Cien años de soledad (One Hundred Years of Solitude)
by Gabriel García Márquez

I have wanted to read this book, the most famous of all García Márquez’s works, for quite some time. I read his shorter novel El coronel no tiene quien le escriba during my undergrad, and I thought García Márquez was truly a master of the Spanish language. Tackling Cien años de soledad, at more than 500 pages, was a bit more ambitious than I could afford while going to school, so I finally read it this summer. It follows the century-long history of the Buendía family and the Colombian town of Macondo that they help found. It starts out pure and innocent, just as each of the characters do, and I was immensely entertained as corruption such as politics, religion, and science are introduced. However, the element that fascinated me the most was that of “realismo mágico, or magic realism. Throughout the novel fantastic events occur with all the fanfare of everyday matters.

There is an excellent translation of Cien años de soledad by Gregory Rabassa, but I don’t necessarily recommend this book to any reader. Despite my fascination with the magical realism in the book, several of the themes will not appeal to many readers. The incestuous tendencies of the Buendía family and the sexual initiations of the males are not necessarily something I think everyone should read. But García Márquez, a Nobel Prize-winning author, includes these elements because the are as much a part of life in Latin America as the rest of the novel. For readers who enjoy magical and surreal elements and can take some of the rougher themes in the appropriate context, Cien años de soledad is a rich and rewarding book.