3 lines
2.5 KiB
Markdown
3 lines
2.5 KiB
Markdown
#hs/lit
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By building tension to the use of anticlimactic moments, Gabriel Garcia Marquez conveys the complexity of life and subverts expectations of a typical plot structure. Throughout the text, Marquez references a moment that will happen in the future and builds up to this moment only to subvert expectations and have it result in an anti-climax. One example of this is when Marquez builds up Colonel Aureliano Buendia’s death after the signing the armistice that he had fought years to get. It is described that “he buried his weapons in the courtyard ... He kept only one pistol with one bullet in it” (pg. 188). During this part of the chapter Aureliano Buendia is preparing to go the final meeting to sign the armistice and is destroying all personal traces from his house. Stating that the only weapon he keeps is a “pistol with one bullet in it” is foreshadowing his attempted suicide. He also asked his personal physician “where the exact location of his heart was” (pg. 189) further reinforcing the idea that he is not planning to live past the meeting. After he signs the deal, Colonel Aureliano Buendia uses the pistol to shoot himself in the place the physician indicated although only a few pages later it is revealed that “The bullet had followed such a neat path ... It was the only point where a bullet could pass through without harming any vital organ” (pg. 193). This anti-climax is one of several throughout the book and Marquez uses them to subvert the readers' expectations and show them that in life not everything will happen as you expect it to. Before this point in the book Aureliano Buendia is away fighting in a war and there are many points where he is assumed dead. With how much of the theme this is, Marquez leads the reader to believe that there is no chance that Aureliano will die of old age. After finally returning to sign an end to the war it seems like his time has finally come, although not to long after attempting to kill himself he settles back down in the town in his old age. While this still generally follows the typical structure of buildup to a climax and then resolution, characters portrayed as heroes like Aureliano Buendia often meet a heroic fate. Aureliano instead ends up signing a very unpopular armistice to end the war, attempts to kill himself and then ends up settling down to live out the rest of his life. This helps to emphasize the theme that life doesn’t always proceed how you think it might that Marquez develops throughout this text. |