PaperbackLanguage: English (Originally Spanish)
Author: Gabriel García Márquez
Translator: Gregory Rabassa
Orignally written in Spanish as Crónica de una muerte anunciada. It is a murder mystery that chronicles the last day of Santiago Nasser, a ranch owner. Almost everyone in the village knows Santiago Nasser is going to be murdered and the reasons surrounding it.
The story starts on a busy day with Nasser waking up from a dream of walking through a grove of timber trees, waiting for the bishop who is to visit his village and the Vicario brothers waiting to kill him. The story isn’t linear, meaning it doesn’t follow an order.
The narrative follows Santiago, it moves on to the marriage of Angela Vicario, the wedding celebrations, Angela’s bride discovering that she is not a virgin and sending her back, the Vicario twins blaming Santiago for defiling their sister and finally murdering him. While the reader gets a clear idea as to why the Vicario twins want Santiago murdered, what we don’t get is whether Santiago really defiled Angela.
The most impressive thing about this work is the way Márquez sketches his characters. Especially the key ones like Santiago, Bayardo, Angela, her family and more importantly her brothers. This novel is replete with symbolism and supernatural stuff.
Never a dull moment in this novel with superbly chiseled characters and a powerful narrative.
A straight SuperRead.
PS: This novel was also adapted as a Spanish language feature film with the same title in 1987 directed by Francesco Rosi
Have to remember this... will try and read it some day.
ReplyDelete@Sajan: Highly recommended !! Go for it...
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