Chronicle of an announced death of Gabriel García Márquez

Gabriel García Márquez

If there is a universal Latin American author, that is Gabriel García Márquez. The Colombian Nobel Prize not only forged a magical realism that would forever change the course of literature, but also set aside enough time to give us some of some works marked by the journalistic ingenuity of the writer of One Hundred Years of Solitude.

The best example is A Chronicle of a Death Foretold, which was published in 1981, instantly becoming one of Gabo's most characteristic works.

Synopsis of Chronicle of a Death Foretold

A Chronicle of a Death Foretold

Set in a coastal town in the Caribbean, Chronicle of a Death Foretold begins with the marriage between Bayardo San Román, a local millionaire, and Ángela Vicario. However, upon arriving home after the ceremony, Bayardo discovers that his new wife is not a virgin, so he decides to return her to the family home. After receiving a blow from his mother, Angela blames Santiago Nasar, a neighbor of Arab origin, to be the cause of his misfortune.

Since then, Angela's brothers, Pedro and Pablo, announce in front of all the people that they will be in charge of assassinating Santiago, although he does not realize the news until seconds before his death, when he is stabbed by two brothers at the door of his house and in front of a crowd aware of a news that begins to run following a map of specific situations and characters that the author reconstructs throughout the pages of the work, since If everyone knew that Santiago was going to be assassinated, why didn't anyone say anything?

Chronicle of a Death Foretold Characters

Chronicle of a Death Foretold Characters

The fact of approaching a story that, in a way, makes all your inhabitants accomplices supposes the presence of numerous characters. So many that there is even an ideal map to locate and remember the relationship of each of the locals in relation to Brother Vicario and Santiago Nasar, while also conceiving all the characters of the town as a whole; a knowing witness who is unfazed by the news.

These are the main characters in Chronicle of a Death Foretold:

  • Santiago Nazar: A 21-year-old young man of Arab descent, Santiago is the character referred to by this "announced death." Responsible for a bequest for a recently deceased father, Santiago is a lively and cheerful young man, lover of horses, whom the Vicario brothers promise to kill.
  • Angela Vicario: The youngest of the Vicario family is a demure and non-believing young woman whose rejection after her loss of virginity was discovered leads her to accuse Santiago of what happened. Although throughout the novel the reason and the moment that led to such an encounter is unknown, it is well known that Angela succumbed as a way to protect someone she loved.
  • Bayardo San Roman: Maker of a great fortune thanks to his status as a train engineer, Bayardo is a thirty-year-old cultured, elegant man whom everyone appreciates in town. A party lover, Bayardo is a noble and kindhearted character who takes his new wife's secret as a betrayal.

Other characters

  • Victoria Guzman: Cook of the Santiago Nasar family.
  • Ibrahim Nassar: Santiago Nasar's father, he always used to speak Arabic with his son and had an affair with Victoria Guzmán, whom he abused.
  • Divine Flower: Daughter of Victoria Guzmán and future lover of Santiago Nasar.
  • Bishop: Arrives in town the same day that Santiago dies.
  • Placida Linero: Mother of Santiago, who is murdered at the door of his house after thinking that he was still inside it.
  • Pedro and Pablo Vicario: Twin brothers of Angela. They are 24 years old and they intend to assassinate Santiago.
  • Narrator: An essential person as a counterpoint to the author, the narrator was not present during the events, since he mentions that he was in the arms of his mother, María Alejandrina Cervantes, being years later when he would reconstruct the events of the murder of Santiago Nasar.

Chronicle of a death foretold: the most journalistic Gabo

Colombia

Manaure, the royal town where the event that inspired Chronicle of a Death Foretold took place.

Gabriel García Márquez was a great writer but, above all, a unique journalist. Contributor to different newspapers in Colombia, the author crossed the fine line between journalism and fiction on several occasions, among them with his famous Story of a Shipwrecked Man or, especially, with Chronicle of a Death Foretold.

Gabriel García Márquez
Related article:
Gabriel García Márquez: biography, phrases and books

Based on an event that took place on January 20, 1951 in the coastal town of Manaure, in the Colombian department of Sucre, Gabo rebuilt the murder of Cayetano Gentile, accused of having raped Margarita Chicha Salas, who would become the Angela Vicario of the novel. Margarita would have been rejected by Miguel Reyes Palencia, the novel's Bayardo San Román, who published in 2007 the book La Verdad: 50 years later, reconstructing his own vision of an event that would draw Gabo's attention until it became the book that would be published in 1981.

Guided by rebuilding a truth whose end is never known (Did Santiago Nasar really disgrace Angela?), The author divides the novel into five blocks, each of them focused on a certain moment during the murder and on the characters involved. A domain of information whose purpose is to explain why the murder of Santiago took place if the whole town knew it was going to happen but no one tried to prevent it.

However, despite its chronicle character, the book also reserves different moments of the dose of magical realism so characteristic of Gabo. A touch that can be appreciated both in the aroma of death that Santiago leaves in the Vicario brothers and in the blue color of the soul of Yolanda de Xius, a neighbor who tries at all costs to recover her home from beyond, or the presence of that "fluorescent bird" that, like a soul, flies over the town church every night.

A novel that is already part of the history of contemporary narrative and that, over time, ended up becoming one of the essential books of Gabriel García Márquez.

Did you read A Chronicle of a Death Foretold?


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