Old Man With Enormous Wings Magical Realism

¶ … Old Man with Enormous Wings

Magical Realism

Magical realism, according to author Gabriel Garcia Marquez, "…expands the categories of the real so as to encompass myth, magic, and other extraordinary phenomena in Nature…" (Marquez, Creighton.edu). Marquez has used magical realism very effectively in his short story A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings; he blends realism and fantasy so well that there does not seem to ever be a movement in the narrative from realism to fantasy. The English Department at Emory University takes the definition to a deeper level, suggestion that magical realism "…aims to seize the paradox of the union of opposites (emory.edu). Magical realism takes two very different (or "conflicting") perspectives and places them side-by-side for the sake of drama in a fictional narrative, according to the Emory University explanation.

One of the perspectives in magical realism is based on "a rational view of reality," but the other perspective is presented assuming the reader will accept the "…supernatural as prosaic reality" (Emory.edu). And magic realism is quite different from pure fantasy because as in Marquez's story, there is a normal, unexceptional world established but within that world magical things occur as part of an ordinary routine. Another way to look at it is to view magical realism through the lens of European rationality versus "the irrational elements of a primitive America" (Emory.edu).

A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings

In Marquez's story, the author creates a very easy-to-relate-to plot, a well-written, and highly crafted -- and yet in one sense an unbelievable -- narrative. But all of a sudden this smooth flowing story becomes infused with some magic as an angel falls to Earth in a very violent rainstorm. Angels are not real, the reader may have been thinking throughout his or her life; angels are found in the Bible, in literature, or in movies like "City of Angels" or "Meet Joe Black" or even "It's a Wonderful Life. But nevertheless in Marquez's story an angel appears and while the angel provides help for a family that is very poor and is steeped in pain from a son who is dying, the family becomes all too human and greedy and tries to take advantage of this miracle.

The reader encounters a miracle when the old man arrives, and Marquez describes him as perfectly natural, so natural that the reader is invited to believe that a "…flesh-and-blood angel" could arrive to help a struggling family. People viewing this character had various explanations, which allowed Marquez to provide some human characterizations to help the contrast between the real and the supernatural. The "simplest" people that viewed the angel figured he should be named "mayor of the world," an absurd idea but it helps describe human simplicity. Other people who had "sterner" minds (but were obviously rather narrow in their focus) had the idea that the angel should become a "five-star general" so wars could be won.

That is an ironic thought -- and shows what could be thought of as flaws in Marquez's characters -- because angels have in literature and in spiritual contexts represented peaceful ideas, not ideas infused with violence. Even the parish priest is shown through the plot and the characterization strategies of Marquez to be shallow in thinking. Why would an angel that just dropped in from on high speak the same language as a priest? Why would an angel automatically be an imposter because he doesn't speak the language of a priest?

Meanwhile Marquez's style is to not only allow the reader to see what this old man with wings looks like (including his "few faded hairs left on his bald skull" and the parasites that were to be seen in his soiled feathers), and how others see him (like a "huge decrepit hen among the fascinated chickens"), but he makes sure we can smell the old man with wings. The old man had "…an unbearable smell of the outdoors," which, while not specific, offers enough information to imaging that the angel didn't smell fresh as a daisy.

The descriptiveness and clever use of comparison by Marquez helps the reader become fully engaged with this interesting specimen that came down from the sky in a storm. For example, a traveling carnival showed up with a "flying acrobat who buzzed over the crowd several times." But even though that would seem to draw attention to the crowd that was gathering, no such thing happened. Why? His wings weren't like an angel but rather they were like a bat's wings.

That contrast is another example of the strange juxtaposition of characters in this story; a bat symbolizes fear and danger and the unknown, so why would a bat be flying over an area where an angel (ragged though he was) was drying wings? And why would a Portuguese man who had trouble sleeping because of the "noise of the stars" kept him awake come to the angel in hopes of a cure? And invalids, what do they hope to gain? Why would the author refer to ridiculous things like a sleepwalker undoing what he had done while awake -- and then alluded to those absurdities as "serious ailments"?

The answer to those questions lies in the fact of Marquez's use of magic reality. People showed up in such great numbers that bayoneted soldiers needed to be there to protect the angel? This is farcical and yet interesting simply because this mixture of weird imagery with different attitudes and reasons for being there "…serves to heighten the reader's uncertainty" (Faulkner, 1968). Magic is hiding around every corner of this story, and it seems to pop out at the reader at any given time, like a jack-in-the-box when a little boy is turning the crack but not knowing when the box will explode open with the jack.

Readers who are looking for realism in this story, or for "logical explanations," they will only find frustration, Faulkner explains in the peer-reviewed Gale Online Encyclopedia. In fact, if a reader is trying to choose between reality and magic, he or she will be disappointed because magic realism is a blend, and readers must expect to get both realism and magic because to expect otherwise is to miss the point. Readers just need to let themselves to and enjoy the story.

What is the lesson the author is trying to present? Is there a lesson? Certainly no author simply writes a tale interspersing magic -- that can be smelly, gross, embrace greed and poor human behaviors -- into the narrative without a point. The mood that is established is part farcical, part magical, and part mind-numbing. Charging money for people to see (and perhaps be healed) by this sad old man is outrageous, but it speaks to the greed that humans are known to display. Having a priest show no genuine compassion for a stranger with wings could be Marquez's way of criticizing the Catholic Church, or organized religion per se.