The atmosphere in this chapter is hostile. Colonel Aureliano Buendía takes his leave and dollies his duties to Arcadio to rule Macondo while he is away. While the colonel was away, Arcadio becomes the cruelest leader the residents of Macondo has ever had (Marquez, 58). Upon attacking Don Apolinar Moscote’s resident, Úrsula gets made and assumes the new leader. Realizing that the sad news disturbs her significant other, she starts lying to him.
The author employs euphemism especially when it comes to the sexual matters in this chapter. In the part where Arcadio, who had an obsession with Pilar and visits her with an intention of having sexual relations, the authors uses a very subtle phrase. Pilar tells Arcadio to come visiting in the night and he pays Sofía de la Piedad to accompany him. The colonel then directed him to give in the town; an order that he disobeyed (Marquez,60). This promotes the theme of betrayal. In a half an hour’s time, the defense is destroyed and Arcadio is executed the following morning. He had his last wishes asking Santa Sofía de la Piedad to make sure that the family name is bared by his children.
Comment
The author understands the art of literary devices. The way he put them in his work is exceptionally interesting. The atmosphere puts in Chapter 6 is hostile. The readers can feel the mood of the story when Arcadios reign starts and he managed to be the cruelest ruler. In addition, the author uses euphemism in his writing. He is not obscene especially when he talks about sexual matters. He puts them in a subtle way that those who read and interpret can understand. The author also uses different themes but in chapter 6 he majorly delved into betrayal.
Chapter 7
Point Of attention
The themes of fantasy and love go unnoticed in this chapter. Magic realism gives hope to a narrative with such a serious topic. Upon the demise of José Arcadio Buendía, there is a downpour of yellow flowers, which paints a picture that nature grieves the fallen patriarch. In the start of the chapter, Ursula who was aware of her child being a wartime captive hears his voice, which was a flag to her that he is alive (Marquez, 64). Colonel Aureliano Buendía and Úrsula both have premonitions and their instincts are conflicting. Pilar remains the only individual who can take advantage of their psychic faculties freely.
Following the death of José Arcadio in the premises, he and Rebeca lease subsequent to Ursula banishing them, a drop blood from his wound travels crosswise over town to the house of his mother (Marquez, 65). It avoids the floor coverings to avoid staining them and makes its way to the kitchen where she bakes bread. The long sentences show the distance that the blood had to travel through to flag the matriarch. Consequently, Ursula trails the blood in a different long sentence to find her child’s body in his room. The blend of the fantastical picture of a child’s blood look for its parent with the long sentences demonstrates the profundity of familial love.
Comment
The author uses the theme of fantasy in an elaborative way in this chapter. As aforementioned, he writes of the rain of yellow flowers that signifies the mourning of nature to the fallen patriarch. Moreover, the picture a drop of blood from the gunfire wound that travels a long distance just to flag a mother of the son’s death, which not only justifies theme of fantasy but also that of love. These are not normal occurrences in the real world. However, they signify the high regard that the patriarch had in the society and the close-knit he had with his mother.
Chapter 8
Point of attention
The quote; Aureliano José had been destined to find with [Carmelita Montiel] the happiness that Amaranta had denied him, to have seven children, and to die in her arms of old age, but the bullet that entered his back and shattered his chest had been directed by a wrong interpretation of the cards (Marquez,76). The quote above is important when it comes to this narration since it brings about a twist in the novel.
In the book, One Hundred Years of Solitude, the notion of a predetermined fate is subject to acknowledgment as natural. Picturing and visioning the future is as easy as recollecting the past considering that time is cyclical. In narrative from chapter 8, nonetheless, a forecast prognosticates the future and influences the outcome. The act of interpreting and reading has a magical power status in this book. This power is also noticed in the last pages of this narrative, where the Aureliano (II) reads the prophecies that lead to the fall of the Macondo. Notwithstanding relegating magical energy to the anecdotal demonstration of reading in the narrative, García Márquez likewise shows his consciousness of the significance of interpretation when it comes to reading.
Comment
The author believes in the interpretation of the texts and uses wordings that have a deeper meaning. Aureliano José and Carmelita Montel’s destiny had a predetermination one that changes in the future. The fate did not play as expected. In chapter 8, the author gives a twist to avoid being predictable. This keeps the readers more interested in his narration hence killing bored. The twists in chapter 8 make every reader glued to the book and its deeper meaning triggers the anticipation of the reader on the expectations of the text to come.
Chapter 9
Points of attention
In the wake of planning another assembly of the principal agitator commander, the author employs magic realism to demonstrate the change, which occurs in Colonel Aureliano Buendía who is not himself following his loss when it comes to “solitude of his power (Marquez, 81).” Those who fought by him took matters into their own hands and killed individuals who were not for him. These killings gave the impression that Colonel Aureliano Buendía powers were diminishing and he could not control his men.
In addition, the author employs the theme of past and the present just to show how much a son and a father are alike in actions but in different generations. While he decimates every evidence of himself aside from Remedios’s daguerreotype that Úrsula stops him from touching, the author compares his actions to the event his father buried a murder weapon he used on Prudencio Aguilar (Marquez, 83). A child rehashing the activities of his dad adds to the circularity of the Buendías’ presence.
The author equally employs the theme of love once in this chapter. In the part Colonel Aureliano Buendía endeavor suicide, Úrsula opens a pot of milk and discovers worms inside. She assumes that the Conservative Party has a hand in killing her son. This moment, which is full of premonition, demonstrates Ursula’s motherly love. Aureliano Buendía is always addressed with as colonel yet his mother just calls him Aureliano. This shows the bond, her sadness and the magic of parenthood.
Comment
The author uses the magic of realism to express to the readers the colonel’s troubles. The colonel’s subjects were not taking orders anymore and chose to do their preferences. The colonel’s mother shows her motherly love when she suspects the poisoning of his son. Moreover the author introduces flashbacks and narrates the similarity of the colonel and his father.
Chapter 10
Points of attention
Character traits in are solely hereditary when it comes to this book. The characters have a similar to their namesakes and parents. However, this chapter creates an impression that the children have been switched during birth; Aureliano Segundo is not as solitary and slim like the older man of the similar name Aureliano Buendía and José Arcadio lacks the impulsiveness and the size of his namesake (Marquez 91). Rather, José Arcadio Segundo is solitary and intense as the former colonel and Aureliano Segundo have attributes similar to José Arcadio.
With just the names turned around and with such solid physical likeness, which they regularly have mistaken for one another, the two combine the traits of the Aurelianos and José Arcadios into a solitary hodgepodge of identity. The family is a subject to an array of repetitions when it comes to personality traits and names from one generation to the other. This paradigm, nonetheless, is not a recurrent one. It is one that has diverse lines of progression stirring simultaneously. Certainly, the family does not return to the precise point, which it started from, however, it cycles through situations and moments that are both different and similar from the encounters before.
Questions
What was the author trying to drive at when he made José Arcadio Segundo be similar to Aureliano Buendía while Aureliano Segundo to José Arcadio in both physique and characters? Perhaps this is another way that the author is trying makes twists in the book and give it a controversial approach. How is it possible that the similar actions that happen to one’s forefathers and namesakes are experienced in different generations? The theme of the past and present is widely used in this narrative and the author uses it link most of the characters.
Work Cited
Marquez, Gabriel Garcia, and Douglas Newman. One hundred years of solitude. Royal Victorian Institute for the Blind Tertiary Resource Service. 2001. Print.
