cien años de soledad
i was extremely pleased to learn that oprah's current pick for her book club was one of the masterpieces of world literature: cien años de soledad (one hundred years of solitude) by gabriel garcía márquez, winner of the 1982 nobel prize in literature. amrican novelist william kennedy wrote that this work is «the first piece of literature since the book of genesis that should be required reading for the entire human race. it takes up not long after genesis left off and carries through to the air age, reporting on everything that happened in between with more lucidity, wit, wisdom, and poetry that is expected from 100 years of novelists, let alone one man...mr garcía márquez has done nothing less than to create in the reader a sense of all that is profound, meaningful, and meaningless in life.»non-fluent readers of spanish should only read edith grossman's translation and indeed count their blessings for hers is a masterpiece in its own right.
you may be interested in reading robert kiely's, real magic (the new york times) and edith grossman's on translation and garcía márquez, a speech delivered at the 2003 PEN tribute to gabriel garcía márquez, held in new york city, 05 november 2003.
note: jonathan bate once wrote in the sunday telegraph that one hundred years of solitude was unreadable trash for "urban intellectuals who feign reverence for the simple wisdom of peasants".
«things have a life of their own... it’s simply a matter of waking up their souls.» «and then they understood that josé arcadia buendía was not as crazy as the family said, but that he was the only one who had enough lucidity to sense the truth of the fact that time also stumbled and had accidents and could therefore splinter and leave an eternalized fragment in a room.» © gabriel garcía márquez, one hundred years of solitude
