One Hundred Years of Solitude

¶ … Solitude

Gabriel Garcia Marquez's novel titled "One Hundred Years of Solitude" is recognized as a modern classic with an insightful and relevant message. Yet, the message is not simple to understand and not easy to define. This is largely because it questions the nature of society and the people in society. It challenges people to look at themselves, human nature, and society in a new way. This is a difficult task, but one that Garcia Marquez succeeds at. This will now be investigated further by focusing on the events of the novel, the meaning of the novel, and the final message.

One Hundred Years of Solitude cannot be understood by analyzing the plot. Its style and structure is not driven by plot like many novels. Instead, it takes a wider approach and focuses on the life of a family and a town. It can be considered as the story of the town Macondo. It can also be considered as the story of the people who founded the town, the Buendias. The novel begins with the formation of town, as Jose Arcadio and Ursula found the town. The town continues to grow and remains largely isolated from the outside world. Later, the town comes into contact with others in the region. This leads to civil war and the once peaceful town is forced to change. Colonel Buendia becomes leader and war continues. The civil war eventually ends and a peace treaty is signed. Different problems reach the town as a banana plantation is established. This represents a new kind of link with the outside world. While the links with neighboring towns was chosen to be done by the people of Macondo, the banana plantation is forced upon them. The Americans that own the plantation enter the town and live in their own fenced-off section. At the same time, the people of Macondo and the land are explotied for the benefit of the Americans. This eventually leads to an uprising of sorts from the workers, who decide to go on strike. Thousands of people are massacred and their bodies are disposed of by putting them in the sea. This leads to five years of rain and the resulting flood destroys the city of Macondo and most of its people. Only a few members of the Buendia family remain. Aureliano and Amaranta Ursula, who are related, parent a child. This child is born with a pig's tail, something that the founders of the town always feared would happen to them. Amaranta Ursula dies during the birth, while Aureliano wanders the town trying to come to terms with what has happened. By the time he realizes he has left the child alone, it is too late. He finds the child beginning to be eaten by ants. Ths reminds him of Melquiades' parchment and he ignores the child and rushes to the study to read the parchment. Aureliano reads the history of the family, as a cyclone begins to destroy the house. In the final line, of the parchment he reads about himself reading the parchment while Macondo is destroyed by a cyclone and forgotten. This final ending reveals that the life of the village and the Buendias has always been known. The Buendias were fated to their tragic lives. The story of the town and of the Buendias family is one of tragedy. To understand the meaning of the novel, it is necessary to look more deeply into what the story of the Buendias means.

As noted, the novel is not one that can be understood in terms of plot. It is not focused on a central character. Instead, it is focused on the story of an entire town and its people. This places the novel as having meaning politically and socially. Essentially, it can be considered as the story of a society. As one author notes, it is not just the story of any society, but the story of Latin America:

... The story of the Buendia family is obviously a metaphor for the history of the continent since Independence, that is, for the neocolonial period. More than that, though, it is also, I believe, a narrative about the myths of Latin American history (Martin 97).

It is about how a society changes from a self-contained society, to linking with its neighbors, to being inhabited by outsiders. There are also internal changes in the structure of the society, where it alters from a democracy to being heavily ruled by Colonel Aureliano Buendia. Most important though, might be the fact that no single political state is suggested as being the preferred one. Instead, all of the political features of society are contained in the novel. One author notes that the novel appeals to all ideologies,

... leftists like its dealing with social struggles and its portraits of imperialism; conservatives are heartened by the corruption and/or failure of those struggles and with the sustaining role of the family; nihilists and quietists find their pessimism reconfirmed; and the apolitical hedonists find solace in all the sex and swashbuckling (Bell-Villada 93).

If the novel is understood as the story of a town and in a larger sense, a story of society, it makes sense that the novel would contain all of the elements of society. It certainly does this as it has periods of growth and prosperity, periods of war and civil strife, periods of progress, and periods of decline. The politics also deals with liberals, conservartives, democary, imperialism, and capitalism. Yet in the end, there does not seem to be any specific point made about any of these political ideas. With the ending of the novel where the town is destroyed and it is revealed that this was fated, it seems that Garcia Marquez is showing that none of the politics matter. Regardless of the politics or the stages of society, or how people try to control their society, it comes down to the people. Essentially, there is nothing the people of Macondo could have done to save their fate. They have flaws and it is these flaws that destroy them, regardless of the systems that become part of their world.

This leads to a consideration of the flaws of the people, with their major flaw being that they are not capable of learning from the past. The people of Macondo largely seem to want to forget their pasts and often do. Memory for them is often a burden and one that they want to be free of. Colonel Aureliano Buendia is a good example because he becomes a man with almost no memory. This causes him to live in a repeating pattern where he makes twenty-five golden fish and then melts down the metal to make 25 more. This pattern is repetitive, endless, and useless. The message seems to be that you have to remember to move forward. Otherwise, you will just move in a repeating circle, never move forward, and never overcome anything. Importantly, this contributes to the overall story of Macondo because their path is also cyclic. Just like Colonel Aureliano Buendia makes the fish, the town builds itself up, and just like he destroys the fish to make more, the town also destroys itself. It can be imagined that the town would later be rebuilt and that the cycle would repeat all over again. The main message is that if you don't recognize and learn from your mistakes, you can never escape from the cycle and progress forward. It is also important that the people of Macondo have no memory of Colonel Aureliano Buendia. This suggests that people are ignorant of the past and that this is part of their downfall. At the same time, other characters become so caught up in memory that they cannot see the present. Rebeca is a good example, where she becomes consumed by memory after her husband's death. She locks herself in her house and does nothing but remember him. She effectively becomes separated from the present world. In doing so, she is no more capable of learning from the past than Colonel Aureliano Buendia, who is trapped in the present. This illustrates how a balance needs to be found where one recalls the past, but lives enough in the present that one can move forward. Another example of forgetting occurs after the massacre of the workers from the banana factory. Just one night after this event, the people of the town cannot remember it. This suggests that part of their forgetting is a process of denial. They have chosen to live in denial about this event and they willfully forget it. This releases a burden for them, since it would be a difficult memory to accept and live with. However, this achieves nothing for the people of Macondo because as long as they cannot remember the event, they cannot learn from it. Denial is used as way for them to reduce their pain, but in effect this only causes them to create more pain since it means they are doomed to repeat the same mistake. This sends a message about recognizing the worst events and the worst flaws, facing them, and using them to move forward.

The next important point to consider is that while we are looking at the actions of the people of Macondo as a whole, they are each driven by their own needs. This establishes that the problems of society are not based on the broad decisions, but on individual people. It was noted earlier that the town of Macondo has various forms of government and that none of them make a difference. This is true because the fate of Macondo depends on the individual people of the town, not on some system that attempts to govern the town as a whole. Put simply, it doesn't matter what government is placed on top of Macondo to try and define it as a whole. As long as the people cannot learn from their own mistakes, the people cannot move forward and overcome their problems. In this way, the problem lies at the heart of the people. Garcia Marquez expresses this point in part by the way that the story of the town often seems like a story of two people. The people repeat in names from one generation to the next, linking the people to those that came before them. It is noted that the town begins when Ursula Iguaran and Jose Arcadio Buendia have a child. At this time, they fear that they will have a child with a pig's tail because they are cousins. One hundred years later, the novel ends after Aureliano and Amaranta Ursula parent a child. Aureliano and Amaranta Ursula are related and their child is born with a pig's tail. This fulfils the prophecy and links the birth of the town to the death of the town. Most importantly, it suggests that after one hundred years, the people have learned nothing. Aureliano and Amaranta Ursula make the same incestuous mistake that Ursula Iguaran and Jose Arcadio Buendia made. Clearly, nothing has been learned from the events of the past. It is also noted that it is at this point that the society spirals into complete downfall. This suggests a message of warning, where Garcia Marquez seems to be saying that if we do not admit to our past mistakes, our lives will spiral into destruction. This aspect of the novel also shows that the destruction of the society does not depend on the systems that govern it. Instead, it depends on individual people. Ursula Iguaran and Jose Arcadio Buendia had a choice and they made the wrong one. In doing this, they sealed their tragic fate. However, this ending also illustrates that it is people that have the power to change things. If Ursula Iguaran and Jose Arcadio Buendia had of been able to consider the past, learn from it, and make a better decision, they might have saved themselves and their society. In this way, the story is both one of tragedy, but also one of hope by showing that people have the power to change their fates.

The link of the start of the novel to the end also suggests a circular process where everything ends at the same point it began. In this, Garcia Marquez seems to be showing how life is circular and endlessly repeats. One issue that confuses this is combining the idea that time moves in a linear fashion and the idea that life repeats itself. Throughout the novel, one event leads to another and Garcia Marquez presents the events in the order at which they occur. In time then, there is a period of one hundred years between the start of the novel and the end. How is it that time passes and yet everything ends up in the same place it started? This can be understood by focusing on how people respond to events and who people are, rather than what is happening to them. The actual events are occurring in time and do not repeat in time, but the people exist in a cycle. It is noted that as time passes in Macondo, the people are met with challenges as their society changes. Most importantly, there are few changes that the people bring upon themselves. The formation of the town is not even a definite decision, but more a product of circumstance, as Buendia leaves behind the old world and just happens to stop at a certain point. This point then becomes the new town. The major events that change the town are also not controlled by the people of the town. They do not initiate contact with surrounding areas, but are contacted by them. They do not initiate the civil war, but circumstances force them into war. They do not seek out opportunities and start a banana factory, but instead it is forced upon them and their town. In this way, the events of the town and its people are not chosen by them, but just come to be part of their lives. These linear events can be considered as their history. However, while it defines what happens, it does not define who they are and how they respond. This explains how the novel can be both linear and circular. The next important point is that the circular events are a result of the people and are not forced upon them. Considering the banana factory and the resulting massacre is a good example of this. In a linear sense, the events can be understood in a timeline. The banana factory arrives in the town. The people are exploited and forced to work there. The people react and go on strike. The people are massacred. These events occur in a series and represent moving forward. If the impact on the people is considered, the linear events become less important and it becomes more important how the respond to it. In short, the people respond to this chain of events by forgetting about it. In doing so, the linear events become erased and the people are no different than they were before the events happened. If the actual events and the changes in the people were graphed, the actual events would show a line from A to B. To C. To D. The changes in the people would show a similar line from A to B. To C. To D, but then a return to before point A. This shows how the actual events and the meaning of the events are two different things. It has also been noted that the actual events were not chosen by the people of Macondo. Instead, they can only choose how they respond to the events. This means that they choose to move in their circular path. The world moves on as events continue. It is the people that choose to remain on a circular path and repeat the mistakes of the past. One again though, while it is a tragic novel, it also seems to have a message of hope. Garcia Marquez seems to be showing people the mistakes they are making and how they cause their own downfall. Most importantly, the events are not what defines the outcome, the outcome lies in how people respond. This puts the power into the hands of people to make a choice to break free of the cycles and move forward. In this way, the novel can be considered as a positive message attempting to enlighten people and push them to change.

Another major issue worth considering is the importance of solitude. Solitude is in the title of the work and mentioned consistently throughout the novel. What does the idea of solitude mean in terms of the novel? It is partly about people giving into problems and escaping by withdrawing into themselves. This begins with the founder of the society, Jose Arcadio Buendia. He initially is determined to achieve something, as seen where he tries to understand science so he can free the people from their belief in magic. However, while he is intelligent, he does not have the tools to achieve this and his mission does not succeed. In response, he gives up completely and states, "We'll rot our lives away here without the benefits of science" (Garcia Marquez 19). He withdraws into himself, gives up on his hope, and never shares the knowledge he did gain in his explorations. In doing so, he is giving up the dream and the possibilty for the entire society. Williamson (49) notes that this decision "condemns the Buendias to a life without science." This state of withdrawal is a state of solitude, where he becomes cut off from society. He essentially confines both his thoughts, his dreams, and his knowledge, to his own mind. And as long as he remains in this solitary state, he cannot pass on his knowledge to anyone else. It was noted earlier that the people of Macondo often choose to forget the past and that this has them moving in endless circles. This example of solitude also shows how the people of the past can prevent future people from having access to the past. In this way, solitude robs people of having the ability to move forward. Jose Arcadio Buendia's solitude leads to his madness, where his reality becomes one based on a fantasy world, rather than the real world. In his tragic death, he is tied to a tree and left to die as described by Garcia Marquez,

Ten men were needed to get him down, fourteen to tie him up, twenty to drag him to the chestnut tree in the courtyard, where they left him tied up, barking in the strange language and giving off a green froth at the mouth (Garcia Marquez 81).

One of the important points about this passage is the reference to Jose Arcadio Buendia barking in a strange language. This emphasizes his solitude by showing that he is not even capable of communicating. He has become a foreign part of his society and doesn't even seem to be recognized as human anymore, but is treated more like an animal. This emphasizes how solitude has cut him off from others completely. This process of being determined while young, failing, and eventually withdrawing into solitude, is not unique to Jose Arcadio Buendia. Many of the men in the novel follow a similar pattern, including Colonel Aureliano Buendia, whose solitude involves focusing entirely on making gold fishes, melting them down, and making them again. Not only has Colonel Aureliano Buendia resigned himself to solitude and forced the cycle to repeat, but he also seems to recognize the cycle through repeating his actions with the gold fishes. Jose Arcadio Segundo shares a similar fate. He leads the workers in the strike against the banana company and is the only survivor of the massacre. He initially tries to achieve something by persuading everyone that the massacre did occur. However, similar to Jose Arcadio Buendia, he finds the task to hard and gives up. He also withdraws into solitude and focuses on deciphering the old prophecies. It was noted previously that the people forgetting the massacre is significant because it means that despite significant events happening, it means that they return to the same point. They do not change, learn, or develop in a way that could improve their future. As the only survivor of the massacre, Jose Arcadio Segundo is important to preserving its memory. However, rather than continue to fight to have the people learn the story, he escapes into the past by concentrating on the old prophecies. This action means that there is no hope for the people to learn from the past. This shows how the cycle is partly because people choose to forget and partly because people of the past hold the truth but do not pass it on to future generations. This shows the damaging nature of solitude and how it is partly the cause of the tragic cycle seen. In short, solitude is a way by which one generation becomes separated from the next. Returning again to the idea that events move in a linear fashion, it can be observed that one event leads to the next, which leads to the next, which leads to the next. Solitude prevents this same linear pattern occurring for the development of people because one generation does not lead to the next in terms of knowledge and understanding. There is a gap between one generation and the next and this results in the next generation starting at the same point as the previous one instead of moving forward.