One Hundred Years of Solitude

[lydy]

I've read about half. I don't like it and I'm not going to continue. The words are very nice, and the magic realism doesn't bother me, but I don't like the people in the book at all. I don't like the distance everything seems to be at. Some of the people are actually repugnant.

Have you read it and liked it? Why? Have you read it and disliked it? Why?

Comments

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I read it my first year of college and hated it. The people were either odious or boring. I wished they'd stayed in solitude and left me alone.

It was particularly galling because the course was supposed to be "Journeys of the Hero," and we were promised the Kalevala and got this instead.

[lydy.livejournal.com]

"Journeys of the Hero?" What hero? Where? Colonel Arelianos Buenidos (or whatever his name is) is not a hero. He's a butcher in revolutionary clothing. None of the rest of them come even close. They whore around and steal money from their mother, and try to marry prepubescent children, or want to sleep with their aunt who raised them from a baby. Blech. I thought I was free love, but _One Hundred Years of Solitude_ made me realize that I have a lot of standards for "free love." Step brother marrying step sister. I dunno. I shouldn't be so shocked, but it just seems wrong. Am I becoming too staid in my old age?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Also they didn't go anywhere. There were no heroes, and they mostly stayed put.

I felt completely cheated in that class. Even the things I liked were just vastly unsuited for the stated topic. I suppose if he'd titled it "Books This Professor Wants To Ramble About" very few people would have taken the course.

(Not that no professor could design a course like that I would have taken in a heartbeat. But not this one.)

I don't think you're being too staid, no.

[supergee.livejournal.com]

I thought the title described the reading experience and quit maybe a hundred pages in (or maybe it just seemed that long).

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

I'll re-read it and let you know. I don't remember disliking it. I've seen the exact scene with the ice from the first page three or five times in rural Central America, and have taken pleasure from it every time, so I suppose that predisposes me to like it.

K. [Hispanic and Latino fiction from the Americas is, I have found, really quite different from European fiction. The erotica is too]

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

So, I guess I wonder if you've read any other Latino fiction? Any Borges, any Llosa, any Cisneros, other Garcia Marquez, or Neruda? And how did you like it?

K.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

And, if you've not gotten a strong liking for Latino fiction, maybe start over with The War of Don Emmanuel's Nether Parts, which I loved. It was written by an Englishman, though he lived in Colombia for some time. On the other hand, if the reviews of Don Emmanuel seem to say that it's got too much of what you don't like, then skip it.

I can loan you it to you. If you want to skip the whole dreary mess, I can loan you Captain Corelli's Mandolin, which is extraordinary, and has nothing to do with Latin America.

Or, I can loan you the best book ever written.

K.

[lydy.livejournal.com]

I haven't read any other Latino fiction. I'd love to borrow The War of Don Emmanuel's Nether Parts and give it a try. I'm interested, provisionally, in the other two as well. I am cautious -- I really only read sf and fantasy with occasional outbreaks of non-fiction, but I'm curious about other areas. I've nothing to do this summer, broadening my reading seems like a worthwhile thing to do.

I'm not doing so well on the classics of sf, either. I read The Dying Earth, and hated it. I'm reluctant to try any other Vance.

[minnehaha.livejournal.com]

Pick up Don Emmanuel tomorrow, or I'll send it home with any likely suspects if I don't see you.

Classic SF is, unfortunately, often hate-able. I threw "The Weapons Shops of Isher" across the room, and haven't touched Van Vogt since. Recently, have you come across any new-to-you classics that you adored?

K.

[aedifica]

On first glance I misread "some of the people are actually repugnant" as "some of the people are actually pregnant."

I remember liking the book a lot, but I didn't read it to myself--the local-to-where-I-was public radio station had someone who would read aloud daily, picking one book and reading it til it was done. He had a good voice and may have made the book better than it would have been on its own, I don't know. I can't actually remember anything that happened in the book now.

[marsgov.livejournal.com]

One "benefit" of my particular college education was that humanities were considered unnecessary for scientists, and as such I can't ever recall even hearing the title of this book, much less reading it.

But now you've piqued my interest.

[mizzlaurajean.livejournal.com]

I read it ages ago. I thought it was well written but slow and I was not enchanted with the characters. I tend to prefer his short stories.

[apostle-of-eris.livejournal.com]

It so happens ((I'm not sure why I've been using that phrase so much lately)) that I read it just a few months ago. I did force myself to finish it, but I Don't Get It. I never did see the point, and the fluidity of the chronology was mildly annoying rather then evocative or significant or anything.
It's reassuring that other people have similar reactions.
(Moshe, "There aren't two cultures, there are only half-cultured people.")

Re: One Hundred Years of Solitude

[pir-anha.livejournal.com]

i didn't like it and didn't finish it (which is extremely rare for me). it sounds like i felt a lot like you feel: i didn't like the people at all; i didn't like the remoteness i felt. it was just really hard slogging, so i put it aside to get back to later.

from the looks of it, i'll need a 100 years of solitude before doing that.