Sharyl reviewed Living to Tell the Tale by Gabriel García Márquez
Review of 'Living to Tell the Tale' on 'Goodreads'
Most of this memoir was fascinating to me--for instance, the fact that Love in the Year of Cholera was based on the romance between the author's parents, and that the tragedy depicted in Chronicle of a Death Foretold was based on the real life story of someone Gabriel Garcia Marquez actually knew.
However, it is important, in understanding the origin of Garcia Marquez's tales, that he was cursed with living in interesting times; Gabo, as he was affectionately called, was a journalist and student during a period of violent and bloody political upheaval in his country, which he remembers in the kind of detail that was very hard for me to follow, since I possess absolutely no background knowledge of Columbia's history. This information certainly belongs in his memoir, since all of it affected his life very directly. Garcia Marquez's depiction of the violence that followed the assassination of a …
Most of this memoir was fascinating to me--for instance, the fact that Love in the Year of Cholera was based on the romance between the author's parents, and that the tragedy depicted in Chronicle of a Death Foretold was based on the real life story of someone Gabriel Garcia Marquez actually knew.
However, it is important, in understanding the origin of Garcia Marquez's tales, that he was cursed with living in interesting times; Gabo, as he was affectionately called, was a journalist and student during a period of violent and bloody political upheaval in his country, which he remembers in the kind of detail that was very hard for me to follow, since I possess absolutely no background knowledge of Columbia's history. This information certainly belongs in his memoir, since all of it affected his life very directly. Garcia Marquez's depiction of the violence that followed the assassination of a populist leader named Jorge Eliécer Gaitán in Bogota is especially shocking.
Garcia Marquez provides a loving portrait of his mother, as well as a colorful depiction of the culture in which he grew up. I would recommend this memoir for those personal touches, with the warning that some of the remembrances he presented here are harder to sift through. Overall, an intriguing read.
(I am now motivated to read Leaf Storm and In Evil Hour, by the way.)
