In his book, Chronicle of A Death Foretold, Gabriel Garcia Márquez explores the relationship between an individual and their religion. With the presence of a bishop, and names such as “Santiago”, “Angela”, “Cristo”, and “Davina”, the audience is able to quickly recognize the influence that Catholicism has on this society. During the class presentation for the first chapter, one student argued how Márquez incorporates religion in an attempted to illustrate its obsolete nature. While depicting the scene at the docks, the narrator says, “Placida Linero was right: the bishop didn’t get off his boat. There were a lot of people at the dock in addition to the authorities and the schoolchildren, and everywhere one could see the crates of well-flattened rooster they were bearing as a gifts for the bishop” (Márquez 17). On the day of Santiago Nasar’s death, the community prepares meals, puts on their best attire, and gathers outside to see the bishop pass through their town. As evident in the quote above, due to the fact that his arrival was highly anticipated, the citizens were disappointed in his inability to personally greet them. As a result, the bishop symbolizes how the people are beginning to lose faith in their religion, thus, making it obsolete. Despite being a valid argument, I would like to assert how instead, Gabriel Garcia Márquez discusses how religion serves as an integral component of one’s life. This is evident through the main predicament of the story, and how Angela Vicario blamed Santiago of ruining her short-lived marriage. In the Catholic religion, women were forced to refrain from losing their virginity before becoming a wife. The failure to adhere to these rules could not only tarnish their reputation, but also prevent them from being married and having children. In regards to the book, once Bayardo San Roman discovers his wife’s “impurity”, Pedro and Pablo get involved, which ultimately leads to the death of Santiago Nasar. By employing multiple perspective on the same event, Márquez enables the audience to see the extent of this single issue. For example, instead of only affecting the Nasar and Vicario family, Angela’s inability to abide by her religion's expectations involved Clotilde Armenta, Cristo Bedoya, Father Amador, Colonel Lazaro Aponte, and more. Due to this, Márquez demonstrate how religion effects several aspects of an individual's life, for if Catholicism wasn’t considered, Angela’s marriage might have lasted. Furthermore, as mentioned previously, several of the prominent characters in the story have names that pertain to Catholicism. For example, Santiago translates to “Saint”, Angela means “Angel”, and Cristo is “Christ”. Since these figures heavily influenced the murder, it is implied that in this story, religion is not obsolete. It’s important to note how the idea that one’s fate serves as an integral component to their life is not entirely relevant in today’s society. With the emergence of scientific studies, as the presentation illustrated, the amount of individuals who believe in a religion has been declining.
This is very in-depth and I totally see your point! I agree that religion can serve as an integral component of one's life, and I can also see how religion may be obsolete or not to others. For example, it is very clear that the narrator disdains religion throughout the book with his statements such as calling the bishop a passing annoyance. However, to characters such as the Vicario twins who murdered Santiago to defend Angela's honor, is it possible that Marquez is saying that while it is important to have religion be a part of your life, is it also important to prioritize your own free will and morals before your religious obligations?
Talia Jensen I appreciate your insight on the character's names and how they reflect the religious elements of the story. I think the plot changes drastically because the influence of individuals belief, whether it be righteous or sinful actions. I still struggle to see exactly what Marquez is trying to communicate about religion, but I know that he is making a prominent effort to express that religion has changed history. It changes peoples actions and reactions everyday.
(3/14/18) In chapter one of Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Marquez starts off with a blunt and direct tone with the phrase “On the day they were going to kill him,”. This creates a shock factor and morbid curiosity within the reader. Along with the tone, juxtaposition is utilized in phrases such as “gentle drizzle” and “splattered in bird shit” to create a violent shift. The juxtaposition between the gentle and the violent represent the contradiction of society, dividing them into the sacred and the profane. All figures of authority, and who are considered sacred, such as Placida Linero, the bishop, and Father Carmen, are actually the most dismissive ones, shattering the illusion of perfection and serenity within religious figures. For example, “the bishop began to make the sign of the cross in the air opposite the crowd, and he kept on doing it mechanically afterwards, without malice or inspiration” shows the Bishop’s disdain of this society as he sails further away from it. Along with that, when Placida Linero is running, she curses “Lowlifes. Shitty animals that can’t do anything that isn’t something awful.” The negative and obscene diction show Linero’s disdain despite her seemingly spiritual and peaceful appearance due to the actions of her society. Through this juxtaposition and harsh negative diction, it appears that Gabriel Garcia Marquez is showing how religion and religious figures are abandoning society, in a way that they are almost becoming more harmful than helpful.
Your analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed how religion and religious figures are abandoning society in a harmful manner. To build upon your ideas, it's important to note how several of the character's names are associated with the Catholic faith. For example, Santiago translates into "saint", Cristo means "christ", and Angela means "angel". In regards to your blog, all of these characters contributes to the story in a negative way. This is evident through Angela's deceitful nature, as well as Santiago's sexual abuse towards Divina Flor.
Talia Jensen, Post #1 Throughout Márquez´ writing in the first chapter, he brings the prominent role of religion to the surface. The characters in the story will often make comments indicating their beliefs, and the actions and appearances of the people speak the loudest of their dependence on religion. On the occasion of the Bishop coming to town, ¨They’d placed the sick people in the archways to receive God’s medicine, and women came running out of their yards with turkeys and suckling pigs and all manner of things to eat, and from the opposite shore came canoes bedecked with flowers” (Marquez, 21). The frantic diction, such as “placed”, “sick”, “running”, reveals the people’s dependence on their strong faith in Catholicism and their passion for receiving gifts and blessings. From only reading this excerpt, one might assume that their whole world revolves around their religion. Their beliefs have noticeable influence over their actions, as women run towards this holy man and many bring gifts and ask for mercy on the sick. To contrasts the almost needy mannerisms of the people, the bishops shows a sense of disdain towards the town: “...The bishop began to make the sign of the cross in the air opposite the crowd on the pier, and he kept on doing it mechanically afterwards, without malice or inspiration, until the boat was lost from view...”(Marquez, 17). Marquez uses the words “air” and “lost” and “mechanically”; and the phrase “without malice or inspiration” to allude to an unemotional and aloof tone, which reflects the way the bishop views the people. He does not see them as equal and is distant and careless towards their gifts and respects to him.
In the first chapter of Chronicle of a Death Foretold, I noticed Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s very prominent theme of various aspects contrasting and juxtaposing with one another. This can be seen especially towards the very beginning of the chapter, where descriptions of seemingly casual actions are matched with brutally descriptive similes and metaphors. “He’d dreamed he was going through a grove of timber trees where a gentle drizzle was falling. And for an instant he was happy on his dream, but when he awoke he felt completely spattered with bird shit.” (Pg. 1). In this passage, Gabriel Garcia Marquez begins to describe Santiago’s dream as a peaceful, natural set, carrying the calm tone over to the reader as well. However, in the very next sentence, he juxtaposes this tone with negative diction as he describes Santiago’s state with a graphic simile. Additionally, there is a contrast employed by Marquez as Santiago Nasar has a conversation with his mother about his dream. “Any dream about birds means good health.” This is his mother’s reply to his dream, which contrasts his fate of death. However, this quote could also be a tool used to foreshadow the fact that everybody else in the city knows about Santiago’s death, as this quote can be interpreted as ‘birds’ being a symbol for freedom, of which he will have plenty in heaven. With his mother’s wish for good health, she wishes him farewell. Although Gabriel Garcia Marquez kills all of the suspense in the story by telling the reader that Santiago Nasar is going to die in the very first sentence of the book, he still foreshadows other aspects and facts about the rest of the book’s society through juxtaposition and symbolism.
Very astute observations Kevin! I love how you analysed the juxtaposition within the first passage, as it wasn't anything that I had considered! Great job! :-)
For my first blog post I chose to answer the investigative question “Will religion ever become obsolete?” and to answer this question, we have to look at what Gabriel Garcia Marquez wrote into the first chapter of the book. With characters named things like “Santiago”, “Angela”, and “Cristo”, among others, the blunt references to Catholicism are thrown in your face. However, it’s important to think about what these characters ended up doing. Santiago was killed, Angela wasn’t a virgin even though she should have been, and Cristo failed at the one job he had, which was to keep Santiago save. Not to mention the use of strong symbolism in this first chapter, where Marquez tells the fantastical story of the gun hidden under Santiago’s pillow accidentally being shot and destroying a statue of a saint in the middle of the town hall, which actually ended up teaching Santiago not to leave loaded guns in the house, which led to his inevitable death anyways. The symbolism of the saint being destroyed shows how Marquez believes that religion will result in being obsolete, as even the people who are meant to be pure and good by name are corrupted and killed.
In chapter 2, the main plot point was the arrival of Bayardo San Román. He was described as being drenched in silver and having “golden eyes” (page 25). Later in the chapter, it is revealed that Bayardo has come into town in order to find someone to marry. Marquez writes “…He had a way of speaking that served to conceal rather than reveal.” (page 26). Later in the chapter, the narrator’s mother says “It also seems that he’s swimming in gold.” (page 27) about Bayardo. The use of silver and gold, as well as how he speaks in a secretive way portrays Bayardo as a very masculine and desirable man. The gold and silver help create the image of a wealthy man, while his general demeanour within the story makes him seem like a man who always gets what he wants. Bayardo is also portrayed as a man of many traits, with the story mentioning that he was a “good drinker, a mediator of fights, and an enemy of cardsharps. One Sunday after mass he challenged the most skilful swimmers who were many, and left the best behind by twenty strokes in crossing the river and back.” (page 27). He’s a skilled engineer, he’s better than the best swimmers, knows as much about medicine as the doctor, knows more about telegraphing than the telegrapher. After his initial arrival, Bayardo asserts his position within the town as a man who belongs, and his machismo act seems almost TOO perfect. One weird thing I noticed about the beginning of Bayardo’s time in town is his description when he first arrives. Wearing tight pants, a short jacket, and kid gloves, all in matching colours, gives off a sense of femininity that Santiago Nasar’s khaki outfit and riding boots just doesn’t seem to have. Not to mention that around the 1840s, kid gloves (gloves made out of lambskin) became unfashionable, and was instead used as an insult to one’s masculinity. This story takes place in the 1950’s Another character (Magdalena Oliver) mentions that “He looked like a fairy.” (page 26), which once again brings into mind the image of a very small and feminine creature. It also might be important to note that a “fairy” is a derogatory term for a homosexual man, which are stereotyped as being excessively feminine. The question is, why did Bayardo San Román show up in this town and worked so hard to assert his masculinity? Is there a reason for him to feel like he has to be the most machismo man in town?
Your analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed how despite his masculine image, the way in which the other characters describe Bayardo is very strange. To answer your question, perhaps Bayardo San Roman worked so hard to assert his masculinity in hopes to surpass the esteemed reputation of his father. When the families first meet, the narrator explains that, “General Petronio San Roman and his family arrived that time on the National Congress ceremonial boat…” (43). As evident in this quote, Bayardo’s father is a very wealthy, highly admired individual. Due to this, maybe Bayardo San Roman puts on an act to appear manly in order impress his father despite not wanting to.
In Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s book, Chronicle of A Death Foretold, the contrast between inferior and glorified diction illustrate the gender inequality that existed in Columbia throughout the 1900’s. While describing each of Purisima del Carmen’s children, the narrator mentions, “Angela Vicario...had a helpless air and a poverty of spirit that augured an uncertain future for her...she seemed more destitute in the window of her house” (Márquez 35). Here, with the utilization of words such as “helpless”, “uncertain”, “destitute”, and “poverty”, Márquez informs the audience that despite her alluring beauty, Angela is incompetent, thus, implies that she is in desperate need of a spouse. However, when describing Bayardo San Roman, the narrator notes, “He arrived on the weekly boat with saddlebags decorated with silver that match the buckle of his belt and the rings on his boots...he had...gold eyes, and a skin slowly roasted by saltpeter” (27). When Bayardo San Roman is first introduced, he is depicted as a confident, highly praised individual who does as he pleases. With the use “decorated”, “silver”, and “gold”, it almost appears that the narrator, along with the other characters, view him as a divine figure. This is indicative in Bayardo San Roman’s extravagant spending habits, esteemed reputation, and ability to woo any woman he desires. In regards to Marquez’s use of juxtaposition, the drastic difference between words used to describe Angela, and ones associated with Bayardo San Roman, demonstrates the inferiority of women during this time period. As stated by the group who presented chapter 2, in the 1900’s, marriages in Columbia were arranged. While the bride’s family often benefited from the deal, the woman who is getting married, whether satisfied or not, is forced to spend the rest of her life with an individual who she may resent. On the contrary, the groom gets to pick his spouse, thus, representing his superiority. This relates to Bayardo and Angela’s relationship, and how despite only meeting him once, she is forced to marry him. Furthermore, this concept is evident at the end of their relationship, when he returns her back to Purisima del Carmen. Here, after finding out about her “impurity”, Bayardo San Roman abandons Angela as if she were object. This action demonstrates that he possesses all of the authority in their relationship, for her justification and opinions were irrelevant in this situation. However, it's interesting to note how in the end, he returns back to her. This goes against societal standards, for this action makes Bayardo seem desperate for her love.
Talia Jensen Good commentary! To go along with that, I think that one can also say that Marquez also uses extravagant characters like Bayardo to create a more clear image of the different social classes in this society. The reader is more able to distinguish what money and authority influences and how it greatly affects the outcomes and decisions made.
Talia Jensen, Post #2 Though maybe not as apparent, marriage is a central motif of Chronicles of a Death Foretold. If Angela Vicario and Bayardo San Roman were not uniting as one, the plot of the story would struggle. Marquez uses the marriage between Angela and Bayardo, as well as the gender roles in marriage, to utilize how the culture of Colombia affects the outcomes and results of the story. "The brothers were brought up to be men. The girls were brought up to be married. They knew how to do screen embroidery, sew by machine, weave bone lace, wash and iron, make artificial flowers and fancy candy, and write engagement announcements… my mother thought there were no better-reared daughters. 'They're perfect,' she was frequently heard to say. 'Any man will be happy with them because they've been raised to suffer'"(Marquez, 31) This excerpt clearly explains the beliefs and customs of this culture. The alliteration of “f”, “b”,“m”, and “w”illustrate the different roles and lifestyles of the man and the woman. The women were “weavers” and “washers” in their own “feminine” manner. The men were taught to be “bold” and “masculine”. The women’s tasks described create the image a wedding being planned and prepared, which is symbolic of how these Colombian women’s live revolved around being worthy and ready for her husband. The final phrase, “Any man will be happy with them because they've been raised to suffer”, simply represents the submissive pressures put upon women that come from their culture. Traditions are carried down generations and the effects of these questionable customs becomes incredibly apparent in the marriage between Angela Vicario and Bayardo San Roman.
Nice observation, I didn't notice how the alliteration differs between both genders! It's interesting how soft alliteration can really establish the different lifestyles of each gender. I also noticed that when Angela is described, there is a lot of consonance and alliteration attached in phrases such as "helpless air and a poverty of spirit" and "she seemed more destitute in the window of her house, where she would sit in the afternoon making cloth flowers and singing songs about single women". The s-alliteration is very smooth and graceful, almost mirroring Angela's portrayal as an angel in society.
In chapter two of Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Marquez focuses on the internalized biases of society related to marriage and how it affects both genders differently. By utilizing juxtaposition between Angela and Bayardo, power roles are established that illustrate society’s reverence towards Bayardo and disdain towards Angela once they discover she is not a virgin. With elegant and expensive diction such as “golden” and “enchanting”, Bayardo is displayed as a valuable idol who should be given everything he wants. However, Angela is described with demure and delicate diction such as “better-reared”, “helpless”, and “poverty of spirit” illustrating a lost soul in society who should become married so she can be put back onto the right track. Supporting their roles in society is Marquez’s construction of characterization. He establishes that women are expected to be meek and delicate, reared up to become housewives and prioritize the lives of their family over themselves. For example, Purisima Del Carmen, who is described as “devoted with such spirit of sacrifice to the care of her husband and the rearing of her children that at times she forgot she still existed (31) differs from Poncio Vicario, who is described as “losing his sight from doing so much fine work in gold in order to maintain the honor of the house” (30). Intriguingly, the prioritizations of the mother and father in this society mirror the expectations of society in A Doll’s House, where Nora is expected to care for the children while Torvald is expected to uphold the reputation of the household. Through juxtaposition and characterization, Marquez illustrates the power of societal expectations to confine or free a person’s spirit based on their role in a marriage, and how when people don’t fit into a mold, it devalues them as a person in society.
Good work Prim! I also noticed the way that Marquez juxtaposed Bayardo and Angela throughout the chapter. I also think it's important to note how the first time Bayardo saw Angela, she was supposed to be in mourning. I guess this could symbolise her fragility as well, as grief and mourning are usually seen as emotions that make a person fragile! Good work!
Since chapter 3 comes before chapter 1, this is where the book begins to get even more confusing. The important thing I chose to analyse for this chapter is how Marquez uses juxtaposition to draw clear distinction between the twins. In the butcher’s shop, the brothers go to sharpen their knives before they have their first argument. Marquez writes “They sharpened them on the grindstone, and the way they always did: Pedro holding the knives and turning them over the stone, and Pablo working the crank.” (page 57). Later on in the book, Pedro begins having doubts about whether or not to go through with the killing of Santiago Nasar, even though he’s the one who came up with the idea in the first place. Pablo later convinces Pedro to go through with it. This quote helps juxtapose the brothers and shed light on their relationship and dynamic. Although Pedro is the one who seems in charge, as he has the easy work of sharpening the knife, and is shown to be the head of the duo, Pablo is the one who “works the crank”. Pedro might have been the younger brother who had seen the likes of war, but in the extremes, Pablo knows how to be the older brother. He is the motor that keeps the clock that is the Vicario brothers in time. Even though Pedro has seen the worst of the world in war, and he came back more responsible and ready to impose his decisions on his brother (like the man who would sharpen the knife), Pablo still knows that sometimes he has to take charge and do the dirty work that his younger brother just may not have the heart for, (like someone who would do the tiresome task of turning the crank). This sentiment is echoed later in the chapter where Marquez writes that Pablo “…put the knife in his [brother’s] hand and dragged him off almost by force in search of their sister’s lost honor.” (page 61). Pedro may not have been ready to kill Santiago, even though he had been through war, but Pablo was, and made the decision for the both of them. This juxtaposition in their character helps the reader separate the twins, as well as creating a sense of dread and panic, in that even the most meek men will take charge and do what they must to protect the honour of a loved one.
Your analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed the contrast between Pedro and Pablo's roles in their relationship. To build upon your ideas, I believe that the knives also had a direct effect on the actions of the two men. Throughout the story, these knives appear to provide the brothers with motivation to restore their sister's honor. As evident in the quote, "...put the knife in his hand and dragged him off almost by force..." (61), it seems as if their weapons influenced their attitude. Furthermore, their resupply of knives informs the audience that Santiago's death was inevitable.
In Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s book, Chronicle of A Death Foretold, the symbolic nature of the knives plays a significant role in the death of Santiago. Upon learning about Angela’s failed marriage, Pedro and Pablo declared that they intend to restore their sister’s honor, sharpened their knives at the meat market, and made their way towards Clotilde Armenta's milk shop. Meanwhile, Colonel Lazaro Aponte is notified about the twin’s plan, thus, confiscates their knives despite not believing that they would actually commit the crime. In spite of this, the Vicario brothers fetch two new knives from their house and continue their search for Santiago. During the class presentation, the group asserted that Pedro and Pablo’s weapon of choice represents the community's lack of concern for the situation. For example, after the twin’s were deterred, the narrator revealed, “Clotilde Armenta suffered another disappointment with the mayor’s casual attitude, because she thought that he should have detained the twins until the truth came out” (34). As evident in this quote, even the mayor wasn’t alarmed by the Pedro and Pablo’s knives, as well as their verbal commitment to murder Santiago. Although the twins had a somewhat reputable reputation in their community, one would anticipate that an individual who represents the citizens of their town would be more apprehensive. Ultimately, this lack of concern for Santiago’s well-being led to his death, for there were several instances where he could have been warned ahead of time. Although this idea makes sense, I thought that the knives were emblematic of the twin’s inability to liberate themselves from their situation. Throughout the book, it is made clear that Pedro and Pablo were very hesitant with killing Santiago. This is evident when they stalled by sitting under a tree, in which Pablo, “put the knife in his hand and dragged him off almost by force in search of their sister’s lost honor” (36). Here, the knives serve as motivation to follow through with the promise that they had made to Angela. With this being said, since the twins slaughter pigs, it is implied that they have access to lots of knives at their house. As a result, no matter how much they wanted to remove themselves from this predicament, it appears that the act of killing Santiago was inevitable. This also seen when the Colonel confiscates their knives, which are easily replaced with two more. Despite how one interprets the symbolic nature of the knives, I am interested but unsure as to why a gun wasn’t the weapon of choice for the murder Perhaps Márquez want to dramatize the death by incorporating a gruesome scene with the intestines.
In Chapter 3, many things stood out to me, both by reading the chapter and by hearing the group presentation. However, one thing in particular caught my attention: the dehumanization of characters in the book through the use of animal imagery. Whilst pig imagery was more on the forefront of most readers’ perspectives, not many noticed the dog imagery and what its possible significance could be. “They left by the way of the pigpen gate, with their knives unwrapped, trailed by the uproar of the dogs in the yards” This quote demonstrates the dogs’ intent to stop (or at least warn) the Vicario brothers that the murder is a bad idea. These dogs were seemingly the only animals to act against the Vicario brothers. In this case, the dogs represent the apparently absent population of those willing to take action against the murder. The fact that Gabriel Garcia Marquez chooses to represent these as dogs shows his intent to “dehumanize” these people, showing that outliers would be frowned upon by society regardless.
I think it's interesting also that dogs are normally considered guardians in our culture despite being animals, yet they seemed to have more sympathy for Santiago than the rest of the townspeople. I think that the punishment of the dogs after Santiago's death also demonstrates how when people go against society, they are punished for it and seen as less than human.
In chapter three of Chronicle of a Death Foretold, I thought that the animal symbolism was very interesting. Juxtaposition is first established when Santiago witnesses Victoria Guzman ripping out the steaming entrails of a rabbit and throwing them to the dogs in chapter one, to which Santiago replies “Don’t be a savage. Make believe it was a human being (10)”. Santiago portrays himself as empathetic and kind to the animals. Similarly, the butchers interviewed by the narrator believed that animals had souls too, disabling them from looking them in the eyes or eating the flesh of an animal that they butchered. This juxtaposes the nature of the Vicario twins, who are seen “sacrificing the same hogs that they raised, which were so familiar to them that they called them by their names. (52)”. The butchering of the pigs is actually a comparison to the death of Santiago, who they were previously friends with even though they felt no remorse after the murder. Their apathy dehumanizes Santiago’s death, illustrating that he is less than an animal and he doesn’t even deserve a clean weapon but rather a rusty and worn down knife instead. The dehumanization of Santiago emphasizes the concept of bystander apathy as everyone watched the planning and slaughtering of Santiago, while Santiago was left helpless and clueless, like an animal being led to their death. Through chapter three, it is possible that Marquez was establishing how Santiago was one of the few people left with empathy in a town full of bystanders at fault.
Your analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed the way in which Marquez utilizes animal symbolism to demonstrate the dehumanization of Santiago Nasar. To build upon your ideas, I feel that the knives also do a sufficient job at demonstrating the alienation of Santiago. In the beginning of the book, it is noted that Santiago, as well as other characters, own a gun. However, the use of knife creates a more dramatic and exaggerated death, especially through the visual imagery of the guts. Furthermore, the use of knife is inhumane, for Santiago suffered before dying.
In Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s book, Chronicle of A Death Foretold, the symbolic nature of the scent provides the audience with greater insight on Santiago’s death. While describing the aftermath of the tragedy, the narrator notes, “Everything continued smelling of Santiago Nasar that day. The Vicario brother could smell him in the jail cell where the mayor had locked them up until he could think of something to do with them...They’d gone three nights without sleep, but they couldn't rest because as soon as they began to fall asleep they would commit the crime all over again…’It was like being awake twice over’” (56). Throughout the book, the narrator makes it clear that the twins didn’t actually want to kill Santiago. This is evident in the way that they keep stalling, and through the fact that the three of them drank together during the wedding. However, in both Colombian culture and Catholicism, a woman’s virginity is an indicator of a her purity and innocence. As a result, due to the magnitude of Angela’s wrongdoing, they knew that they had to uphold their family’s reputation by carrying out the crime. With this being said, the scent symbolizes the guilt that the brothers have to live with for the rest of their lives. It’s important to note how the narrator explicitly states that Pedro and Pablo couldn’t rid of the smell of Santiago even after they left town and went to prison. In terms of the other citizens, each person had an influence on Santiago’s death. For example, Cristo Bedoya intended to tell Santiago, but instead decided to play dominoes. In the end, he realized that he was too late when he found Santiago’s dead body at his house. This demonstrates that he will also have to endure the burden of experiencing the “scent”, for his lack of concern caused the death of his friend. By implementing the symbolism of the Santiago’s smell, Marquez explores the idea of karma, and how one’s actions can result in unforeseen repercussions. In addition, in chapter 4, I was intrigued by the fact that Bayardo returns to Angela. After the presentation, the class discussed how Angela wrote letters to Bayardo because she truly loves him and wanted to escape from her parents. However, although I believe that this is a valid explanation, I also wanted to note how perhaps Angela feels guilty for the predicament that she caused. Due to her deceitful nature, Bayardo was heartbroken, the townspeople are now haunted by guilt, and most importantly, Santiago died. With this being said, the act of sending letters could be a way in which to put her mind at ease. This leads to the question of whether or not Angela truly cared about her marriage.
In Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s book, Chronicle of A Death Foretold, the symbolic nature of the magistrate and love letters illustrate the prominent role that fate has throughout the plot. After the murder had been committed, the narrator notes, “He was so perplexed by the enigma that fate had touched him with, that he kept falling into lyrical distractions that ran contrary to the rigor of his profession (Marquez 116). In chapter five, the magistrate is introduced as a recent graduate who wore a black linen law school suit, thus, representing that he had just started his professional career. As evident by the words “perplexed” and “enigma”, the quote above informs that audience that the magistrate was perturbed by the simplicity of the case he had been assigned to. Even though he didn’t have a personal connection with the victim, the magistrate could have foreseen his death from the beginning. This ultimately reveals the simplicity of Santiago’s passing, and how it could have been easily avoided. However, due to its “natural path”, it appears as if the death of Santiago was fated. Additionally, it is revealed that the magistrate’s, “...marginal notes, and not just because the color of the ink, seemed to be written in blood” (116). Blood is notorious for its ability to stain clothing. Due to this, by comparing the magistrate’s marginal notes to blood, the narrator hints that Santiago’s death was inevitable and “stained” within his timeline. In a broader perspective, the magistrate plays a significant role in the story. By providing an “outside” perspective to the murder, the audience is able to note how the amount of coincidences contributed to Santiago’s inevitable demise. Furthermore, after Flora Miguel calls off their marriage, “Santiago Nasar was so perplexed that he dropped the chest of his loveless letter...” (134). In the 1900’s, information was primarily sent through the postal service, for online messaging services were nonexistent. As a result, handwritten letter were somewhat personal, for unlike in today’s society, one would have to endure the process of writing the message, sealing it into an envelope, and taking it to a mailbox or post office. In regards to the quote above, the audience is informed that Santiago had been sending love letters to Flora Miguel for the duration of their relationship. However, in the final scene, she throws them back at him, thus, demonstrating that their hopes of marriage has now diminished. This seemed to be fated, for in this same scene, the narrator reveals that Flora Miguel was desperate to get married after serving as a bridesmaid for her whole life.
Your analysis was quite intriguing! I think the "loveless letters" that Santiago got back from Flora Miguel shows that Santiago never really loved Flora Miguel, instead of the loveless letters representing how their chances of marriage all but vanished. Like you mentioned, Flora Miguel was desperate to become a bride after spending her whole life as a bridesmaid. Santiago Nasar spent almost all of his free time out with his friends or at the whore's house. Márquez even mentioned that "Whenever he passed by Flora Miguel's house, even if nobody was home, Santiago Nasar would scratch his keys across the window screens." (pg 112). This is important to note because it shows that although Santiago Nasar and Flora Miguel clearly lived very close to each other, they most often communicated through letters. Márquez even says that Flora wasn't worried about whether or not Santiago was going to be killed, she was more concerned that her chance of becoming a bride would be taken from her. I think this helps the reader understand why the letters were loveless. Santiago Nasar never really loved Flora Miguel, and Flora Miguel never really loved Santiago Nasar.
In Chapter 5 one of the most important things I picked up on was the way the narrator portrayed the townsfolk as sadistic bystanders. On page 115, the narrator writes that “the people had stationed themselves on the square the way they did on parade days.” The townsfolk are said to be standing around like they do on a parade day. Parades are joyous and interesting events that garner a lot of attention. The fact that Santiago, wandering around the town completely delirious and confused, is treated the same way as a parade is sick. Also, the way that Santiago Nasar stumbles dizzily around the town while the rest of the townsfolk jeer at him is another interesting way to portray the townsfolk. “They [the townsfolk] began to shout at him from every side, and Santiago Nasar went backward and forward several times, baffled by hearing so many voices.” (pg 115). The way this is written reminds me of a caged animal being disoriented by the crowd of people above it, shouting and screaming. Santiago Nasar himself is even described as pacing backwards and forwards like said caged animal. I think it’s interesting that the narrator describes all the townsfolk in this manner after mentioning how “…most of those who could have done something to prevent the crime and did not consoled themselves with the pretext that affairs of honour are sacred monopolies…” (pg 97). This line means that all the bystanders who could have saved Santiago Nasar convinced themselves that not saving him was the right thing to do because the reason Santiago died was a matter of honour, and its important that they didn’t get involved. Then, the narrator lists all the ways the different characters in the story shifted blame onto someone else. I think the reason why the narrator chose to describe the townsfolk that way, after explaining the reasons the townsfolk gave as to why they didn’t save Santiago, is to emphasise the point that none of the bystanders are innocent. Every single person in this town, who knew about Santiago’s death and did nothing, are all responsible for Santiago’s death. And although some might justify not getting involved with “It was a matter of honour” or “He was going to die after a month anyways”, the narrator still firmly believes that everyone, including himself, has to carry the weight of knowing that they killed Santiago, that they stood by and allowed him to die, that they watched him with the same sadistic interest as one watches a parade, and didn’t do anything to save him.
I can totally see how all of the town residents viewed Santiago's death as a spectacle to watch. Especially before his death too, when Cristo and Santiago are walking through the plaza and everyone parts for them to go through and when Cristo is looking for Santiago and the townspeople begin to gather because they're awaiting the crime to happen. The level of apathy involved is amazing, as even the animals (the dogs) did more to warn Santiago than the people did.
A very interesting aspect about Chapter 5, as I stated in my presentation as well, was Gabriel Garcia MArquez’s use of names to highlight certain characteristics of the characters in the book. Each character’s personalities and way of acting is pre-described due to the meaning behind his or her name, many examples of which can be found in Chapter 5 of Chronicle of a Death Foretold. Furthermore, Gabriel Garcia Marquez used names referring to floral imagery to symbolize a rather tranquil trait for most females in the book. Take Hortensia Baute for example. “Hortensia Baute, whose only participation was having seen the two bloody knives that weren’t bloody yet felt so affected by the hallucination that she fell in a penitential crisis, and one day, unable to stand it any longer, she ran out naked into the street.” The first name “Hortensia” means “garden”- demonstrating her calm and tranquil nature, This is further emphasized in the quote above as Gabriel Garcia Marquez attempts to display the severe trauma caused by solely witnessing the crime. Another name, Aura Villeros, is a reference to Aura the Titan goddess of breeze and fresh, cool air. “Aura Villeros, the midwife who had helped bring three generations into the world, suffered a spasm of the bladder when she heard the news and to the day of her death had to use a catheter in order to urinate.” This quote again shows the severe effect on a customarily calm and peaceful personality. There are many more female names in the book that relate to floral things, for example Placida Linero (“Placida” is Spanish for calm), Flora Miguel, and Divina Flor (both Spanish for flower). While these names may possibly illustrate Gabriel Garcia’s view on women at the time, it may also just be magical realism to emphasize the effect on the town of Santiago Nasar’s death, seeing as not only women were given floral names and suffered tragic consequences after experiencing the murder. Don Rogelio de la Flor, for example, was a man who suffered a tragedy afterwards as well. “Don Rogelio de la Flor, Clotilde Armenta’s good husband, who was a marvel of vitality at the age of eighty-six, got up for the last time to see how they had hewn Santiago Nasar to bits against the locked door of his own house, and he didn’t survive the shock.” Don Rogelio de la flor also contains floral imagery (Flor=flower), but also relates to how “Rogelio” is a name for Spanish Catholics who ask for the absolution of sins from Jesus Christ. In this situation, his guilt is extremely apparent as it caused his shock and consequently, his death. I find it extremely ironic how it is only after the murder when people start feeling sympathy for Santiago, which is hyperbolized through the gruesome graphicness of the incidents caused by the guilt of the bystanders. Although Gabriel Garcia Marquez may be making a social statement about women by assigning them these sorts of names, he is also showing through the names that although they feel sympathetic for Santiago, the way certain characters acted in situations and reacted to the crime was predetermined.
Your analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed the religious allusions that Gabriel Garcia Márquez employs to further emphasizes aspects of Santiago's death. To build upon your ideas, when the magistrate comes into town, the narrator states, "The judge...had doubtless read the Spanish classics and a few Latin ones, and he was quite familiar with Nietzsche..." (58). Friedrich Nietzsche was a 19th century German philosopher who believed that people should craft their own reality. This went against the Columbia community in Chronicle of Death Foretold, for as evident in Angela's circumstances, their lives were heavily dictated by their religious beliefs. As a result, by including this historical allusion, Marquez illustrates how those who investigated Santiago's death were alienated.
One interesting thing I noticed about chapter five was the juxtaposition between Santiago and the townspeople before his death. Santiago was often portrayed with calm and purposeful diction, such as “strolled along the dock and both seemed so unconcerned that they gave rise to false impressions (101)” and “serenity” while the townspeople are described with mindless and apathetic diction, as displayed in examples like “The people who were coming back from the docks, alerted by the shouts, began to take up positions around the square to witness the crime. (109)” and “But most of those who could have done something to prevent the crime and did not consoled themselves with the pretext that affairs of honor are sacred monopolies, giving access only to those who are part of the drama. (97). Something to point out about this chapter is its large emphasis on fate because of religion, including the fate of Santiago’s death and the fate of the townspeople affected by his death, like Flora Miguel and Hortensia Baute. It is believed that Santiago’s fate was destined from the moment the Vicario brothers declared that they were going to defend their honour, and because of this, all the townspeople who could have prevented the murder avoided the blame, saying that it was a matter of religion and honour between two families. Marquez scattered many religious allusions throughout the chapter, such as Cristo being Saint Christopher and Clotilde resembling Sainte Clotilde. Through situational irony, I believe that he did this to show how fate can seem inevitable based off of your beliefs as the townspeople who relied on religion believed that Santiago was inevitably going to die, while others such as Cristo did everything he could to save him out of his own free will.
Just to preface this, the calendar says I’m meant to write about commonalities between the passages handed out in class, but I don’t know any of the other passages, so I’m just going to blog about the story in general.
Throughout the story of A Chronicle of a Death Foretold, I thought it was interesting how men and women differed throughout the story. The stark double standard within the concept of virginity and religious purity was a strange one. On the side of the women, virginity is the most pure thing they have to their name. Being a virgin until marriage is the one thing they have grown up to learn, and by keeping something as minute as one’s virginity, they are the most desirable they could ever be. Something as minuscule as a social construct, the idea of being a virgin, determines the complete and total social standing and their worth in this society. Because Angela lost her virginity before she got married, she was completely discarded by her husband, and the whole town shunned her. One passage even writes that “…the fact that Angela Vicario dared put on the veil and the orange blossoms without being a virgin would be interpreted afterwards as a profanation of the symbols of purity.” (page 41). Because Angela wasn’t a virgin when she wore the veil and blossoms, the whole town views this as a destruction of the symbols, as if because she wasn’t a virgin those symbols of purity are tainted forever. Men, on the other hand, are absolutely free of the idea of purity. In fact, the unnamed narrator even states that María Alejandrina Cervantes had done away with his generation’s virginity (page 65). This is interesting, because it shows that although the men did understand the concept of their own virginity and how it can be taken away, they don’t have to care. So what if Santiago was sleeping with María Alejandrina Cervantes while he was engaged to Flora Miguel? As long as Flora Miguel remains a virgin, that doesn’t seem to matter. I also think it’s interesting that when Angela admitted to losing her virginity before marriage, she was shunned, but María Alejandrina Cervantes is almost treasured by the men in the town. This might be because María is there specifically for the men’s pleasure. María is “allowed” to be “impure” because she has been reduced to a simple object, there to provide the townsmen with intimacy when required. The machismo mindset and the hyper-masculinity that is exhibited in this time period allows men to get away with whatever they want, while females have their worth reduced down to whether or not they’ve slept with a man before having their wedding. I think this concept is especially harmful to young women growing up in these societies, specifically because it allows men to get away with awful things like sexual abuse and rape, all in the name of machismo, while the women are left to deal with the aftermath of not being a virgin anymore. And although this story was written almost 40 years ago, this double standard still exists among girls in middle and high school. That teach abstinence only sex education have recently come under fire for comparing girls to a number of things, and stressing that nobody will want you if you aren’t a virgin. They’ve even gone so far as to say to young girls that their virginity is a tall glass of clear water, and “nobody wants to drink from a glass that’s already been spit in.” This problematic construct proves to be damaging to women from a long time ago, and it still proves to be damaging today.
I totally agree with you that the social construct of "virginity" tied to self-worth is extremely damaging. To support your post, I also thought about the treatment of the townspeople after Santiago's murder. To start this off, it's really obvious that most of this was kinda Bayardo's fault for returning Angela, but no one blames Bayardo for returning her like an object. They blame Angela for losing her virginity already. Along with that, after Santiago's death, Flora Miguel leaves and ends up becoming a prostitute that is shamed by her community, while Bayardo wastes away but is pitied by the town for being given a girl who wasn't a virgin during their wedding. Their obvious lack of sympathy for women who went against social norms is extremely damaging, and as awful as it is, definitely is still prevalent today.
The passage my group analyzed was passage #7, where Bayardo confronts the widower Xius for the house holding his wife’s treasured possessions. Marquez constructs a cold and detached tone through juxtaposition and materialistic diction throughout this passage that leaves the reader feeling as inferior as Xius. As Bayardo bargains for the house, Xius retorts that “young people don’t understand the motives of the heart”, in which in result Bayardo “doesn’t pause to think” and offers five thousand pesos. The quick thought process and lack of empathy juxtapose Bayardo and Xius to display the shifting values between the young and old of society. As Xius values the memory of his wife and sentimentality, Bayardo values winning and lavish goods, caring more about buying the house to win Angela over instead of courting her himself. The diction used by Bayardo himself focuses on the materialistic aspect of the situation, while Xius focuses on the emotional aspect of the situation. For example, diction revolving money such as “I’ll buy it along with everything inside” and “silver-trimmed saddlebags with the printed bands of the State Bank” portray his extravagant nature and reliance on wealth, while Xius is displayed with diction such as “olden”, “lifetime of sacrifice”, and “heart”. This detail further separates Xius and Bayardo as they argue for the house, as Xius is fighting to keep the house for his wife, while Bayardo is fighting to gain the house for Angela’s heart instead of working for it.
Talia Jensen I love your insight on the differences between the old and the young! I think this is definitely a prominent idea in this book but it is not paid much attention. The difference between the young and the old is expressed with these characters, and the this particular relationship emphasizes the old man's wisdom and the young man's inability to show sympathy or reasoning. Maybe if the Vicario brothers were older, the sitaution would have been handled differently.
Talia Jensen After centering my focus on the smaller specifics of Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s works, I have learned to appreciate and notice the many devices he uses in his writing to invoke emotion and allude to images of magical realism. In chapter 5, Santiago Nasar and his neighbors and friends experience one of the most intense scenes of the book: his gruesome and impending death. Marquez uses irony and animal imagery throughout Santiago’s bloody murder. Before the graphic slashes and tears take place, Pablo Vicario expresses, “...I was scared when I saw him face on...because he looked twice as big as he was….”(Marquez, 117). The irony of Pablo’s fears is that there is only one of Santiago and two of the Vicarios, but the very real fear that occurs before murdering another leads to questioning one’s own abilities and strengths. After beginning their aggressive and animalistic attempts to kill, Santiago reaches a point of accepting his fate, and Pedro Vicario explains, “He didn't cry out again….Just the opposite: it looked to me as if he was laughing.” The last reaction one would expect of Santiago in this state would be to laugh, and this is why the occasion contains ironic elements. The animal imagery throughout the passage alludes to Santiago himself representing a small innocent animal reaching the moment of his inevitable slaughter. Phrases such as: “(he) Let out a moan the moan of a calf” (Marquez, 118); and “Pedro Vicario sought his heart….where pigs have it” (Marquez, 119) allude to the fact that the Vicario brothers are used to killing in their slaughter house and they have become accustomed to killing and murdering animals and creatures who have names. Pablo Vicario recalled murdering Santiago feeling like “the way you do when galloping on horseback (Marquez, 119). This image expresses the rush of adrenaline one experiences in an act so intense and heavy on an individual.
Your analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed the irony that is employed throughout this passage! However, it is important to note the symbolic nature of Pedro Vicario grabbing his armpit. While explaining Santiago's death, the narrator notes, “Furthermore: all the many people he ran into after leaving his house at five minutes past six and until he was carved up like a pig an hour later remembered him as being a little sleepy but in a good mood, and he remarked to all of them in a casual way that it was a very beautiful day” (Marquez 1). Throughout the plot, it is made clear that in Colombia, pigs are seen as source of meat, thus, are constantly being raised and slaughtered. In regards to this quote, by comparing Santiago to a pig, the narrator hints that he was fated to die. With this kept in mind, since he looks for his heart where pigs have them, Pedro's death in the military was fated as well.
For the Chronicle of a Death Foretold passage presentations, I analyzed paragraphs three and four from chapter five. In this scene, the magistrate, who had recently graduated from school, begins to investigate the peculiar death of Santiago Nasar. While the narrator searches for legal documents that may facilitate his investigation, it is noted that, “Everything we know about his character had been learned from the brief, which several people helped me look for twenty years later in the Palace of Justice in Riohacha. There was no classification of files whatever, and more than a century of cases were piled up on the floor of the decrepit colonial building that had been Sir Francis Drake’s headquarters” (Marquez 115-116). Here, Gabriel Garcia Marquez employs an allusion to illustrate the failure of the Colombian justice system. In the late 1500’s, Sir Francis Drake sailed to Santo Domingo and enslaved the natives, burned down the city, and stole several pounds of gold and silver. In regards to the plot, this English sailor’s corrupt nature is evident within the judicial system of the town in which Chronicle of a Death Foretold takes place. In today’s society, legal buildings are seen as organized, well-kept facilities in which individuals can receive helpful information or services. However, as indicated by the quote above, this palace, which is where most of the legal documents are held, is flooded and disorderly, therefore, hindering the narrator’s investigative process. Since the governmental figures in this community had failed to fix this issue, Marquez demonstrate how corrupt and indolent the judicial system is. This excerpt directly relates to the analysis conducted by the group who read passage six. In their presentation, they discussed the gruesome death of Santiago, and how the twins struggled to murder the man who supposedly took their sister’s virginity. One detail that was quite intriguing includes how the knives that stabbed Santiago kept coming out of his body clean of any blood. As discussed in class, this was chosen to symbolize the innocence of Santiago. In regards to the passage that Hailey and I analyzed, the flawed justice system was a prominent factor that resulted in Santiago’s death. Since the Colonel Aponte failed to question the Vicario brothers when he had the chance, and decided to play dominoes instead of warning Santiago, the twins were able to carry out their act of honor.
Hello?!
ReplyDeleteHello!
DeleteIn his book, Chronicle of A Death Foretold, Gabriel Garcia Márquez explores the relationship between an individual and their religion. With the presence of a bishop, and names such as “Santiago”, “Angela”, “Cristo”, and “Davina”, the audience is able to quickly recognize the influence that Catholicism has on this society. During the class presentation for the first chapter, one student argued how Márquez incorporates religion in an attempted to illustrate its obsolete nature. While depicting the scene at the docks, the narrator says, “Placida Linero was right: the bishop didn’t get off his boat. There were a lot of people at the dock in addition to the authorities and the schoolchildren, and everywhere one could see the crates of well-flattened rooster they were bearing as a gifts for the bishop” (Márquez 17). On the day of Santiago Nasar’s death, the community prepares meals, puts on their best attire, and gathers outside to see the bishop pass through their town. As evident in the quote above, due to the fact that his arrival was highly anticipated, the citizens were disappointed in his inability to personally greet them. As a result, the bishop symbolizes how the people are beginning to lose faith in their religion, thus, making it obsolete. Despite being a valid argument, I would like to assert how instead, Gabriel Garcia Márquez discusses how religion serves as an integral component of one’s life. This is evident through the main predicament of the story, and how Angela Vicario blamed Santiago of ruining her short-lived marriage. In the Catholic religion, women were forced to refrain from losing their virginity before becoming a wife. The failure to adhere to these rules could not only tarnish their reputation, but also prevent them from being married and having children. In regards to the book, once Bayardo San Roman discovers his wife’s “impurity”, Pedro and Pablo get involved, which ultimately leads to the death of Santiago Nasar. By employing multiple perspective on the same event, Márquez enables the audience to see the extent of this single issue. For example, instead of only affecting the Nasar and Vicario family, Angela’s inability to abide by her religion's expectations involved Clotilde Armenta, Cristo Bedoya, Father Amador, Colonel Lazaro Aponte, and more. Due to this, Márquez demonstrate how religion effects several aspects of an individual's life, for if Catholicism wasn’t considered, Angela’s marriage might have lasted. Furthermore, as mentioned previously, several of the prominent characters in the story have names that pertain to Catholicism. For example, Santiago translates to “Saint”, Angela means “Angel”, and Cristo is “Christ”. Since these figures heavily influenced the murder, it is implied that in this story, religion is not obsolete. It’s important to note how the idea that one’s fate serves as an integral component to their life is not entirely relevant in today’s society. With the emergence of scientific studies, as the presentation illustrated, the amount of individuals who believe in a religion has been declining.
ReplyDeleteThis is very in-depth and I totally see your point! I agree that religion can serve as an integral component of one's life, and I can also see how religion may be obsolete or not to others. For example, it is very clear that the narrator disdains religion throughout the book with his statements such as calling the bishop a passing annoyance. However, to characters such as the Vicario twins who murdered Santiago to defend Angela's honor, is it possible that Marquez is saying that while it is important to have religion be a part of your life, is it also important to prioritize your own free will and morals before your religious obligations?
DeleteTalia Jensen
DeleteI appreciate your insight on the character's names and how they reflect the religious elements of the story. I think the plot changes drastically because the influence of individuals belief, whether it be righteous or sinful actions. I still struggle to see exactly what Marquez is trying to communicate about religion, but I know that he is making a prominent effort to express that religion has changed history. It changes peoples actions and reactions everyday.
(3/14/18)
ReplyDeleteIn chapter one of Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Marquez starts off with a blunt and direct tone with the phrase “On the day they were going to kill him,”. This creates a shock factor and morbid curiosity within the reader. Along with the tone, juxtaposition is utilized in phrases such as “gentle drizzle” and “splattered in bird shit” to create a violent shift. The juxtaposition between the gentle and the violent represent the contradiction of society, dividing them into the sacred and the profane. All figures of authority, and who are considered sacred, such as Placida Linero, the bishop, and Father Carmen, are actually the most dismissive ones, shattering the illusion of perfection and serenity within religious figures. For example, “the bishop began to make the sign of the cross in the air opposite the crowd, and he kept on doing it mechanically afterwards, without malice or inspiration” shows the Bishop’s disdain of this society as he sails further away from it. Along with that, when Placida Linero is running, she curses “Lowlifes. Shitty animals that can’t do anything that isn’t something awful.” The negative and obscene diction show Linero’s disdain despite her seemingly spiritual and peaceful appearance due to the actions of her society. Through this juxtaposition and harsh negative diction, it appears that Gabriel Garcia Marquez is showing how religion and religious figures are abandoning society, in a way that they are almost becoming more harmful than helpful.
Your analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed how religion and religious figures are abandoning society in a harmful manner. To build upon your ideas, it's important to note how several of the character's names are associated with the Catholic faith. For example, Santiago translates into "saint", Cristo means "christ", and Angela means "angel". In regards to your blog, all of these characters contributes to the story in a negative way. This is evident through Angela's deceitful nature, as well as Santiago's sexual abuse towards Divina Flor.
ReplyDeleteTalia Jensen, Post #1
ReplyDeleteThroughout Márquez´ writing in the first chapter, he brings the prominent role of religion to the surface. The characters in the story will often make comments indicating their beliefs, and the actions and appearances of the people speak the loudest of their dependence on religion. On the occasion of the Bishop coming to town, ¨They’d placed the sick people in the archways to receive God’s medicine, and women came running out of their yards with turkeys and suckling pigs and all manner of things to eat, and from the opposite shore came canoes bedecked with flowers” (Marquez, 21). The frantic diction, such as “placed”, “sick”, “running”, reveals the people’s dependence on their strong faith in Catholicism and their passion for receiving gifts and blessings. From only reading this excerpt, one might assume that their whole world revolves around their religion. Their beliefs have noticeable influence over their actions, as women run towards this holy man and many bring gifts and ask for mercy on the sick. To contrasts the almost needy mannerisms of the people, the bishops shows a sense of disdain towards the town: “...The bishop began to make the sign of the cross in the air opposite the crowd on the pier, and he kept on doing it mechanically afterwards, without malice or inspiration, until the boat was lost from view...”(Marquez, 17). Marquez uses the words “air” and “lost” and “mechanically”; and the phrase “without malice or inspiration” to allude to an unemotional and aloof tone, which reflects the way the bishop views the people. He does not see them as equal and is distant and careless towards their gifts and respects to him.
Kevin Krenz
ReplyDeleteIn the first chapter of Chronicle of a Death Foretold, I noticed Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s very prominent theme of various aspects contrasting and juxtaposing with one another. This can be seen especially towards the very beginning of the chapter, where descriptions of seemingly casual actions are matched with brutally descriptive similes and metaphors. “He’d dreamed he was going through a grove of timber trees where a gentle drizzle was falling. And for an instant he was happy on his dream, but when he awoke he felt completely spattered with bird shit.” (Pg. 1). In this passage, Gabriel Garcia Marquez begins to describe Santiago’s dream as a peaceful, natural set, carrying the calm tone over to the reader as well. However, in the very next sentence, he juxtaposes this tone with negative diction as he describes Santiago’s state with a graphic simile. Additionally, there is a contrast employed by Marquez as Santiago Nasar has a conversation with his mother about his dream. “Any dream about birds means good health.” This is his mother’s reply to his dream, which contrasts his fate of death. However, this quote could also be a tool used to foreshadow the fact that everybody else in the city knows about Santiago’s death, as this quote can be interpreted as ‘birds’ being a symbol for freedom, of which he will have plenty in heaven. With his mother’s wish for good health, she wishes him farewell. Although Gabriel Garcia Marquez kills all of the suspense in the story by telling the reader that Santiago Nasar is going to die in the very first sentence of the book, he still foreshadows other aspects and facts about the rest of the book’s society through juxtaposition and symbolism.
Very astute observations Kevin! I love how you analysed the juxtaposition within the first passage, as it wasn't anything that I had considered! Great job! :-)
DeleteFor my first blog post I chose to answer the investigative question “Will religion ever become obsolete?” and to answer this question, we have to look at what Gabriel Garcia Marquez wrote into the first chapter of the book. With characters named things like “Santiago”, “Angela”, and “Cristo”, among others, the blunt references to Catholicism are thrown in your face. However, it’s important to think about what these characters ended up doing. Santiago was killed, Angela wasn’t a virgin even though she should have been, and Cristo failed at the one job he had, which was to keep Santiago save. Not to mention the use of strong symbolism in this first chapter, where Marquez tells the fantastical story of the gun hidden under Santiago’s pillow accidentally being shot and destroying a statue of a saint in the middle of the town hall, which actually ended up teaching Santiago not to leave loaded guns in the house, which led to his inevitable death anyways. The symbolism of the saint being destroyed shows how Marquez believes that religion will result in being obsolete, as even the people who are meant to be pure and good by name are corrupted and killed.
ReplyDeleteBlogpost 2
ReplyDeleteIn chapter 2, the main plot point was the arrival of Bayardo San Román. He was described as being drenched in silver and having “golden eyes” (page 25). Later in the chapter, it is revealed that Bayardo has come into town in order to find someone to marry. Marquez writes “…He had a way of speaking that served to conceal rather than reveal.” (page 26). Later in the chapter, the narrator’s mother says “It also seems that he’s swimming in gold.” (page 27) about Bayardo. The use of silver and gold, as well as how he speaks in a secretive way portrays Bayardo as a very masculine and desirable man. The gold and silver help create the image of a wealthy man, while his general demeanour within the story makes him seem like a man who always gets what he wants. Bayardo is also portrayed as a man of many traits, with the story mentioning that he was a “good drinker, a mediator of fights, and an enemy of cardsharps. One Sunday after mass he challenged the most skilful swimmers who were many, and left the best behind by twenty strokes in crossing the river and back.” (page 27). He’s a skilled engineer, he’s better than the best swimmers, knows as much about medicine as the doctor, knows more about telegraphing than the telegrapher. After his initial arrival, Bayardo asserts his position within the town as a man who belongs, and his machismo act seems almost TOO perfect. One weird thing I noticed about the beginning of Bayardo’s time in town is his description when he first arrives. Wearing tight pants, a short jacket, and kid gloves, all in matching colours, gives off a sense of femininity that Santiago Nasar’s khaki outfit and riding boots just doesn’t seem to have. Not to mention that around the 1840s, kid gloves (gloves made out of lambskin) became unfashionable, and was instead used as an insult to one’s masculinity. This story takes place in the 1950’s Another character (Magdalena Oliver) mentions that “He looked like a fairy.” (page 26), which once again brings into mind the image of a very small and feminine creature. It also might be important to note that a “fairy” is a derogatory term for a homosexual man, which are stereotyped as being excessively feminine. The question is, why did Bayardo San Román show up in this town and worked so hard to assert his masculinity? Is there a reason for him to feel like he has to be the most machismo man in town?
Your analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed how despite his masculine image, the way in which the other characters describe Bayardo is very strange. To answer your question, perhaps Bayardo San Roman worked so hard to assert his masculinity in hopes to surpass the esteemed reputation of his father. When the families first meet, the narrator explains that, “General Petronio San Roman and his family arrived that time on the National Congress ceremonial boat…” (43). As evident in this quote, Bayardo’s father is a very wealthy, highly admired individual. Due to this, maybe Bayardo San Roman puts on an act to appear manly in order impress his father despite not wanting to.
DeleteIn Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s book, Chronicle of A Death Foretold, the contrast between inferior and glorified diction illustrate the gender inequality that existed in Columbia throughout the 1900’s. While describing each of Purisima del Carmen’s children, the narrator mentions, “Angela Vicario...had a helpless air and a poverty of spirit that augured an uncertain future for her...she seemed more destitute in the window of her house” (Márquez 35). Here, with the utilization of words such as “helpless”, “uncertain”, “destitute”, and “poverty”, Márquez informs the audience that despite her alluring beauty, Angela is incompetent, thus, implies that she is in desperate need of a spouse. However, when describing Bayardo San Roman, the narrator notes, “He arrived on the weekly boat with saddlebags decorated with silver that match the buckle of his belt and the rings on his boots...he had...gold eyes, and a skin slowly roasted by saltpeter” (27). When Bayardo San Roman is first introduced, he is depicted as a confident, highly praised individual who does as he pleases. With the use “decorated”, “silver”, and “gold”, it almost appears that the narrator, along with the other characters, view him as a divine figure. This is indicative in Bayardo San Roman’s extravagant spending habits, esteemed reputation, and ability to woo any woman he desires. In regards to Marquez’s use of juxtaposition, the drastic difference between words used to describe Angela, and ones associated with Bayardo San Roman, demonstrates the inferiority of women during this time period. As stated by the group who presented chapter 2, in the 1900’s, marriages in Columbia were arranged. While the bride’s family often benefited from the deal, the woman who is getting married, whether satisfied or not, is forced to spend the rest of her life with an individual who she may resent. On the contrary, the groom gets to pick his spouse, thus, representing his superiority. This relates to Bayardo and Angela’s relationship, and how despite only meeting him once, she is forced to marry him. Furthermore, this concept is evident at the end of their relationship, when he returns her back to Purisima del Carmen. Here, after finding out about her “impurity”, Bayardo San Roman abandons Angela as if she were object. This action demonstrates that he possesses all of the authority in their relationship, for her justification and opinions were irrelevant in this situation. However, it's interesting to note how in the end, he returns back to her. This goes against societal standards, for this action makes Bayardo seem desperate for her love.
ReplyDeleteTalia Jensen
DeleteGood commentary! To go along with that, I think that one can also say that Marquez also uses extravagant characters like Bayardo to create a more clear image of the different social classes in this society. The reader is more able to distinguish what money and authority influences and how it greatly affects the outcomes and decisions made.
Talia Jensen, Post #2
ReplyDeleteThough maybe not as apparent, marriage is a central motif of Chronicles of a Death Foretold. If Angela Vicario and Bayardo San Roman were not uniting as one, the plot of the story would struggle. Marquez uses the marriage between Angela and Bayardo, as well as the gender roles in marriage, to utilize how the culture of Colombia affects the outcomes and results of the story. "The brothers were brought up to be men. The girls were brought up to be married. They knew how to do screen embroidery, sew by machine, weave bone lace, wash and iron, make artificial flowers and fancy candy, and write engagement announcements… my mother thought there were no better-reared daughters. 'They're perfect,' she was frequently heard to say. 'Any man will be happy with them because they've been raised to suffer'"(Marquez, 31) This excerpt clearly explains the beliefs and customs of this culture. The alliteration of “f”, “b”,“m”, and “w”illustrate the different roles and lifestyles of the man and the woman. The women were “weavers” and “washers” in their own “feminine” manner. The men were taught to be “bold” and “masculine”. The women’s tasks described create the image a wedding being planned and prepared, which is symbolic of how these Colombian women’s live revolved around being worthy and ready for her husband. The final phrase, “Any man will be happy with them because they've been raised to suffer”, simply represents the submissive pressures put upon women that come from their culture. Traditions are carried down generations and the effects of these questionable customs becomes incredibly apparent in the marriage between Angela Vicario and Bayardo San Roman.
Nice observation, I didn't notice how the alliteration differs between both genders! It's interesting how soft alliteration can really establish the different lifestyles of each gender. I also noticed that when Angela is described, there is a lot of consonance and alliteration attached in phrases such as "helpless air and a poverty of spirit" and "she seemed more destitute in the window of her house, where she would sit in the afternoon making cloth flowers and singing songs about single women". The s-alliteration is very smooth and graceful, almost mirroring Angela's portrayal as an angel in society.
DeleteIn chapter two of Chronicle of a Death Foretold, Marquez focuses on the internalized biases of society related to marriage and how it affects both genders differently. By utilizing juxtaposition between Angela and Bayardo, power roles are established that illustrate society’s reverence towards Bayardo and disdain towards Angela once they discover she is not a virgin. With elegant and expensive diction such as “golden” and “enchanting”, Bayardo is displayed as a valuable idol who should be given everything he wants. However, Angela is described with demure and delicate diction such as “better-reared”, “helpless”, and “poverty of spirit” illustrating a lost soul in society who should become married so she can be put back onto the right track. Supporting their roles in society is Marquez’s construction of characterization. He establishes that women are expected to be meek and delicate, reared up to become housewives and prioritize the lives of their family over themselves. For example, Purisima Del Carmen, who is described as “devoted with such spirit of sacrifice to the care of her husband and the rearing of her children that at times she forgot she still existed (31) differs from Poncio Vicario, who is described as “losing his sight from doing so much fine work in gold in order to maintain the honor of the house” (30). Intriguingly, the prioritizations of the mother and father in this society mirror the expectations of society in A Doll’s House, where Nora is expected to care for the children while Torvald is expected to uphold the reputation of the household. Through juxtaposition and characterization, Marquez illustrates the power of societal expectations to confine or free a person’s spirit based on their role in a marriage, and how when people don’t fit into a mold, it devalues them as a person in society.
ReplyDeleteGood work Prim! I also noticed the way that Marquez juxtaposed Bayardo and Angela throughout the chapter. I also think it's important to note how the first time Bayardo saw Angela, she was supposed to be in mourning. I guess this could symbolise her fragility as well, as grief and mourning are usually seen as emotions that make a person fragile! Good work!
DeleteSince chapter 3 comes before chapter 1, this is where the book begins to get even more confusing. The important thing I chose to analyse for this chapter is how Marquez uses juxtaposition to draw clear distinction between the twins. In the butcher’s shop, the brothers go to sharpen their knives before they have their first argument. Marquez writes “They sharpened them on the grindstone, and the way they always did: Pedro holding the knives and turning them over the stone, and Pablo working the crank.” (page 57). Later on in the book, Pedro begins having doubts about whether or not to go through with the killing of Santiago Nasar, even though he’s the one who came up with the idea in the first place. Pablo later convinces Pedro to go through with it. This quote helps juxtapose the brothers and shed light on their relationship and dynamic. Although Pedro is the one who seems in charge, as he has the easy work of sharpening the knife, and is shown to be the head of the duo, Pablo is the one who “works the crank”. Pedro might have been the younger brother who had seen the likes of war, but in the extremes, Pablo knows how to be the older brother. He is the motor that keeps the clock that is the Vicario brothers in time. Even though Pedro has seen the worst of the world in war, and he came back more responsible and ready to impose his decisions on his brother (like the man who would sharpen the knife), Pablo still knows that sometimes he has to take charge and do the dirty work that his younger brother just may not have the heart for, (like someone who would do the tiresome task of turning the crank). This sentiment is echoed later in the chapter where Marquez writes that Pablo “…put the knife in his [brother’s] hand and dragged him off almost by force in search of their sister’s lost honor.” (page 61). Pedro may not have been ready to kill Santiago, even though he had been through war, but Pablo was, and made the decision for the both of them. This juxtaposition in their character helps the reader separate the twins, as well as creating a sense of dread and panic, in that even the most meek men will take charge and do what they must to protect the honour of a loved one.
ReplyDeleteYour analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed the contrast between Pedro and Pablo's roles in their relationship. To build upon your ideas, I believe that the knives also had a direct effect on the actions of the two men. Throughout the story, these knives appear to provide the brothers with motivation to restore their sister's honor. As evident in the quote, "...put the knife in his hand and dragged him off almost by force..." (61), it seems as if their weapons influenced their attitude. Furthermore, their resupply of knives informs the audience that Santiago's death was inevitable.
DeleteIn Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s book, Chronicle of A Death Foretold, the symbolic nature of the knives plays a significant role in the death of Santiago. Upon learning about Angela’s failed marriage, Pedro and Pablo declared that they intend to restore their sister’s honor, sharpened their knives at the meat market, and made their way towards Clotilde Armenta's milk shop. Meanwhile, Colonel Lazaro Aponte is notified about the twin’s plan, thus, confiscates their knives despite not believing that they would actually commit the crime. In spite of this, the Vicario brothers fetch two new knives from their house and continue their search for Santiago. During the class presentation, the group asserted that Pedro and Pablo’s weapon of choice represents the community's lack of concern for the situation. For example, after the twin’s were deterred, the narrator revealed, “Clotilde Armenta suffered another disappointment with the mayor’s casual attitude, because she thought that he should have detained the twins until the truth came out” (34). As evident in this quote, even the mayor wasn’t alarmed by the Pedro and Pablo’s knives, as well as their verbal commitment to murder Santiago. Although the twins had a somewhat reputable reputation in their community, one would anticipate that an individual who represents the citizens of their town would be more apprehensive. Ultimately, this lack of concern for Santiago’s well-being led to his death, for there were several instances where he could have been warned ahead of time. Although this idea makes sense, I thought that the knives were emblematic of the twin’s inability to liberate themselves from their situation. Throughout the book, it is made clear that Pedro and Pablo were very hesitant with killing Santiago. This is evident when they stalled by sitting under a tree, in which Pablo, “put the knife in his hand and dragged him off almost by force in search of their sister’s lost honor” (36). Here, the knives serve as motivation to follow through with the promise that they had made to Angela. With this being said, since the twins slaughter pigs, it is implied that they have access to lots of knives at their house. As a result, no matter how much they wanted to remove themselves from this predicament, it appears that the act of killing Santiago was inevitable. This also seen when the Colonel confiscates their knives, which are easily replaced with two more. Despite how one interprets the symbolic nature of the knives, I am interested but unsure as to why a gun wasn’t the weapon of choice for the murder Perhaps Márquez want to dramatize the death by incorporating a gruesome scene with the intestines.
ReplyDeleteKevin Krenz
ReplyDeleteIn Chapter 3, many things stood out to me, both by reading the chapter and by hearing the group presentation. However, one thing in particular caught my attention: the dehumanization of characters in the book through the use of animal imagery. Whilst pig imagery was more on the forefront of most readers’ perspectives, not many noticed the dog imagery and what its possible significance could be. “They left by the way of the pigpen gate, with their knives unwrapped, trailed by the uproar of the dogs in the yards” This quote demonstrates the dogs’ intent to stop (or at least warn) the Vicario brothers that the murder is a bad idea. These dogs were seemingly the only animals to act against the Vicario brothers. In this case, the dogs represent the apparently absent population of those willing to take action against the murder. The fact that Gabriel Garcia Marquez chooses to represent these as dogs shows his intent to “dehumanize” these people, showing that outliers would be frowned upon by society regardless.
I think it's interesting also that dogs are normally considered guardians in our culture despite being animals, yet they seemed to have more sympathy for Santiago than the rest of the townspeople. I think that the punishment of the dogs after Santiago's death also demonstrates how when people go against society, they are punished for it and seen as less than human.
DeleteIn chapter three of Chronicle of a Death Foretold, I thought that the animal symbolism was very interesting. Juxtaposition is first established when Santiago witnesses Victoria Guzman ripping out the steaming entrails of a rabbit and throwing them to the dogs in chapter one, to which Santiago replies “Don’t be a savage. Make believe it was a human being (10)”. Santiago portrays himself as empathetic and kind to the animals. Similarly, the butchers interviewed by the narrator believed that animals had souls too, disabling them from looking them in the eyes or eating the flesh of an animal that they butchered. This juxtaposes the nature of the Vicario twins, who are seen “sacrificing the same hogs that they raised, which were so familiar to them that they called them by their names. (52)”. The butchering of the pigs is actually a comparison to the death of Santiago, who they were previously friends with even though they felt no remorse after the murder. Their apathy dehumanizes Santiago’s death, illustrating that he is less than an animal and he doesn’t even deserve a clean weapon but rather a rusty and worn down knife instead. The dehumanization of Santiago emphasizes the concept of bystander apathy as everyone watched the planning and slaughtering of Santiago, while Santiago was left helpless and clueless, like an animal being led to their death. Through chapter three, it is possible that Marquez was establishing how Santiago was one of the few people left with empathy in a town full of bystanders at fault.
ReplyDeleteYour analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed the way in which Marquez utilizes animal symbolism to demonstrate the dehumanization of Santiago Nasar. To build upon your ideas, I feel that the knives also do a sufficient job at demonstrating the alienation of Santiago. In the beginning of the book, it is noted that Santiago, as well as other characters, own a gun. However, the use of knife creates a more dramatic and exaggerated death, especially through the visual imagery of the guts. Furthermore, the use of knife is inhumane, for Santiago suffered before dying.
DeleteIn Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s book, Chronicle of A Death Foretold, the symbolic nature of the scent provides the audience with greater insight on Santiago’s death. While describing the aftermath of the tragedy, the narrator notes, “Everything continued smelling of Santiago Nasar that day. The Vicario brother could smell him in the jail cell where the mayor had locked them up until he could think of something to do with them...They’d gone three nights without sleep, but they couldn't rest because as soon as they began to fall asleep they would commit the crime all over again…’It was like being awake twice over’” (56). Throughout the book, the narrator makes it clear that the twins didn’t actually want to kill Santiago. This is evident in the way that they keep stalling, and through the fact that the three of them drank together during the wedding. However, in both Colombian culture and Catholicism, a woman’s virginity is an indicator of a her purity and innocence. As a result, due to the magnitude of Angela’s wrongdoing, they knew that they had to uphold their family’s reputation by carrying out the crime. With this being said, the scent symbolizes the guilt that the brothers have to live with for the rest of their lives. It’s important to note how the narrator explicitly states that Pedro and Pablo couldn’t rid of the smell of Santiago even after they left town and went to prison. In terms of the other citizens, each person had an influence on Santiago’s death. For example, Cristo Bedoya intended to tell Santiago, but instead decided to play dominoes. In the end, he realized that he was too late when he found Santiago’s dead body at his house. This demonstrates that he will also have to endure the burden of experiencing the “scent”, for his lack of concern caused the death of his friend. By implementing the symbolism of the Santiago’s smell, Marquez explores the idea of karma, and how one’s actions can result in unforeseen repercussions. In addition, in chapter 4, I was intrigued by the fact that Bayardo returns to Angela. After the presentation, the class discussed how Angela wrote letters to Bayardo because she truly loves him and wanted to escape from her parents. However, although I believe that this is a valid explanation, I also wanted to note how perhaps Angela feels guilty for the predicament that she caused. Due to her deceitful nature, Bayardo was heartbroken, the townspeople are now haunted by guilt, and most importantly, Santiago died. With this being said, the act of sending letters could be a way in which to put her mind at ease. This leads to the question of whether or not Angela truly cared about her marriage.
ReplyDeleteIn Gabriel Garcia Márquez’s book, Chronicle of A Death Foretold, the symbolic nature of the magistrate and love letters illustrate the prominent role that fate has throughout the plot. After the murder had been committed, the narrator notes, “He was so perplexed by the enigma that fate had touched him with, that he kept falling into lyrical distractions that ran contrary to the rigor of his profession (Marquez 116). In chapter five, the magistrate is introduced as a recent graduate who wore a black linen law school suit, thus, representing that he had just started his professional career. As evident by the words “perplexed” and “enigma”, the quote above informs that audience that the magistrate was perturbed by the simplicity of the case he had been assigned to. Even though he didn’t have a personal connection with the victim, the magistrate could have foreseen his death from the beginning. This ultimately reveals the simplicity of Santiago’s passing, and how it could have been easily avoided. However, due to its “natural path”, it appears as if the death of Santiago was fated. Additionally, it is revealed that the magistrate’s, “...marginal notes, and not just because the color of the ink, seemed to be written in blood” (116). Blood is notorious for its ability to stain clothing. Due to this, by comparing the magistrate’s marginal notes to blood, the narrator hints that Santiago’s death was inevitable and “stained” within his timeline. In a broader perspective, the magistrate plays a significant role in the story. By providing an “outside” perspective to the murder, the audience is able to note how the amount of coincidences contributed to Santiago’s inevitable demise. Furthermore, after Flora Miguel calls off their marriage, “Santiago Nasar was so perplexed that he dropped the chest of his loveless letter...” (134). In the 1900’s, information was primarily sent through the postal service, for online messaging services were nonexistent. As a result, handwritten letter were somewhat personal, for unlike in today’s society, one would have to endure the process of writing the message, sealing it into an envelope, and taking it to a mailbox or post office. In regards to the quote above, the audience is informed that Santiago had been sending love letters to Flora Miguel for the duration of their relationship. However, in the final scene, she throws them back at him, thus, demonstrating that their hopes of marriage has now diminished. This seemed to be fated, for in this same scene, the narrator reveals that Flora Miguel was desperate to get married after serving as a bridesmaid for her whole life.
ReplyDeleteYour analysis was quite intriguing! I think the "loveless letters" that Santiago got back from Flora Miguel shows that Santiago never really loved Flora Miguel, instead of the loveless letters representing how their chances of marriage all but vanished. Like you mentioned, Flora Miguel was desperate to become a bride after spending her whole life as a bridesmaid. Santiago Nasar spent almost all of his free time out with his friends or at the whore's house. Márquez even mentioned that "Whenever he passed by Flora Miguel's house, even if nobody was home, Santiago Nasar would scratch his keys across the window screens." (pg 112). This is important to note because it shows that although Santiago Nasar and Flora Miguel clearly lived very close to each other, they most often communicated through letters. Márquez even says that Flora wasn't worried about whether or not Santiago was going to be killed, she was more concerned that her chance of becoming a bride would be taken from her. I think this helps the reader understand why the letters were loveless. Santiago Nasar never really loved Flora Miguel, and Flora Miguel never really loved Santiago Nasar.
DeleteIn Chapter 5 one of the most important things I picked up on was the way the narrator portrayed the townsfolk as sadistic bystanders. On page 115, the narrator writes that “the people had stationed themselves on the square the way they did on parade days.” The townsfolk are said to be standing around like they do on a parade day. Parades are joyous and interesting events that garner a lot of attention. The fact that Santiago, wandering around the town completely delirious and confused, is treated the same way as a parade is sick. Also, the way that Santiago Nasar stumbles dizzily around the town while the rest of the townsfolk jeer at him is another interesting way to portray the townsfolk. “They [the townsfolk] began to shout at him from every side, and Santiago Nasar went backward and forward several times, baffled by hearing so many voices.” (pg 115). The way this is written reminds me of a caged animal being disoriented by the crowd of people above it, shouting and screaming. Santiago Nasar himself is even described as pacing backwards and forwards like said caged animal. I think it’s interesting that the narrator describes all the townsfolk in this manner after mentioning how “…most of those who could have done something to prevent the crime and did not consoled themselves with the pretext that affairs of honour are sacred monopolies…” (pg 97). This line means that all the bystanders who could have saved Santiago Nasar convinced themselves that not saving him was the right thing to do because the reason Santiago died was a matter of honour, and its important that they didn’t get involved. Then, the narrator lists all the ways the different characters in the story shifted blame onto someone else. I think the reason why the narrator chose to describe the townsfolk that way, after explaining the reasons the townsfolk gave as to why they didn’t save Santiago, is to emphasise the point that none of the bystanders are innocent. Every single person in this town, who knew about Santiago’s death and did nothing, are all responsible for Santiago’s death. And although some might justify not getting involved with “It was a matter of honour” or “He was going to die after a month anyways”, the narrator still firmly believes that everyone, including himself, has to carry the weight of knowing that they killed Santiago, that they stood by and allowed him to die, that they watched him with the same sadistic interest as one watches a parade, and didn’t do anything to save him.
ReplyDeleteI can totally see how all of the town residents viewed Santiago's death as a spectacle to watch. Especially before his death too, when Cristo and Santiago are walking through the plaza and everyone parts for them to go through and when Cristo is looking for Santiago and the townspeople begin to gather because they're awaiting the crime to happen. The level of apathy involved is amazing, as even the animals (the dogs) did more to warn Santiago than the people did.
DeleteA very interesting aspect about Chapter 5, as I stated in my presentation as well, was Gabriel Garcia MArquez’s use of names to highlight certain characteristics of the characters in the book. Each character’s personalities and way of acting is pre-described due to the meaning behind his or her name, many examples of which can be found in Chapter 5 of Chronicle of a Death Foretold. Furthermore, Gabriel Garcia Marquez used names referring to floral imagery to symbolize a rather tranquil trait for most females in the book. Take Hortensia Baute for example. “Hortensia Baute, whose only participation was having seen the two bloody knives that weren’t bloody yet felt so affected by the hallucination that she fell in a penitential crisis, and one day, unable to stand it any longer, she ran out naked into the street.” The first name “Hortensia” means “garden”- demonstrating her calm and tranquil nature, This is further emphasized in the quote above as Gabriel Garcia Marquez attempts to display the severe trauma caused by solely witnessing the crime. Another name, Aura Villeros, is a reference to Aura the Titan goddess of breeze and fresh, cool air. “Aura Villeros, the midwife who had helped bring three generations into the world, suffered a spasm of the bladder when she heard the news and to the day of her death had to use a catheter in order to urinate.” This quote again shows the severe effect on a customarily calm and peaceful personality. There are many more female names in the book that relate to floral things, for example Placida Linero (“Placida” is Spanish for calm), Flora Miguel, and Divina Flor (both Spanish for flower). While these names may possibly illustrate Gabriel Garcia’s view on women at the time, it may also just be magical realism to emphasize the effect on the town of Santiago Nasar’s death, seeing as not only women were given floral names and suffered tragic consequences after experiencing the murder. Don Rogelio de la Flor, for example, was a man who suffered a tragedy afterwards as well. “Don Rogelio de la Flor, Clotilde Armenta’s good husband, who was a marvel of vitality at the age of eighty-six, got up for the last time to see how they had hewn Santiago Nasar to bits against the locked door of his own house, and he didn’t survive the shock.” Don Rogelio de la flor also contains floral imagery (Flor=flower), but also relates to how “Rogelio” is a name for Spanish Catholics who ask for the absolution of sins from Jesus Christ. In this situation, his guilt is extremely apparent as it caused his shock and consequently, his death. I find it extremely ironic how it is only after the murder when people start feeling sympathy for Santiago, which is hyperbolized through the gruesome graphicness of the incidents caused by the guilt of the bystanders. Although Gabriel Garcia Marquez may be making a social statement about women by assigning them these sorts of names, he is also showing through the names that although they feel sympathetic for Santiago, the way certain characters acted in situations and reacted to the crime was predetermined.
ReplyDeleteYour analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed the religious allusions that Gabriel Garcia Márquez employs to further emphasizes aspects of Santiago's death. To build upon your ideas, when the magistrate comes into town, the narrator states, "The judge...had doubtless read the Spanish classics and a few Latin ones, and he was quite familiar with Nietzsche..." (58). Friedrich Nietzsche was a 19th century German philosopher who believed that people should craft their own reality. This went against the Columbia community in Chronicle of Death Foretold, for as evident in Angela's circumstances, their lives were heavily dictated by their religious beliefs. As a result, by including this historical allusion, Marquez illustrates how those who investigated Santiago's death were alienated.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteOne interesting thing I noticed about chapter five was the juxtaposition between Santiago and the townspeople before his death. Santiago was often portrayed with calm and purposeful diction, such as “strolled along the dock and both seemed so unconcerned that they gave rise to false impressions (101)” and “serenity” while the townspeople are described with mindless and apathetic diction, as displayed in examples like “The people who were coming back from the docks, alerted by the shouts, began to take up positions around the square to witness the crime. (109)” and “But most of those who could have done something to prevent the crime and did not consoled themselves with the pretext that affairs of honor are sacred monopolies, giving access only to those who are part of the drama. (97). Something to point out about this chapter is its large emphasis on fate because of religion, including the fate of Santiago’s death and the fate of the townspeople affected by his death, like Flora Miguel and Hortensia Baute. It is believed that Santiago’s fate was destined from the moment the Vicario brothers declared that they were going to defend their honour, and because of this, all the townspeople who could have prevented the murder avoided the blame, saying that it was a matter of religion and honour between two families. Marquez scattered many religious allusions throughout the chapter, such as Cristo being Saint Christopher and Clotilde resembling Sainte Clotilde. Through situational irony, I believe that he did this to show how fate can seem inevitable based off of your beliefs as the townspeople who relied on religion believed that Santiago was inevitably going to die, while others such as Cristo did everything he could to save him out of his own free will.
ReplyDeleteJust to preface this, the calendar says I’m meant to write about commonalities between the passages handed out in class, but I don’t know any of the other passages, so I’m just going to blog about the story in general.
ReplyDeleteThroughout the story of A Chronicle of a Death Foretold, I thought it was interesting how men and women differed throughout the story. The stark double standard within the concept of virginity and religious purity was a strange one. On the side of the women, virginity is the most pure thing they have to their name. Being a virgin until marriage is the one thing they have grown up to learn, and by keeping something as minute as one’s virginity, they are the most desirable they could ever be. Something as minuscule as a social construct, the idea of being a virgin, determines the complete and total social standing and their worth in this society. Because Angela lost her virginity before she got married, she was completely discarded by her husband, and the whole town shunned her. One passage even writes that “…the fact that Angela Vicario dared put on the veil and the orange blossoms without being a virgin would be interpreted afterwards as a profanation of the symbols of purity.” (page 41). Because Angela wasn’t a virgin when she wore the veil and blossoms, the whole town views this as a destruction of the symbols, as if because she wasn’t a virgin those symbols of purity are tainted forever. Men, on the other hand, are absolutely free of the idea of purity. In fact, the unnamed narrator even states that María Alejandrina Cervantes had done away with his generation’s virginity (page 65). This is interesting, because it shows that although the men did understand the concept of their own virginity and how it can be taken away, they don’t have to care. So what if Santiago was sleeping with María Alejandrina Cervantes while he was engaged to Flora Miguel? As long as Flora Miguel remains a virgin, that doesn’t seem to matter. I also think it’s interesting that when Angela admitted to losing her virginity before marriage, she was shunned, but María Alejandrina Cervantes is almost treasured by the men in the town. This might be because María is there specifically for the men’s pleasure. María is “allowed” to be “impure” because she has been reduced to a simple object, there to provide the townsmen with intimacy when required. The machismo mindset and the hyper-masculinity that is exhibited in this time period allows men to get away with whatever they want, while females have their worth reduced down to whether or not they’ve slept with a man before having their wedding. I think this concept is especially harmful to young women growing up in these societies, specifically because it allows men to get away with awful things like sexual abuse and rape, all in the name of machismo, while the women are left to deal with the aftermath of not being a virgin anymore. And although this story was written almost 40 years ago, this double standard still exists among girls in middle and high school. That teach abstinence only sex education have recently come under fire for comparing girls to a number of things, and stressing that nobody will want you if you aren’t a virgin. They’ve even gone so far as to say to young girls that their virginity is a tall glass of clear water, and “nobody wants to drink from a glass that’s already been spit in.” This problematic construct proves to be damaging to women from a long time ago, and it still proves to be damaging today.
I totally agree with you that the social construct of "virginity" tied to self-worth is extremely damaging. To support your post, I also thought about the treatment of the townspeople after Santiago's murder. To start this off, it's really obvious that most of this was kinda Bayardo's fault for returning Angela, but no one blames Bayardo for returning her like an object. They blame Angela for losing her virginity already. Along with that, after Santiago's death, Flora Miguel leaves and ends up becoming a prostitute that is shamed by her community, while Bayardo wastes away but is pitied by the town for being given a girl who wasn't a virgin during their wedding. Their obvious lack of sympathy for women who went against social norms is extremely damaging, and as awful as it is, definitely is still prevalent today.
DeleteThe passage my group analyzed was passage #7, where Bayardo confronts the widower Xius for the house holding his wife’s treasured possessions. Marquez constructs a cold and detached tone through juxtaposition and materialistic diction throughout this passage that leaves the reader feeling as inferior as Xius. As Bayardo bargains for the house, Xius retorts that “young people don’t understand the motives of the heart”, in which in result Bayardo “doesn’t pause to think” and offers five thousand pesos. The quick thought process and lack of empathy juxtapose Bayardo and Xius to display the shifting values between the young and old of society. As Xius values the memory of his wife and sentimentality, Bayardo values winning and lavish goods, caring more about buying the house to win Angela over instead of courting her himself. The diction used by Bayardo himself focuses on the materialistic aspect of the situation, while Xius focuses on the emotional aspect of the situation. For example, diction revolving money such as “I’ll buy it along with everything inside” and “silver-trimmed saddlebags with the printed bands of the State Bank” portray his extravagant nature and reliance on wealth, while Xius is displayed with diction such as “olden”, “lifetime of sacrifice”, and “heart”. This detail further separates Xius and Bayardo as they argue for the house, as Xius is fighting to keep the house for his wife, while Bayardo is fighting to gain the house for Angela’s heart instead of working for it.
ReplyDeleteTalia Jensen
DeleteI love your insight on the differences between the old and the young! I think this is definitely a prominent idea in this book but it is not paid much attention. The difference between the young and the old is expressed with these characters, and the this particular relationship emphasizes the old man's wisdom and the young man's inability to show sympathy or reasoning. Maybe if the Vicario brothers were older, the sitaution would have been handled differently.
Talia Jensen
ReplyDeleteAfter centering my focus on the smaller specifics of Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s works, I have learned to appreciate and notice the many devices he uses in his writing to invoke emotion and allude to images of magical realism. In chapter 5, Santiago Nasar and his neighbors and friends experience one of the most intense scenes of the book: his gruesome and impending death. Marquez uses irony and animal imagery throughout Santiago’s bloody murder. Before the graphic slashes and tears take place, Pablo Vicario expresses, “...I was scared when I saw him face on...because he looked twice as big as he was….”(Marquez, 117). The irony of Pablo’s fears is that there is only one of Santiago and two of the Vicarios, but the very real fear that occurs before murdering another leads to questioning one’s own abilities and strengths. After beginning their aggressive and animalistic attempts to kill, Santiago reaches a point of accepting his fate, and Pedro Vicario explains, “He didn't cry out again….Just the opposite: it looked to me as if he was laughing.” The last reaction one would expect of Santiago in this state would be to laugh, and this is why the occasion contains ironic elements. The animal imagery throughout the passage alludes to Santiago himself representing a small innocent animal reaching the moment of his inevitable slaughter. Phrases such as: “(he) Let out a moan the moan of a calf” (Marquez, 118); and “Pedro Vicario sought his heart….where pigs have it” (Marquez, 119) allude to the fact that the Vicario brothers are used to killing in their slaughter house and they have become accustomed to killing and murdering animals and creatures who have names. Pablo Vicario recalled murdering Santiago feeling like “the way you do when galloping on horseback (Marquez, 119). This image expresses the rush of adrenaline one experiences in an act so intense and heavy on an individual.
Your analysis was quite intriguing! I also noticed the irony that is employed throughout this passage! However, it is important to note the symbolic nature of Pedro Vicario grabbing his armpit. While explaining Santiago's death, the narrator notes, “Furthermore: all the many people he ran into after leaving his house at five minutes past six and until he was carved up like a pig an hour later remembered him as being a little sleepy but in a good mood, and he remarked to all of them in a casual way that it was a very beautiful day” (Marquez 1). Throughout the plot, it is made clear that in Colombia, pigs are seen as source of meat, thus, are constantly being raised and slaughtered. In regards to this quote, by comparing Santiago to a pig, the narrator hints that he was fated to die. With this kept in mind, since he looks for his heart where pigs have them, Pedro's death in the military was fated as well.
DeleteFor the Chronicle of a Death Foretold passage presentations, I analyzed paragraphs three and four from chapter five. In this scene, the magistrate, who had recently graduated from school, begins to investigate the peculiar death of Santiago Nasar. While the narrator searches for legal documents that may facilitate his investigation, it is noted that, “Everything we know about his character had been learned from the brief, which several people helped me look for twenty years later in the Palace of Justice in Riohacha. There was no classification of files whatever, and more than a century of cases were piled up on the floor of the decrepit colonial building that had been Sir Francis Drake’s headquarters” (Marquez 115-116). Here, Gabriel Garcia Marquez employs an allusion to illustrate the failure of the Colombian justice system. In the late 1500’s, Sir Francis Drake sailed to Santo Domingo and enslaved the natives, burned down the city, and stole several pounds of gold and silver. In regards to the plot, this English sailor’s corrupt nature is evident within the judicial system of the town in which Chronicle of a Death Foretold takes place. In today’s society, legal buildings are seen as organized, well-kept facilities in which individuals can receive helpful information or services. However, as indicated by the quote above, this palace, which is where most of the legal documents are held, is flooded and disorderly, therefore, hindering the narrator’s investigative process. Since the governmental figures in this community had failed to fix this issue, Marquez demonstrate how corrupt and indolent the judicial system is. This excerpt directly relates to the analysis conducted by the group who read passage six. In their presentation, they discussed the gruesome death of Santiago, and how the twins struggled to murder the man who supposedly took their sister’s virginity. One detail that was quite intriguing includes how the knives that stabbed Santiago kept coming out of his body clean of any blood. As discussed in class, this was chosen to symbolize the innocence of Santiago. In regards to the passage that Hailey and I analyzed, the flawed justice system was a prominent factor that resulted in Santiago’s death. Since the Colonel Aponte failed to question the Vicario brothers when he had the chance, and decided to play dominoes instead of warning Santiago, the twins were able to carry out their act of honor.
ReplyDelete