Exactly 10 years ago, on
April 17, 2014 , the world said goodbye to one of the
greatest authors of the century .
Gabriel García Márquez , a Colombian who won the
Nobel Prize for Literature in 1982 , established himself as one of the most powerful names in literature, but his works are
remembered to this day . Born in 1927 in Colombia,
"Gabo" (the author's nickname) had his own writing style and was an important name in the emergence of the
"magical realism" genre: a combination of elements of reality with touches of fantasy, which even inspired Brazilian authors, such as
Socorro Acioli , winner of the Jabuti award. García Márquez's life story and the stories he told in his books are often intertwined, as the author drew on aspects of his daily life to bring
his works to life . Below, discover
five of Gabo's novels to add to your reading list:
One Hundred Years of Solitude (1967)
A
literary classic , this novel tells the story of several generations of the
Buendía family in the city of Macondo, known for being a mythical and mysterious place, which elucidates the magical realism that is a hallmark of Gabo's writing. Fifteen years after its publication, this work was one of the main reasons that the author won the
Nobel Prize for Literature .
Love in the Time of Cholera (1985)
Inspired by
his parents' love story , Gabo tells the story of violinist Gabriel García who fell in love with Luiza Márquez - a love forbidden by the young woman's father, who, in an attempt to prevent the couple from getting together and getting married, sends the young woman
to spend a year in the countryside . To get around his "father-in-law's" orders, García creates a
communication network to reach Luiza wherever she is.
Of Love and Other Demons (1994)
When assigned to a job to oversee the
removal of burial crypts from a chapel that was to be transformed into a hotel, García Márquez came across the tomb of a girl, which reminded him of a legend told by his grandmother about a miraculous young woman with long hair, who was killed by the bite of a rabid dog. Inspired by this, it tells the story of a little marquise who was raised among slaves and suffers after being supposedly "possessed" by demons. There is also a
love story in the midst of all this chaos , full of mystery and witchcraft.
News of a Kidnapping (1996)
Inspired by the
kidnappings that took place in Colombia in the 1990s , García Márquez wrote this book-report narrating a controversial topic that shook up the country at the time, when
Pablo Escobar , known as the "king of drug trafficking" kidnapped
several journalists as a way of rebelling against the government and the international community. Before writing, the author did extensive research and also a
series of interviews with people involved in the kidnappings and shows a more humane and action-packed side of the war against trafficking.
See You In August (2024)
The author's first posthumous novel, published this year by the author's sons (Rodrigo and Gonzalo García), In August We See Each Other was an unfinished work by the writer that he
worked on in his last years of life , before he began to suffer from dementia, which greatly damaged his memory. The story is about a woman who visits her mother's grave every August to bring flowers and stays at a nearby hotel. On one of her visits, she meets a man at the bar who makes her forget about her relationship and children, and give in to a momentary passion with a set date:
always in August .
