Old Man With Enormous Wings

¶ … Old Man with Enormous Wings What is the theme of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's a Very Old Man with Enormous Wings? The predominant theme of the story seems to be that humans have a much stronger tendency to express sympathy, concern, and compassion to those who are similar to themselves than to those who are different.

Another theme seems to be that people also have a tendency to put their own selfish interests ahead of those of others; they are much more likely to think about what someone can do for them than what they can do for another. That would seem to be especially true for strangers. When Pelayo and Elisenda first found the old winged man, they treated him more like an animal than a human being, probably very much because they were unable to understand him.

The "wise" neighbor lady had even less compassion, advising Pelayo and Elisenda to beat him to death with a club. Their only concern was for themselves and they wondered whether the old winged man was an angel sent to help their sick child. It never occurred to them that the old man also seemed to be very sick and in need of their help at least as much as they needed his.

When the priest arrived to investigate, he too seemed only concerned about the old man if he happened to be a Christian. If he had understood the Father and responded in Latin, the priest would probably have demanded that he be treated with greater kindness and respect. Since the old man could not understand Latin and because he seemed much more likely to be some form of person instead of an angel, the priest showed little concern for him.

Ironically, the Father himself argued that the old winged man was actually very human-like; still, he was unconcerned for his welfare because he was not a Christian. The implications of that response is much larger than the story, especially if one considers some of the ways that people view and treat one another based strictly on whether or not they happen to share the same religion.

What does the story imply about human nature and how we treat one another? The story seems to make very clear that human beings can be very self-centered and comparatively uncaring of others who are different from us. During the entire time that the old winged man lived in the chicken coop, nobody seemed to care about his comfort. Many people came to be amused by him and some of them even tormented him by throwing stones at him and even burning him, just to see his reaction.

There is a very good argument that it is highly immoral to treat animals cruelly or to raise and slaughter them for food in ways that are inhumane. This story seems to suggest that this type of insensitivity is not something that people only express toward animals, but also toward one another. Except for having wings that made the old man different from other people, he was a human being. Chances are if the same old man had been.