Love in the Time of Cholera Essay

Love is a powerful emotion that can cause people to act in abnormal ways. In the novel, Love in the Time of Cholera, the main character Florentino Ariza falls passionately in love with Fermina Daza. He immediately spends hours composing poetic love letters to Fermina as his entire life becomes dedicated to loving her. Fermina’s father, who greatly disapproves of the relationship between the two, decides to take his daughter to travel throughout the Caribbean. After many years of separation, when Fermina finally sees Florentino for the first time since she had been back in Hispaniola, all of her love immediately disappears after realizing she does not actually love Florentio. From that day on, Florentino would live for over a century in misery as he realizes that he cannot be with the only woman he had ever truly loved. In Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s novel, Love in the Time of Cholera, and Ronald Wright’s novel “A Scientific Romance”, the theme of misery caused by the loss of love is relevant. Both writers use the motif of lost love, the effects of this lost love on the characters in the stories and the similar archetypes to show this theme.
Firstly, both authors use character development to convey this message of the effects of lost love on the main characters in both novels. Both Florentino Ariza (Love in the Time of Cholera) and David Lambert (A Scientific Romance) fail to develop as individuals in the stories. Florentino Ariza begins as a young man who has dedicated his entire life to Fermina Daza. He spends hours writing passionate letters to her and every day of his life is consumed by the thought of her. In the following quotation Florentino reveals his eternal love for Fermina: “I have waited for this opportunity for more than half a century, to repeat to you once again my vow of eternal fidelity and everlasting love.” (Marquez 50). It is clear that Florentino would give anything to be with Fermina as his love for her is immeasurable. When Fermina becomes