Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Gabriel Gбrcia Mбrquez

Gabriel Josй Garcнa Mбrquez was born on March 6, 1928 in Aracataca, a town in Northern Colombia, where he was raised by his maternal grandparents in a house filled with countless aunts and the rumors of ghosts. But in order to get a better grasp on Garcнa Mбrquez's life, it helps to understand something first about both the history of Colombia and the unusual background of his family.

Colombia

Colombia won its independence from Spain in 1810, technically making it one of Latin America's oldest democracies, but the sad fact is that this "democracy" has rarely known peace and justice.

In the beginning, there was of course Spain and the Indians, happily hating each other as the Spaniards tore the land up in quest for gold, El Dorado, religious converts, and political power. The English, too, played their part, with Drake attacking Riohachi in 1568 and the countless colonial squabbles of the next few centuries. Declaring itself independent from Spain when Napoleon ousted the Spanish King in 1810, the new country experienced a brief period of freedom and then was quickly reconquered in 1815 by the unpleasant and bloody campaigns of General Murillo. So much did their internal bickering allow their fledgling country to fall to the sword of Murillo, the period is immortalized in Colombia's history with the colorful name of la Patria Boba, or "The Booby Fatherland." Round two, however, fell to the Colombians, when Simуn Bolнvar reliberated the country in 1820 and became its very first president. In 1849, the country was sufficiently advanced enough to concretize their squabbling in the form of two political parties, the Liberals and the Conservatives, who exist to this day. These two parties form the political framework for much of Garcнa Mбrquez's fiction, and understanding their true natures is both a key to his writing and, unfortunately, an important insight to Latin American politics in general.

Although initially forming around the nucleus of two distinct and different ideologies, long years of bloody conflict have served to significantly erode the distinctions between the parties. The Conservatives and the Liberals are more like warring factions or clans than any parties with firmly established and radically different ideologies. Both tend to be repressive, both are corrupt, and both terribly abuse power when it falls into their hands; and throughout the sad history of Colombia, both parties have been more or less at war. It has often been said of Colombia's parties that you do not join them, you are born into them; and indeed they act more as territorial and familial units than as peacefully functioning parties with distinct political platforms. In addition, the country is split into two main regional groups -- the costeсos of the coastal Caribbean, and the cachacos of the central highland. Both groups use those terms as pejorative of the other, and both view the other with disdain. The costeсos tend to be more racially mixed, verbally outgoing, and superstitious. They are primarily the "descendants of pirates and smugglers, with a mixture of black slaves," and as a whole are "dancers, adventurers, people full of gaiety." The cachacos, on the other hand, are more formal, aristocratic, and racially pure, who pride themselves on their advanced cities such as Bogotб and on their ability to speak excellent Spanish. Traditionally, the tropical Caribbean coast has been a Liberal bastion, and the cool mountains and valleys of the interior tend to the Conservative side. Garcнa Mбrquez has often remarked that he views himself as a mestizo and a costeсo, both characteristics enabling his formation and development as a writer.

Throughout the nineteenth century, Colombia was wracked by rebellions, civil wars of both the local and national variety, and several coups d'etat.This century of bloodshed had its culmination in 1899, when the War of a Thousand Days began -- Colombia's most devastating civil war, a conflict that ended in late 1902 with the defeat of the Liberals. The war claimed the lives of over 100,000 people, primarily peasants and their sons. Garcнa Mбrquez's grandfather fought in that war, and many of its veterans would eventually find their way into immortalization as fictional characters in his work.

Another event that would influence his work was the prevalence banana industry and the massacre of 1928. Although coffee is generally considered Colombia's main export, for the first few decades of the twentieth century, bananas were also of crucial importance to the economy. The banana trade had its principle manifestation in the United Fruit Company, an American outfit that had a virtual monopoly on the banana industry, which at the time was the only source of income for many of the costeсo areas, including Aracataca. The UFC had unlimited economic power and tremendous political clout, but it was a corrupt and amoral company that abused its Colombian workers terribly. In October of 1928, over 32,000 native workers went on strike, demanding, among other such unreasonable things, toilets and payment in cash rather than company scrip. One night a huge crowd of them gathered to hold a demonstration. In order to quell the incident, the Conservative government sent in the troops, which fired on the unarmed workers, killing hundreds. Over the next few months, more people simply vanished, and finally the whole incident was official denied and struck from the history books. Garcнa Mбrquez would later incorporate the incident in One Hundred Years of Solitude.

The next significant event that would eventually affect his writing was a period of time that he himself would live through, a horrible period of time called la violencia, or "the Violence." The Violence has its roots in the banana massacre. At that time, one of the only politicians courageous enough to take a stand against government corruption was a man named Jorge Eliйcer Gaitбn, a young Liberal member of congress who convened meetings to investigate the incident. Gaitбn began to rise in prominence, a champion of the peasants and the poor, but an annoyance to the powerful members of both parties, who viewed him with something akin to fear and loathing. Using radio as his medium, he heralded a time of change, a time when the people would take part in a true democracy and corporations would be forced to act responsibly. By 1946, Gaitбn was powerful enough to cause a split in his own