Historical Background of One Hundred Years of Solitude

1. Historical Background of One Hundred Years of Solitude A Presentation by Annie Strachan and Paige Beaty

2. Early Life • Gabriel García Marquéz born March 6, 1928 in Aracataca, Northern Colombia. • Lived with grandparents and aunts in Aracataca for first 8 years. • After the death of his grandparents, he returned to his parents living in Sucre. • Sent to boarding school in Barranquilla at 8 or 9. • He enrolled in Law School in Bogotá at his parents’ suggestion, although he wanted to become a journalist.

3. Later Life • While studying in Bogotá, read Kafka’s Metamorphosis • Began writing fiction and was published in newspapers during the mid 1940s. • Continued to study law until 1950. • Influenced by El grupo de Barranquilla • Worked for a variety of Colombian newspapers throughout the 1950s • Temporarily exiled from Colombia in 1955 • Published Leaf Storm, introducing the fictional town of Macondo.

4. Political Repercussions • Returned to Latin America in 1958 • In Venezuela, he worked for Momento, a newspaper that he quit when they took a decidedly pro-American stance. • Emigrated to Cuba with his wife, where their first son was born in 1959. • Published No One Writes to the Colonel in 1961 and Big Mama’s Funeral in 1962 while living in Mexico City. • His book In Evil Hour, originally titled This Town of Shit dealt with la violencia. • Three years of writer’s block began in 1962, until he was able to write One Hundred Years of Solitude, published in 1967.

6. Colonialism and Independence • The Spanish settled in Colombia as early as the 1500s. • First permanent settlement in Santa Marta 1525. • July 20, 1810 citizens of Bogotá created the first representative council defying Spanish rule. • War for independence ended after the Battle of Boyaca on August 7, 1819. • “Republic of Colombia” 1886

7. Conservatives and Liberals • 1849: Two political parties form, the Liberals and the Conservatives. • Both parties tended to be corrupt, repressive and abused power. • Parties acted as territorial and familial units. • Liberal and Conservative Parties competed and cooperated with one another through the 19th and 20th centuries. • Costeños: Coastal Caribbean. Racially mixed, outgoing, dancers, adventurers, more liberal. • Cachacos: Central Highland. More formal, aristocratic, more conservative.

8. The Thousand Days War • The Thousand Days War (1899-1902) a civil war between the Conservative and Liberal Parties. • Conservative Party accused of holding fraudulent elections to stay in power. • Conflict worsened by falling coffee prices in the international market which mostly affected the Liberal Party. • Cost 100,000 lives. Most of those who died were peasants. • Ended with the defeat of the Liberals.

9. Personal Significance • Colonel Nicolás Ricardo Márquez Mejía, Liberal veteran of the Thousand Days War. • The Colonel took García Márquez to see ice. • The Colonel allegedly had 16 children. • The Colonel refused to stay silent about the Banana Strike Massacre.

10. Banana Strike Massacre • United Fruit Company, an American company that monopolized the banana industry. • The United Fruit Company exploited Colombian workers. • October 1928 workers went on strike and the Colombian government employed the military to end the strike. • December in Ciénaga military troops fired on unarmed demonstrators. • This event was stricken from history.

11. La Violencia • La violencia, “The Violence,” a civil conflict between the Conservative and Liberal Parties throughout Colombia, taking place roughly from 1948 to 1958. • Assasination of Liberal presidential candidate Jorge Eliécer Gaitán in April 1948 triggered large riots. This is considered the beginning of la violencia. • In Evil Hour is García Márquez’s response to the events going on around him.

12. Period of Reconciliation: 1903-1930 • After the Thousand Days War, the Liberals and Conservatives wanted to share power rather than be exclusive. • General Rafael Reyes elected president in 1904: Centralized power by strengthening the executive, replaced Congress with a National Assembly. • 1909 Thompson-Urrutia Treaty with the United States is unsuccessful. • June 1909 Republic Union, bipartisan group of Liberals and Historical Conservatives opposes Reyes and reestablishes the Colombian Congress.

13. National Front Regime • National Front agreement: Liberals and Conservatives agreed to be cooperative and share power in order to end the strife and violence. • Began the gradual decline of confrontation between the two parties. • Stalemate and inaction of governmental process.

14. One Hundred Years of Solitude • García Márquez drew heavily on his personal experiences while writing One Hundred Years of Solitude, incorporating characters from his own past – especially from his own family, into the novel. • Tranquilina Iguarán Cotés, García Márquez’s grandmother, told her grandson folktales, superstitions, ghost stories, greatly influenced his style as seen in One Hundred Years of Solitude. • Locked himself up in his house for 18 months while writing the novel.

15. Bibliography “García Márquez.” http://www.themodernword.com/gabo/gabo_biography.html The Library of Congress Country Studies. “Colombia History Index” http://workmall.com/wfb2001/colombia/colombia_history_index.html Palacios, Marco. Between Legitimacy and Violence: A History of Colombia, 1875-2002. Durham: Duke Univeresity Press, 2006. Stafford, Frank. Colombia: Fragmented Land, Divided Society. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002. Wiarda, H.J and H.F Kline eds. Latin American Politics and Development. Boulder: Perseus Books, 2000