Chronicle of a death foretold :: English Literature:

Chronicle of a death foretold Chronicle of a death foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez is a fictitious novel. It was originally written in Spanish but was later translated to English. The story began on the morning of Santiago Nasar’s murder. We are being told the story in first person view by an unnamed narrator who has witness the events that occurred. I think there is a surreal and repetitive tone; I get the feeling that the narrator is investigating the murder because we are told the story years later from an omniscient point of view and all the characters’ thoughts are shared. There were two main themes that I noticed. The main theme was how unpowerful the women are in the story. This is shown when Marquez writes "The brothers were brought up to be men. The girls were brought up to be married.† This excerpt shows the severity of the lives women lead in the reserved Colombian culture of the town. A woman's worthiness as a wife was measured by her beauty in conjunction with her ability to gracefully run all aspects of a household. The idea that the woman in a marriage is expected to suffer is significant-no woman enters marriage expecting to be happiness unless she is fortunate enough to love whichever man decides to court her. In this Spanish culture, unlike Western culture, marriage is not based on love. There is also the importance of cultural traditions like honor. The twin brothers murder Santiago Nasar because he took their sister’s virginity away. Also, I became aware the there in an emphasis on the dream that Santiago had, with the trees and the weather on the day he was murdered. Some recalled that it rained and some said that it was sunny. One technique used in the story as a motif as magic realism. This is the incorporation of fantastic or mythical into realistic fiction. I noticed that Marquez keeps on repeating the murder before it occurred, this helped to build suspense. From the second chapter I understood that the narrator implies that Santiago is innocent for the crime he dies for. But if he is innocent, then who took Angela Vicario’s virginity? The brutality of the social conventions surrounding women becomes clear in this chapter. Because she was not a virgin when she married, not only is Angela abandoned by her husband, but she is beaten by her mother. The double standards of her culture are highlighted by the fact that the narrator, Santiago and some other friends are all at a whorehouse doing whatever they please. This novel reminded me of the difficulty of understanding events.