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3.71 AVERAGE
3.71 AVERAGE
adventurous
emotional
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
An absolute masterpiece of Latin American literature and literature in general. Exceptional in every aspect and perfectly showcases the genius of Gabriel García Márquez. The portrayal of obsessive love that spans decades is both beautiful and haunting. However, I was deeply disturbed by the relationship between the elderly protagonist and a 14-year-old girl. It’s definitely uncomfortable and problematic, though I understand it reflects a different historical context. Despite this troubling element, it remains a masterpiece and one of the best books I’ve ever read.
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
The writing is beautiful. I loved the descriptive scenery. The characters in this book don't make a lot of sense but for some reason it still works.
adventurous
emotional
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I thought the writing was exceptional! Some of the best writing I’ve read! But the books drags on a bit too long and hearing about all the women this man fucks becomes tiring once he starts an affair with a 14 year old at the age of 70 something. That was rough. I feel like this book would be perfect if it was edited down a bit. I enjoyed his visceral description of aging. I’ve never experienced being 80 but I felt the limitations with them
Content Warnings
Graphic: Adult/minor relationship, Drug use, Infidelity, Sexual violence, Suicide, Pandemic/Epidemic
challenging
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I have never hated a novel more than this one. I love 100 Years of Solitude but was so disappointed with this book. It's supposed to be a romance, but there's nothing romantic about it. Obsession is not love, and that's what's going on here. Most of the characters are too irredeemable to even care about. I'm just glad I'm finished with this book.
challenging
dark
reflective
slow-paced
Loveable characters:
No
ummm… so I was really excited to read a Marquez book… but I think when people say another one is better I should just listen lol.
the writing is the only thing that saved the book for me, the story and characters fell a bit flat for me. it was basically a stalker story, then he pulls up claiming to have saved himself for her for years while having 622 affairs with other women…
the writing is the only thing that saved the book for me, the story and characters fell a bit flat for me. it was basically a stalker story, then he pulls up claiming to have saved himself for her for years while having 622 affairs with other women…
wiele gwałtów, przekroczonych granic, obsesja i pedofilia a to wszystko chowane (jak zwykle) za maską namiętności - ale w wydaniu Marqueza ja to kupuję
I won’t disparage this time-honored classic, but I do think it’s interesting to think about how the fact that a book or an author has been so celebrated really does affect the way I read. Marquez’s recent death (April of this year) has especially renewed attention to the great author. But I also completely understand why other Latin American authors would turn away from magical realism and from the narrative style that made Latin American literature so famous. It’s a little bit of a stereotype. In fact, while reading, I sometimes felt like I was reading a Wes Anderson film.
It actually made it a little difficult for me to think about this novel in terms of its novelistic qualities. At times, yes, I wondered about the narrative voice – the magical all-seeing, all-perceiving narrator who dips into every mind and every time – and I do love the lyrical quality of the language, but I couldn’t quite delve much deeper. For instance, when trying to talk about the men in Love in the Time of Cholera, I realized that I was about to generalize “men in Latin American literature,” even though other writers have written deeply complex portraits of many different kinds of men. Carlos Fuentes’ The Death of Artemio Cruz will always be the model of astounding, breathtaking literary skill for me.
So what I try to think about instead, to avoid that generalizing tendency, is what Latin American literature is, and how Marquez and this book speak to that question. The classic debate over authenticity in the postcolonial world, the one interrogated in Roberto Fernández Retamar’s essay “Caliban: Notes towards a discussion of culture in our America”(summary available here). Love in the Time of Cholera is set in the Caribbean, in a postcolonial period, with civil war looming in the background, and the memory of health epidemics and their resulting public developments still lingering, reminiscent of 19th-century European cities and emphasizing the poverty and Third-Worldness of the text. And yet the characters seem to hang in the balance between clutching an upper class identity and recognizing their coloniality – recall Dr. Juvenal Urbino, upon his return from Paris.
It actually made it a little difficult for me to think about this novel in terms of its novelistic qualities. At times, yes, I wondered about the narrative voice – the magical all-seeing, all-perceiving narrator who dips into every mind and every time – and I do love the lyrical quality of the language, but I couldn’t quite delve much deeper. For instance, when trying to talk about the men in Love in the Time of Cholera, I realized that I was about to generalize “men in Latin American literature,” even though other writers have written deeply complex portraits of many different kinds of men. Carlos Fuentes’ The Death of Artemio Cruz will always be the model of astounding, breathtaking literary skill for me.
So what I try to think about instead, to avoid that generalizing tendency, is what Latin American literature is, and how Marquez and this book speak to that question. The classic debate over authenticity in the postcolonial world, the one interrogated in Roberto Fernández Retamar’s essay “Caliban: Notes towards a discussion of culture in our America”(summary available here). Love in the Time of Cholera is set in the Caribbean, in a postcolonial period, with civil war looming in the background, and the memory of health epidemics and their resulting public developments still lingering, reminiscent of 19th-century European cities and emphasizing the poverty and Third-Worldness of the text. And yet the characters seem to hang in the balance between clutching an upper class identity and recognizing their coloniality – recall Dr. Juvenal Urbino, upon his return from Paris.
reflective
sad
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
medium-paced
A fiction read that encapsulates the turn of the century (late 1800s to early 1900s) thru the story of Florentino Aziza and Fermina Daza. I very much enjoyed the historic elements infused in this book and the period felt real to me: Cholera, the mention of The Wager!, and other references. The book has an epic feel with a hint of the fantastical. I loved how the characters were referenced by their full names. I think Garcia Marquez is also exploring the many facets of love that can happen throughout one's life, but it fails with that on several counts, particularly as it relates to consent (an issue at various points!), stalking, and grooming. The book is also blatantly racist. I have always thought of this as a classic must-read and Garcia Marquez definitely knows how to tell a story, but it is good to approach this tale with a skeptical eye. I read half audiobook half paper, and while the audiobook was good there were no section breaks in it and it's like a 16-hour book!
Banned Books: https://mlcref.blogspot.com/2010/10/banned-books-week-in-time-of-cholera.html?m=1
Banned Books: https://mlcref.blogspot.com/2010/10/banned-books-week-in-time-of-cholera.html?m=1
