One Hundred Years of Solitude is a book written by Gabriel García Márquez, first published in nineteen sixty seven. Gabriel was born March sixth, nineteen twenty seven in Aracataca, Colombia. He is a famous novelist who has written many acclaimed books such as Love in the Time of Cholera, The Autumn of the Patriarch, and of course, One Hundred Years of Solitude. His literary style of his books has been labeled as magic realism, using magical elements in a realistic situations. His life greatly influenced One Hundred Years of Solitude. Macondo, the fictional city which the book focuses on, is based off his birthplace of Aracataca in Colombia. Many events Gabriel experienced during his lifetime mirrored in the story, such as the Banana Massacre he experienced, or his Grandmother’s stories. Over the course of Gabriel’s life his renowned books earned him many awards, and even the Nobel prize for literature. However, on April seventeenth, two thousand fourteen, he passed away from pneumonia in conjunction with cancer that was deleterious to his health. In One Hundred Years of Solitude, Gabriel implemented a couple recurrent themes in the book. The first is that time is just a cycle that repeats itself. This theme is reinforced by the dismissed suspicion of Ursula before her death. “…time was not passing… it was turning in a circle” (335) Throughout the story, the many generations of the Buendia family have recurrent names, using variations of Jose, Arcadio, Aureliano, or other family names. These names are accompanied by personalities similar to to their kinsman. Events also seem to be caught up in this cycle whether by coincidence or by a mystical force, it’s unknown. An early member of the Buendia family will do something that a century later will happen again by an offspring of their offspring, and so forth. Another significant theme is solitude, hence the title. Gabriel delves into the personalities of the many characters of the Buendia family tree. He explores their journey through their life, oddly somehow or another ending in solitude. Whether enlightening to them, or quite the contrary, solitude has a recurring attraction to members of their family. Quoted by Melquiades, He really had been through death, but he had returned because he could not bear the solitude. (316)

The story fixates on the multitude of the Buendia family, and it dives into their beginning in the newly founded town Macondo. The story begins with Jose Arcadio Buendia, and his wife Ursula Buendia. It goes into detail about the rigorous expedition to find the sea where they would found Macondo, but instead give up to build near swamps. The couple has children, Jose Arcadio, Amaranta, and Aureliano. The many other founders and there descendants intertwine with the family’s lives such as Pilar, Gerineldo, Pietro, and many others. Jose Arcadio leaves during adolescence; however, Amaranta and Aureliano reside in the home through their childhood. Later, Aureliano goes to war; Jose Arcadio returns as a seasoned sailor. The war is a significant subject of a large portion of the book. Aureliano earns the title which with he bears to the grave, Colonel Aureliano Buendia and fights for the Liberal side for what was originally his beliefs, which had the hidden motive of pride. This war lasts for more than thirty years. Over this time the family exponentially grows into many more generations, with them mingling with mistresses, and then their kids having kids. Gabriel brings you into an empathetic perspective of the characters seeing their story through the mind of themselves. It details their personal endeavors and battles they fight in their own thoughts. Ridden with joy, sorrow, disappointment, abandonment and a plethora of unexpected emotions the character feels, until their death. Each character has a place in the timeline of the Buendia, and Macondo itself. The story is filled with foreshadowing, and the story later backtracks to these moments leaving you uttering an “AHhh…” The book goes deeply into the timeline of Macondo, starting with the prospering community as it is founded, to it’s flourishing population at the height of it’s growth, to the final desolation of once great city. 

Overall I think the book is spectacular. Gabriel Garcia Marquez did a wonderful job writing the book. Exceptionally manipulating the third person omniscient point of view to tell the tale of a fictional city rich with history and it’s inhabitants. Gabriel describes everything with an intricate magnitude of vocabulary, submersing you in the character’s lives. While the repetition of names does become confusing at some points of the story, it plays well into the theme of the cycle of time repeating itself. While the story was monotonous sometimes, it fluctuated to being more exciting. The book captures a thought-provoking view on the morbid melancholy with which all the characters end with, lives that are just pieces of a bigger picture. The book truly portrays a unique experience that would be valuable to any reader. In conclusion, I would certainly recommend this book to any diligent reader of all ages. The tale of Macondo provides realistic situations and events, while giving them an interesting twist of magic in it.