Religion and magical realism in One Hundred Years of Solitude

¶ … Solitude

The theme of religion in One Hundred Years of Solitude

The words 'solitude' and 'solitary' appear frequently throughout this novel. Both words are often associated with religion and religious experiences. For instance, in the Christian faith, Jesus spends forty days and nights in solitude in the desert. The meaning and significance of 'solitude' in this context is to separate oneself from the mundane world and to communicate with one's God.

Spiritual solitude is also linked to mystical and transformational experiences. In this sense, the concept of solitude as a process of spiritual meditation will be applied to the novel. One Hundred Years of Solitude is in essence a book about the origins and demise of the town of Macondo. In a very real sense the novel deals with the isolation or solitude of the settlement of Macondo and describes the lives and progress of the families and individuals in the town.

There are many themes that run throughout this complex and intriguing novel. The theme of religion and its relevance to the important theme of magical realism will be discussed in this paper,

2. The critique of conventional religion

The book is filled with images and scenarios that evoke wonder and mystery. Miraculous events take place in the daily lives of the people of Macondo. These astounding feats of alchemy include levitation and the return from the dead. There are also dark and strange mysteries that form an integral part of the daily life of the town. One for the central aspects of the novel is that it makes the reader aware of the strangeness of ordinary life. This refers to the combination of magic and realism that is a central characteristic of this type of fiction.

The central point being made in the novel is that the world is filled with wonder and mystery, and that the religious or spiritual is intertwined and intermixed with the mundaneity of everyday life in Macondo. The atmosphere in the town is alive with unseen living presences and forces everywhere. For example, objects that are normally inert and not considered to be alive are filled with their own sense of life and being. This refers particularly to the animistic belief in the forces and energy that exist in all objects and entities. As one critic notes;

Gabriel Garcia Marquez's One Hundred Years of .Solitude provides 'perhaps the simplest and most effective statement of the core idea of animist belief. This is the moment when the gypsy artist Melquiades drags two metal ingots from house to house, attracting all kinds of metallic objects to follow him. 'Things have a life of their own,' the gypsy proclaimed with a harsh accent. 'It's simply a matter of waking up their souls'.

(Harvey, 25)

Therefore, the book refers essentially to an older form of religious belief that believes that all objects are alive and that there is a close link between the natural and the supernatural and between the religious and the mundane. The world of Macondo, filled with wonder and mystery, is however sharply contrasted with the rigidity and formality of conventional religion. In fact, the novel satirizes and ridicules the major conventional religions of Latin America. For example, we see this aspect in the character of Fernanda del Carpio, who represents the formality and rigidity of extreme Catholicism in his introduction of harsh religious practices. As one critic notes;

Fray Pedro and Padre Nicanor each conscript labor from the populace in order to build large church buildings; and both impose new moral restrictions on the people, as Padre Nicanor tries to force the people of Macondo into the heavy ritualism of Catholicism.

(Johnson)

Throughout the book we encounter characters that make us skeptical of conventional or organized religion; for example, two of the main characters in the novel, Aureliano Segundo and Jose Arcadio Buendia, do not follow the dictates or dogma of conventional or formal religion. They in fact mock the local priests. There is also the suggestion in the novel that the town of Macondo was a much more open and better place before the arrival of formal religion.

In contrast to formal religion, the religious spirit that we encounter in One hundred Years of Solitude is one that is open to individual expression, freedom and a sense of delight in the mystery and wonder of both the natural and supernatural worlds. This religious ethos that pervades the book will be more fully explored in the following section.

4. Magical Realism

However, as has been suggested, the religious spirit that pervades the novel is not formal or conventional. It is rather characterized by the technique of magical realism that is central to the book and its meaning.

Magical realism is in essence a literary style in which the strange or magical events and insights are integrated with ordinary reality in such a way that a sense of a new reality is created. The term "magic realism" was coined by the German art critic Franz Roh in 1925 to describe "a magic insight into reality." (Johnston)

The entire novel and the description of Macondo is one where magic and reality combine and create an aura of the mysterious and magical, which in turn creates a sense of a different and perhaps more expressive and intense view of life. We see this at the start of the novel where Jose Arcadio shows an intense interest in strange sciences and particularly in alchemy. It is important to note that alchemy is essentially the art of physical and spiritual change or transformation. Many religious rites and ceremonies are specifically intended to transform the individual and to enlighten them spiritually. This is therefore linked to the theme of the spiritual or religious in the ordinary and to the creation of the particular atmosphere of the town of Macondo. As one critic notes, "There is something clearly magical about the world of Macondo; it is a state of mind as much as, or even more than, a real geographical place…" (Johnston)

5. Conclusion

In order to fully understand the religious element in this novel one firstly has to understand the meaning and function of magical realism in the book. This novel explores the foundations of religion and religious experience in an unconventional way through the use of the technique of magical realism. This style reduces the distance that we normally expect between the supernatural and the natural. In other words, the book explores the religious not as a dimension that is outside or beyond the human, but rather an intimate and integral part of human life and experience.

Therefore, we can conclude that the way this novel explores the area of religion and the spiritual is decidedly unconventional. It could also be argued that the view of religion in this book is more 'primitive' or vital and older than the formal and conventional religions of the modern world. This can be seen for example in the animistic universe that is created in the novel as well as other aspects that point to a understanding of religion that is based on the wonder and mystery of human experience, rather than on formal dogma or tradition.