Of Love and Other Demons
OF LOVE AND OTHER DEMONS (Gabriel García Márquez) - Three Stars
It is the sign of a good author, I think, when the ending to a story can be so obvious, so telegraphed, such a foregone conclusion and yet still pack a punch. Especially when the punch follows a more-or-less cliché "tragic love story" plot of a story that is only average.
Marquez is a good author, and despite its brevity Of Love and Other Demons makes an impression. It's a breezy read too, despite some serious subject matter, thanks both to its short duration (not quite 150 pages) and to Marquez's use of a "standard" prose style (the dizzying, run-on, magical realism style of One Hundred Years of Solitude is absent). Of Love... is a great story to become familiar with Marquez's florid, weighty use of language, and his fantastical imagination and skill at creating and populating ancient urban environments.
The problem is that Marquez approaches the story as if he's writing a 500+ page epic novel. Of Love... contains probably close to 40 characters, and probably 30 of them are on the fringes of being superfluous. The amount of time Marquez spends going into great detail about many of the characters is disproportionate to the role those characters play in the story. Indeed, the two main characters of the 141-page novella don't even meet each other until the end of page 81!
Of Love... makes some interesting commentary on the nature of disease, love, and religion; indeed, it even implies that those three are much closer to being the same thing than most people might admit. Indeed, by the end of the story one might wonder if Sierva Maria really was possessed, or rabid, or just love-struck mad.
It is the sign of a good author, I think, when the ending to a story can be so obvious, so telegraphed, such a foregone conclusion and yet still pack a punch. Especially when the punch follows a more-or-less cliché "tragic love story" plot of a story that is only average.
Marquez is a good author, and despite its brevity Of Love and Other Demons makes an impression. It's a breezy read too, despite some serious subject matter, thanks both to its short duration (not quite 150 pages) and to Marquez's use of a "standard" prose style (the dizzying, run-on, magical realism style of One Hundred Years of Solitude is absent). Of Love... is a great story to become familiar with Marquez's florid, weighty use of language, and his fantastical imagination and skill at creating and populating ancient urban environments.
The problem is that Marquez approaches the story as if he's writing a 500+ page epic novel. Of Love... contains probably close to 40 characters, and probably 30 of them are on the fringes of being superfluous. The amount of time Marquez spends going into great detail about many of the characters is disproportionate to the role those characters play in the story. Indeed, the two main characters of the 141-page novella don't even meet each other until the end of page 81!
Of Love... makes some interesting commentary on the nature of disease, love, and religion; indeed, it even implies that those three are much closer to being the same thing than most people might admit. Indeed, by the end of the story one might wonder if Sierva Maria really was possessed, or rabid, or just love-struck mad.
Abrenuncio understood. He had always thought that ceasing to believe caused a permanent scar in the place where one's faith had been, making it impossible to forget. What did seem inconceivable to him was subjecting one's child to the castigation of exorcism.
"There is not much difference between that and the witchcraft of blacks," he said. "In fact, it is even worse, because blacks only sacrifice roosters to their gods, while the Holy Office is happy to break innocents on the rack or burn them alive in a public spectacle."
posted by Kevin at 10:46 PM
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