87 years of Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Family & Youth
Gabriel Garcia Marquez one of the most important
writers on Colombian literature that was born in Aracataca (Magdalena)
in Colombia, the 6 of March of 1927. His parents were Gabriel Eligio
Garcia and Luisa Santiaga Marquez, he was the first of twelve children
they had. His grandmother was a storyteller that gave him bases for his
future inspirations for his famous writings. He lived with his
grandparents until he was 9 years because his grandfather died, so he
went to live with his parents again. He went to a boarding school were
he was such a great student an a famous poet as he said: "from my early
days in school I have fame as a poet, first by the ease with which I
memorized and recited aloud the poems of the classic and romantic
Spanish, then by the satire in rhymed verses dedicated to my classmates
in the school magazine Juventud were father Mejia name it "bobadas
mias" by signing gabito".
New Beginnings
He graduated in 1946 wanting to be a journalist but his parents made
him study law so he entered to the Universidad Nacional of Bogota. He
hated studying law so he entered entered in a literary supplement of
"El Espectador" where he published his first 10 stories. Then, in 1948
because of the recent event of murdered of Jorge Eliecer Gaitan a
prominent Colombian Liberal member, the university shut his doors and
he had to move to Cartagena where he continued studying on the
university of Cartagena. he never completed his degree on law because
he wrote and wrote more and more pieces of journalism and of his own
stories that all he wanted to do was to write. He moved to Barranquilla
where he continued writing in the column of the newspaper. For his
future inspiration he read books of authors such as: Virgina Woolf,
Sophocles, William Faulkner, Franz Kafka, James Joyce and Ernest
Hemingway. In 1952 he wrote La Hojarasca and his friends published
it, there was were he started his famous career of a writer. It
continued with "El Coronel no tien quien le escriba". A year later,
1958 he got married with Mercedes Barcha Pardo. They had two children;
Rodrigo and Gonzalo, this was just the beginning for him and his family.
Road to fame
He founded "Prensa Latina" the Cuban press agency in which he travel
mostly all the world including: New York, Venezuela, New Orlans,
Louisiana, New Mexico and Barranquilla. In 1961 he published his first
edition of "Cien años de Soledad" in Buenos Aires, Argentin, he said: "
I was sure that one hundred years of solitude would have good review,
but not its success in public. I calculated about five thousand copies
were going to be sold, but the SouthAmerican publisher was more
optimistic, saying that eight thousand copies would be sold, but in
fact, the first edition sold out in 15 days and in one city, Buenos
Aires." He's novel was and still is one of the most successful novels
of the world that he won international prizes such as: Prix du Meilleur
Livre Etranger, The Italian Premio Chianciano, The American Neustadt
Prize and Venezuelan Romulo Gallegos Prize. When he realized his fame
he thought "I don't know at what time it all happened, just know that
since I was 17 and until this morning , I haven't done something
different than getting up early every day, sit in front of a keyboard,
to fill a blank page or an empty screen of a computer, with the only
mission of writing a story haven't told by anyone that makes a happy
life to a nonexistent reader."
Successful life
With his great success moving on, he moved to Barcelona, Spain with his
family in which he started political affiliations in the conflict of
Cuba and United States were he said: "If what I say does not have a
certain importance, I say political things. I'll put that reputation at
the service of the liberation of the countries in Latin American. And
that's why I'm doing this; I'm doing a political job and tell you
honestly, I think I have no vocation or training, but I have tried,
because I think it is the duty of every Latin American with audience,
as in my case" but in 1981 he flew to Colombia after going to Cuba were
he was charged to jail because of helping the "M-19" a paramilitary
group, so he decided to go to Mexico where he stayed the rest of his
life, when Belisario Betancourt became president of Colombia proposed
to Gabriel to move to Colombia and have political agreements, but he
ejected them. In 1982, Gabriel Garcia Marquez recieved the Nobel Prize
of Literature a huge surprise and proud for him, his family and
Colombia. In 1955 he founded a foundation in Cartagena for yuong
journalist who wanted to write just as he used to. Years later, he was
diagnosed with linfatic cancer which he got over but he had several
complications with other illness such as Alzheimer and respiratory
problems that took his life on April 17 of 2014.
"His life
was not only marked by the fantastic flights of his imagination and his
memory but also for the many trips that shaped his life and that each
of these the son of Aracataca learned something that was definitive for
his writing career, a permanent desire to know and tell stories led him
around the world as a student, journalist, novelist and politician and
even if he visited or lived in other countries and he never leave
Colombia and Colombia will never leave him; instead, we will remember
him forever."
FILBO
