Cartegena, a typical South American town where the popular siesta, the hammock and the huerto of los naranjos, bring up the life of the natural environment; the author relates the story ...

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... personalities were shared, since in the time of inquisition, they were ruled by religious and Catholic thoughts that were nothing else that a mirror of non-free life that all citizen should follow. Both the Marquis and Bernarda die turning crazy on each corner of their lives, but the love that the Marquis tried to give once will remain alive although his daughter is not aware about it.

Sierva Maria was not possessed by the demons, since at the end of the novel, Garcia Marquez specifies that she dies of love, pulling the grapes off not one by one but two by two, hardly breathing in her longing to strip the cluster of its last grape. Desperation is following her everywhere she goes within her mind, and love and demons cannot pertain to each other, cultures can.

Works Cited:

Garcia Marquez, Gabriel. Of Love and Other Demons. New York: Penguin Books, 1995.

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