Chronicle Of A Death Foretold Essay
English A: Literature Written Assignment
Topic: Significance of honor portrayed by Marquez in his novella- Chronicle of a Death Foretold
Candidate name: Deep Kotadia
Session No: 003768-0003
Subject: English A: Literature
Level: Standard
Word counts
Reflective Statement: 399 words
Essay: 1483 words
IB English A: Literature
Part 1
Reflective Statement
Name: Deep Kotadia
Level: SL
Work Studied: Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez Date: 22/03/2013
Question: How has the cultural and contextual understanding of the text developed through the interactive oral? In our interactive oral we discussed a number of topics including Marquez’s reason for writing ‘Chronicle of a Death foretold’ …show more content…
and the cultural and social issues portrayed by him according to the situation of Colombia (the setting) during the then time period. The interactive oral led to a drastic development in my understanding of the Colombian society and culture, adopted by Marquez in his novella. The fact that Marquez has tried to utilize his friend’s death as a tool to portray the behavioural aspects of the Colombian society gave me a focused and detailed understanding about these particular behavioural aspects. Columbia had experienced a nationalist movement in the 1700s as a result of political restrictions placed on the Creoles. This led to disparities and conflicts between the Conservatives and the Liberals, which further gave rise to the Colombian wars for independence. This political unrest in the society led to a massive alteration in the behaviour and the cultural beliefs of the people staying or newly settled in Colombia. Keeping this cultural transformation in mind, the oral proceeded with detailed discussion about some of the vigorous cultural aspects as evident in this novella. Cultural and social issues especially revolving around a woman’s virginity (honor) in the Colombian society really caught my attention. Gender biasness is one of them. The way Marquez dramatizes the discriminatory belief about premarital sex being the ultimate transgression against society, but not for men who hang out at Maria Cervantes’ brothel noticeably helped me understand the extent to which gender biasness existed in the Colombian culture. This also helped me link such a scenario to my own Indian culture where a similar belief about gender biasness exists even today. One of the most interesting things I learnt from this interactive oral is that the root cause for all this chaos and vengeance was the deflowering of a girl before marriage. The entire plot revolved around the notion of honor killing. The raising of the crucial point, during the open discussion, related to loss of Angela’s virginity leading to the death of Santiago Nasar, deepened my contextual understanding, that the existence of rigid cultural beliefs is the sole reason for Nasar’s gruesome murder. Besides these cultural beliefs, economic and social inequities also made Santiago Nasar a target of hatred. All in all, this interactive oral has helped me to understand the significance of honor in the Columbian culture.
Word count: 399 words
Topic: Significance of honor as portrayed by Marquez in his novella- Chronicle of a Death Foretold
In the ‘Chronicle of a Death Foretold’, Gabriel Garcia Marquez uses the Colombian society of the mid nineteen hundreds to highlight some of the key cultural aspects and beliefs of the people of that time.
By laying utmost importance upon honor as a key belief of the Colombians, Marquez effectively uses the cultural beliefs surrounding honor to shed light on the shocking 1real-life incident which took place with one of his very close friends during that time period in the same setting i.e. Colombia. Marquez found this belief so strong in the Colombian society, that he has portrayed it in almost all the chapters through the use of a shadowy narrator, making honor the central theme of the novella. The significance of this belief can be seen not only from a cultural viewpoint, but also from political, philosophical, religious and psychological perspectives. The importance and emphasis upon honor and its surrounding pillars is to such an extent that it becomes the main driving force of the plot and to the eventual murder of Santiago Nasar, the central character, who in the real world represents Marquez’s friend with whom the incident of honor killing took
place. In the Chronicle of a Death foretold, Marquez at a few instances has effectively portrayed the significance of honor in the Colombian society from a political perspective. This can be explored very clearly at the beginning of Chapter 3 when the court gives its decision in “legitimate defence of honor” (P. 48). Here, Marquez ironically mocks and criticizes on the local court’s and the political system’s failure to do effective justice. Ethically, if Prussian philosopher- Immaneul Kant’s moral theory of Kantianism is applied here, the murder of Santiago can be ethically judged. 2Kant believed that in a political regime, a murder is only ethical if the intention of the murderer was good for the whole society. The Vicario brothers’ intention was to regain their family honor, which indicates that they were only concerned about their own self-interest, not that of the society. So, this act is highly unethical from Kant’s viewpoint. Even though this is the case, the court was in support of the Vicarios since “it was a matter of honor” (P. 49).The great importance of honor can be easily seen here as legal/political decisions and judgements are made on the basis of honor rather than ethics, so much so that honor killing is also termed legal by the court. Further, Marquez again highlights the significance of honor through a political example in the middle of chapter three, when Colonel Aponte, the mayor of the town only confiscates the knives from the Vicarios, but does not arrest them as he thinks that “now, it’s a matter of warning [for] Santiago Nasar; it’s a matter of honor” (P. 57). This again indicates that the matter of honor is more important for the mayor than the life of Santiago and perhaps this is the reason he does not want to interrupt into the “matter of honor” and arrest the Vicarios. Here, Marquez effectively employs the theme ‘Failure of Authority’ to show how many of the townsmen (including Father Amador, Colonel Aponte, and Leandro Pornoy among others) felt honor so much significant that none could prevent the murder from happening even though fate was completely in their hands. They believed that “affairs of honor are sacred monopolies with access only for those who are part of the drama” (P. 98). This is quite ironical. Everybody puts honor over death and ethics in terms of prominence. In addition to highlighting the significance of honor in the novella, this particular theme also makes the plot more dramatic and full of suspense which makes the readers eager to know about such fatal coincidences, hence clinging their attention and interest firmly. Similarly, significance of honor can also be seen from a religious perspective. According to Father Amador, the Vicarios are morally right in committing the murder and so, he called this “surrender as an act of dignity” (P. 49). Also, by saying that they killed Santiago “perhaps before god” (P. 49), he implicitly means that this act was completely right from a religion point of view. He also explicitly means that if they would have failed in their attempt, god would have punished Santiago. However, honor killing is 3unethical according to most religion ethics. Several religions including all of the ones portrayed by Marquez in his novella (Christianity, Islam, and Judaism) consider honor killing to be a false and punishable practice. In fact, 4one of the ten commandments of Christianity in the Bible states ‘Thou shalt not kill’, which is completely contradictory to the act the Vicario brothers did, who were in fact Catholics of Spanish origin. They ignored religious beliefs and teachings for the sake of regaining honor. Marquez here again tries to emphasize on the significance of honor in the society, so much so that even religion can be manipulated or ignored if honor is to be preserved. In addition to the political, philosophical and religious perspectives, significance of honor in Marquez’s novella is also very evident from a familial perspective. The famous incident (also the rising action of the novella) at the very end of Chapter 2, where Bayardo San Roman returns Angela Vicario to her house upon discovering the secret that Angela is not a virgin undoubtedly throws light on the Colombian belief that “a woman is only worth marrying when she is a virgin; after that she is soiled”. Since Angela has been deflowered, hence dishonoured before marriage, her husband immediately breaks the crucial married relationship with her. It is yet again very ironical here as Bayardo San Roman is the one who has proposed Angela for marriage and not he is also the one breaking the relationship. Bayardo’s love for Angela diminished at the very instantaneous moment when Bayardo discovered the secret of Angela’s lost honor. A relationship is broken for the sake of honor. Marquez showcases another similar example in Chapter 3 when Prudencia Cotes (Pablo Vicario’s fiancée) says that “[She] never would have married him if he hadn’t done what a man should do” (P. 63). This example shows that Prudencia is putting a do-or-die dilemma in front of Pablo. So here, a to-be relationship is threatened because of honor. So overall, taking both these examples into account, Marquez is trying to prove the point that honor was considered much significant than even love and relationship in the Colombian society and families. In short “honor is love” (P. 98) according to what Marquez is trying to prove and show extensively from the Colombian culture. In addition, importance of honor in the society can also be seen through a psychological perspective. Since “the [Vicario] brothers were brought up to be men” (P. 30), it was their duty to regain the family honor lost by Angela. This could only be done by killing Santiago, who was one of their very close friends. Because of this friendship, the Vicario brothers didn’t want to kill Santiago at all and hence they kept on telling everyone about their plans, expecting someone to stop them. But, it was their psychological and cultural mind-set that it was their duty by default to regain honor. This mind-set of regaining honor eventually gave the Vicarios enough willpower to assassinate Santiago, their close friend. Here, honor is significant in a way where it is even overpowering friendship as well as companionship, due to a set psychological mind-set. In conclusion, Marquez has effectively portrayed the value of honor in the Colombian society from various perspectives, in order to convey his overall message that honor was at the epitome of all the cultural beliefs during the then Colombian society. By using different perspectives, Marquez investigates moral dilemmas facing the Colombians which range from choosing honor instead of death and religion to friendship, companionship and love. Without a doubt, if Marquez had reduced the importance he has placed on honor, he wouldn’t have effectively been able to mock the cultural beliefs of Colombia that revolved around honor during that time. Perhaps, the honor killing incident that happened with Marquez’s friend might have hurt Marquez emotionally, and hence he has written this novel to criticize on the ill cultural beliefs of Latin America and provide justice to his fellow by bringing in a change. By placing utmost significance upon the cultural beliefs surrounding the aspect of honor, Marquez carps the culture greatly and maybe writes this novella to bring in a change. Probably, his novella since its publication has been one of the driving forces for the changed Colombian culture today, where honor killing and other such ill cultural beliefs are into minimal practice today. Along with Colombia, Marquez’s thoughts which explicitly come out through this novella have almost certainly been one of the reasons for the elimination of honor killing from today’s society in many parts of the world.
Bibliography
Márquez, Gabriel García. Chronicle of a Death Foretold. New Delhi: Penguin Group, 1996. Print.
"Gabriel Garcia Marquez- Chronicle of a Death Foretold." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 02 Sept. 2013. .
Topic: Significance of honor portrayed by Marquez in his novella- Chronicle of a Death Foretold
Candidate name: Deep Kotadia
Session No: 003768-0003
Subject: English A: Literature
Level: Standard
Word counts
Reflective Statement: 399 words
Essay: 1483 words
IB English A: Literature
Part 1
Reflective Statement
Name: Deep Kotadia
Level: SL
Work Studied: Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez Date: 22/03/2013
Question: How has the cultural and contextual understanding of the text developed through the interactive oral? In our interactive oral we discussed a number of topics including Marquez’s reason for writing ‘Chronicle of a Death foretold’ …show more content…
and the cultural and social issues portrayed by him according to the situation of Colombia (the setting) during the then time period. The interactive oral led to a drastic development in my understanding of the Colombian society and culture, adopted by Marquez in his novella. The fact that Marquez has tried to utilize his friend’s death as a tool to portray the behavioural aspects of the Colombian society gave me a focused and detailed understanding about these particular behavioural aspects. Columbia had experienced a nationalist movement in the 1700s as a result of political restrictions placed on the Creoles. This led to disparities and conflicts between the Conservatives and the Liberals, which further gave rise to the Colombian wars for independence. This political unrest in the society led to a massive alteration in the behaviour and the cultural beliefs of the people staying or newly settled in Colombia. Keeping this cultural transformation in mind, the oral proceeded with detailed discussion about some of the vigorous cultural aspects as evident in this novella. Cultural and social issues especially revolving around a woman’s virginity (honor) in the Colombian society really caught my attention. Gender biasness is one of them. The way Marquez dramatizes the discriminatory belief about premarital sex being the ultimate transgression against society, but not for men who hang out at Maria Cervantes’ brothel noticeably helped me understand the extent to which gender biasness existed in the Colombian culture. This also helped me link such a scenario to my own Indian culture where a similar belief about gender biasness exists even today. One of the most interesting things I learnt from this interactive oral is that the root cause for all this chaos and vengeance was the deflowering of a girl before marriage. The entire plot revolved around the notion of honor killing. The raising of the crucial point, during the open discussion, related to loss of Angela’s virginity leading to the death of Santiago Nasar, deepened my contextual understanding, that the existence of rigid cultural beliefs is the sole reason for Nasar’s gruesome murder. Besides these cultural beliefs, economic and social inequities also made Santiago Nasar a target of hatred. All in all, this interactive oral has helped me to understand the significance of honor in the Columbian culture.
Word count: 399 words
Topic: Significance of honor as portrayed by Marquez in his novella- Chronicle of a Death Foretold
In the ‘Chronicle of a Death Foretold’, Gabriel Garcia Marquez uses the Colombian society of the mid nineteen hundreds to highlight some of the key cultural aspects and beliefs of the people of that time.
By laying utmost importance upon honor as a key belief of the Colombians, Marquez effectively uses the cultural beliefs surrounding honor to shed light on the shocking 1real-life incident which took place with one of his very close friends during that time period in the same setting i.e. Colombia. Marquez found this belief so strong in the Colombian society, that he has portrayed it in almost all the chapters through the use of a shadowy narrator, making honor the central theme of the novella. The significance of this belief can be seen not only from a cultural viewpoint, but also from political, philosophical, religious and psychological perspectives. The importance and emphasis upon honor and its surrounding pillars is to such an extent that it becomes the main driving force of the plot and to the eventual murder of Santiago Nasar, the central character, who in the real world represents Marquez’s friend with whom the incident of honor killing took
place. In the Chronicle of a Death foretold, Marquez at a few instances has effectively portrayed the significance of honor in the Colombian society from a political perspective. This can be explored very clearly at the beginning of Chapter 3 when the court gives its decision in “legitimate defence of honor” (P. 48). Here, Marquez ironically mocks and criticizes on the local court’s and the political system’s failure to do effective justice. Ethically, if Prussian philosopher- Immaneul Kant’s moral theory of Kantianism is applied here, the murder of Santiago can be ethically judged. 2Kant believed that in a political regime, a murder is only ethical if the intention of the murderer was good for the whole society. The Vicario brothers’ intention was to regain their family honor, which indicates that they were only concerned about their own self-interest, not that of the society. So, this act is highly unethical from Kant’s viewpoint. Even though this is the case, the court was in support of the Vicarios since “it was a matter of honor” (P. 49).The great importance of honor can be easily seen here as legal/political decisions and judgements are made on the basis of honor rather than ethics, so much so that honor killing is also termed legal by the court. Further, Marquez again highlights the significance of honor through a political example in the middle of chapter three, when Colonel Aponte, the mayor of the town only confiscates the knives from the Vicarios, but does not arrest them as he thinks that “now, it’s a matter of warning [for] Santiago Nasar; it’s a matter of honor” (P. 57). This again indicates that the matter of honor is more important for the mayor than the life of Santiago and perhaps this is the reason he does not want to interrupt into the “matter of honor” and arrest the Vicarios. Here, Marquez effectively employs the theme ‘Failure of Authority’ to show how many of the townsmen (including Father Amador, Colonel Aponte, and Leandro Pornoy among others) felt honor so much significant that none could prevent the murder from happening even though fate was completely in their hands. They believed that “affairs of honor are sacred monopolies with access only for those who are part of the drama” (P. 98). This is quite ironical. Everybody puts honor over death and ethics in terms of prominence. In addition to highlighting the significance of honor in the novella, this particular theme also makes the plot more dramatic and full of suspense which makes the readers eager to know about such fatal coincidences, hence clinging their attention and interest firmly. Similarly, significance of honor can also be seen from a religious perspective. According to Father Amador, the Vicarios are morally right in committing the murder and so, he called this “surrender as an act of dignity” (P. 49). Also, by saying that they killed Santiago “perhaps before god” (P. 49), he implicitly means that this act was completely right from a religion point of view. He also explicitly means that if they would have failed in their attempt, god would have punished Santiago. However, honor killing is 3unethical according to most religion ethics. Several religions including all of the ones portrayed by Marquez in his novella (Christianity, Islam, and Judaism) consider honor killing to be a false and punishable practice. In fact, 4one of the ten commandments of Christianity in the Bible states ‘Thou shalt not kill’, which is completely contradictory to the act the Vicario brothers did, who were in fact Catholics of Spanish origin. They ignored religious beliefs and teachings for the sake of regaining honor. Marquez here again tries to emphasize on the significance of honor in the society, so much so that even religion can be manipulated or ignored if honor is to be preserved. In addition to the political, philosophical and religious perspectives, significance of honor in Marquez’s novella is also very evident from a familial perspective. The famous incident (also the rising action of the novella) at the very end of Chapter 2, where Bayardo San Roman returns Angela Vicario to her house upon discovering the secret that Angela is not a virgin undoubtedly throws light on the Colombian belief that “a woman is only worth marrying when she is a virgin; after that she is soiled”. Since Angela has been deflowered, hence dishonoured before marriage, her husband immediately breaks the crucial married relationship with her. It is yet again very ironical here as Bayardo San Roman is the one who has proposed Angela for marriage and not he is also the one breaking the relationship. Bayardo’s love for Angela diminished at the very instantaneous moment when Bayardo discovered the secret of Angela’s lost honor. A relationship is broken for the sake of honor. Marquez showcases another similar example in Chapter 3 when Prudencia Cotes (Pablo Vicario’s fiancée) says that “[She] never would have married him if he hadn’t done what a man should do” (P. 63). This example shows that Prudencia is putting a do-or-die dilemma in front of Pablo. So here, a to-be relationship is threatened because of honor. So overall, taking both these examples into account, Marquez is trying to prove the point that honor was considered much significant than even love and relationship in the Colombian society and families. In short “honor is love” (P. 98) according to what Marquez is trying to prove and show extensively from the Colombian culture. In addition, importance of honor in the society can also be seen through a psychological perspective. Since “the [Vicario] brothers were brought up to be men” (P. 30), it was their duty to regain the family honor lost by Angela. This could only be done by killing Santiago, who was one of their very close friends. Because of this friendship, the Vicario brothers didn’t want to kill Santiago at all and hence they kept on telling everyone about their plans, expecting someone to stop them. But, it was their psychological and cultural mind-set that it was their duty by default to regain honor. This mind-set of regaining honor eventually gave the Vicarios enough willpower to assassinate Santiago, their close friend. Here, honor is significant in a way where it is even overpowering friendship as well as companionship, due to a set psychological mind-set. In conclusion, Marquez has effectively portrayed the value of honor in the Colombian society from various perspectives, in order to convey his overall message that honor was at the epitome of all the cultural beliefs during the then Colombian society. By using different perspectives, Marquez investigates moral dilemmas facing the Colombians which range from choosing honor instead of death and religion to friendship, companionship and love. Without a doubt, if Marquez had reduced the importance he has placed on honor, he wouldn’t have effectively been able to mock the cultural beliefs of Colombia that revolved around honor during that time. Perhaps, the honor killing incident that happened with Marquez’s friend might have hurt Marquez emotionally, and hence he has written this novel to criticize on the ill cultural beliefs of Latin America and provide justice to his fellow by bringing in a change. By placing utmost significance upon the cultural beliefs surrounding the aspect of honor, Marquez carps the culture greatly and maybe writes this novella to bring in a change. Probably, his novella since its publication has been one of the driving forces for the changed Colombian culture today, where honor killing and other such ill cultural beliefs are into minimal practice today. Along with Colombia, Marquez’s thoughts which explicitly come out through this novella have almost certainly been one of the reasons for the elimination of honor killing from today’s society in many parts of the world.
Bibliography
Márquez, Gabriel García. Chronicle of a Death Foretold. New Delhi: Penguin Group, 1996. Print.
"Gabriel Garcia Marquez- Chronicle of a Death Foretold." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, n.d. Web. 02 Sept. 2013. .