Memories of my melancholy whores - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
It was during a summer vacation that i came to know about Gabriel Garcia Marquez for the very first time in life. I was just 12 years old back then. A steaming coffee at his side, head resting on the raised portion of an old cane chair, Dad is busy reading "One hundred years of solitude" on an extremely hot Indian Summer afternoon. I tried to get the right pronunciation of author's name. He sensed my effort and read it out for me. He found my curiosity rising up and explained that Marquez is a Spanish writer and has got a line of good novels to his credit. One who writes in the literary style known as "magical realism". You should read, he said. Read and understand Marquez, but not now..you are too young for that. No one writes in the way Marquez does and that is exactly why it is magical, he took a sip from his coffee mug and smiled.
It took me 12 long years to finally get to Marquez and that feeling is inexplicable. Dad was right, no one writes like Marquez. Memories of my melancholy whores starts with the following sentence,
"The year i turned ninety, i wanted to give myself the gift of a night of wild love with an adolescent virgin."
The first sentence itself grips you down into the story and takes you away into a far away land and into the life of an old cable editor. He has never married,never loved, never been to bed with a woman he didn't pay and he feels young even at the age of ninety. He contacts the owner of an illicit house, Rosa Cabarcas in order to fulfill his birthday wish. Rosa mocks him saying" the only Virgos left in the world are people like you who were born in august". But yet she finds a girl. He calls her Delgadina..finds her sleeping each night he visits her. He never tries to disturb her sleep and watches her quietly. During these solitary hours his love for her deepens and reminds him of the loveless life he has led. His Sunday columns in the local newspaper details how he found love at the age of ninety.
Marquez is witty and extremely narrative. His magical procreation of words is mesmerizing and excellent. Marquez is not a subject of critics.
-Nisanth Thomas
(nisanththomas@gmail.com)
It was during a summer vacation that i came to know about Gabriel Garcia Marquez for the very first time in life. I was just 12 years old back then. A steaming coffee at his side, head resting on the raised portion of an old cane chair, Dad is busy reading "One hundred years of solitude" on an extremely hot Indian Summer afternoon. I tried to get the right pronunciation of author's name. He sensed my effort and read it out for me. He found my curiosity rising up and explained that Marquez is a Spanish writer and has got a line of good novels to his credit. One who writes in the literary style known as "magical realism". You should read, he said. Read and understand Marquez, but not now..you are too young for that. No one writes in the way Marquez does and that is exactly why it is magical, he took a sip from his coffee mug and smiled.
It took me 12 long years to finally get to Marquez and that feeling is inexplicable. Dad was right, no one writes like Marquez. Memories of my melancholy whores starts with the following sentence,
"The year i turned ninety, i wanted to give myself the gift of a night of wild love with an adolescent virgin."
The first sentence itself grips you down into the story and takes you away into a far away land and into the life of an old cable editor. He has never married,never loved, never been to bed with a woman he didn't pay and he feels young even at the age of ninety. He contacts the owner of an illicit house, Rosa Cabarcas in order to fulfill his birthday wish. Rosa mocks him saying" the only Virgos left in the world are people like you who were born in august". But yet she finds a girl. He calls her Delgadina..finds her sleeping each night he visits her. He never tries to disturb her sleep and watches her quietly. During these solitary hours his love for her deepens and reminds him of the loveless life he has led. His Sunday columns in the local newspaper details how he found love at the age of ninety.
Marquez is witty and extremely narrative. His magical procreation of words is mesmerizing and excellent. Marquez is not a subject of critics.
-Nisanth Thomas
(nisanththomas@gmail.com)
