10/31/2008 One Hundred Years of Solitude

This story seems built to be read around Halloween with all the ghosts and fluidity of time. There is a consistent theme that seems to run through this novel that relates to the "universe of unreality" that walks hand-in-hand with the reality of the Buendias and Macondo and Columbia (161). We are celebrating the Day of the Dead at my school and we have had some interesting discussions about death and the role it plays in defining our reality. During traditional celebrations of the Day of the Dead, whole families would build a family altar in remembrance of those who have passed and spend this night in the cemeteries surrounded by their spirits in honor of their memories. It reminds me of what we started speaking of in class of how death enters our world or evil corrupts our garden. Some nights the past comes crashing in on me and I wonder if there is anything or if I have fooled myself into thinking there is something after death. Colonel Marquez reflects on Colonel Aureliano's decision to sabotage the revolution, "Don't worry. Dying is much more difficult than one imagines"(170). With the context that the spirits inhabit our world, there is less of a fear of death as it becomes just a transition to another way of living--much like a labyrinth is a journey towards a more spiritual way of walking your path in life. I guess the solitude that consumes the various people of Macondo leads to this conversation on death and the meaning time has for us all.

Here's an eerie-looking labyrinth:
http://www.tonipecoraro.it/Pecoraro_labyrinth_01_labyrinths.jpg