- Hardcover: 688 pages
- Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC (20 Oct 2008)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0747594767
- ISBN-13: 978-0747594765
- Product Dimensions: 23.6 x 15.8 x 6.2 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 248,623 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Gabriel Garcia Marquez: A Life
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Product Description
Review
`Martin blends the stories and novels superbly into his narrative ... and helps readers to ground his exceptional fiction in history.' --Jason Wilson, Independent
`Remarkable ... Illuminating literary analysis is deftly blended with the chronicling of an eventful life in this outstanding biography, the result of 17 years' work. How did it come to be overlooked for non-fiction prizes?' --Guardian
`Remarkable ... Illuminating literary analysis is deftly blended with the chronicling of an eventful life in this outstanding biography, the result of 17 years' work. How did it come to be overlooked for non-fiction prizes?' --Guardian
Review
`Gerald Martin has done a good job here in presenting the myths about the career, as well as debunking many of them ... a good, thorough job.'
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
"What a good thing you were there, so you can tell people we didn't make up the story."
14 July 2010
Format:Paperback
If there is one thing this impeccably researched biography brings home, it is how the life of a jobbing journalist was altered forever by a sudden, blinding shaft of inspiration. Whether one buys García Márquez' story about "One Hundred Years of Solitude" is another matter: that the shaft of inspiration was so blinding that, just when the family thought they had reached their holiday destination, he turned around the car and raced back to Mexico City to write it all down. García Márquez was, after all, the man who put the magic in magical realism. But read the early chapters about his antecedents and unstable upbringing and you immediately have the bricks and mortar for "One Hundred Years", and it is fascinating to see how the novel fuses the history of his family with that of Colombia itself. "Chronicle of a Death Foretold" likewise re-enacts a real-life drama from his family's past, as does my own favourite, "Love in the Time of Cholera", which also catalysed at last a rapprochement between the author and his unpredictable father. Suddenly, everything drops into place and this biography should be essential reading for any García Márquez fan.
That is not to say there are not some slight longueurs. There are lesser hills between the peaks: the early to-ings and fro-ings between Aracataca, Baranquilla and Bogotá, for example, as well as the more wide-ranging ones between Colombia, Europe and Mexico; not to mention the seemingly endless periodicals and newspapers. But once García Márquez emerges from the chrysalis of workaday hack to major player, everything changes. Suddenly, we are rubbing shoulders with heads of state and Central American dictators (Clinton, Castro and Panama's General Torrijos, to name but three) and living it up in fine Latin American style at Nobel Prize celebrations in Stockholm. The world became a stage for García Márquez and he has played it for all it is worth.
One or two things showed up my ignorance. The description of Felipe González, and later José María Aznar, as "President" of Spain had me checking out the facts, but Gerald Martin is perfectly correct: the head of government in Spain is indeed known as the "Presidente del Gobierno", and not as the "Prime Minister". I also now know to refer to Gabo as García Márquez rather than just Márquez.
For anyone interested in how the life informs the works - and how intriguingly it does - it is relatively simple to fast forward through five hundred odd pages; the relevant chapters are clearly sign-posted. It would be a great shame to do that, though, because it would do little justice to the tome that Gerald Martin has produced: an endeavour which, as he modestly points out, eventually earned him his transformation from "tolerated" to "official" biographer.
That is not to say there are not some slight longueurs. There are lesser hills between the peaks: the early to-ings and fro-ings between Aracataca, Baranquilla and Bogotá, for example, as well as the more wide-ranging ones between Colombia, Europe and Mexico; not to mention the seemingly endless periodicals and newspapers. But once García Márquez emerges from the chrysalis of workaday hack to major player, everything changes. Suddenly, we are rubbing shoulders with heads of state and Central American dictators (Clinton, Castro and Panama's General Torrijos, to name but three) and living it up in fine Latin American style at Nobel Prize celebrations in Stockholm. The world became a stage for García Márquez and he has played it for all it is worth.
One or two things showed up my ignorance. The description of Felipe González, and later José María Aznar, as "President" of Spain had me checking out the facts, but Gerald Martin is perfectly correct: the head of government in Spain is indeed known as the "Presidente del Gobierno", and not as the "Prime Minister". I also now know to refer to Gabo as García Márquez rather than just Márquez.
For anyone interested in how the life informs the works - and how intriguingly it does - it is relatively simple to fast forward through five hundred odd pages; the relevant chapters are clearly sign-posted. It would be a great shame to do that, though, because it would do little justice to the tome that Gerald Martin has produced: an endeavour which, as he modestly points out, eventually earned him his transformation from "tolerated" to "official" biographer.
2 of 16 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I was very disappointed by the quality of the paper. I contacted Amazon and told them what I thought, and they were kind enough to replace the first book straight away. However, the replacement was identical, so I just kept it without further comment.
As it was a book my son had particularly asked for as a Christmas present, I had hoped it would be special - the paper in a book of this type seems to me to be important.
As it was a book my son had particularly asked for as a Christmas present, I had hoped it would be special - the paper in a book of this type seems to me to be important.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
14 reviews
22 of 25 people found the following review helpful
A marvelous biography of a literary giant and great writer
28 May 2009
Format:Hardcover
Gerald Martin's biography of the Nobel Laureate, "Gabriel Garcia Marquez: A Life," is an extraordinary and gripping book. Rich in information and helpful insight regarding Gabriel Garcia's likes and dislikes and obsessions, this marvelous biography reads like a novel, and it is bound to fascinate its readers,
Gabriel Garcia was less than a year old when his mother left him to the care of her parents. He was too young to have had any memories of her, and so when she returns six years later, he doesn't recognize her. He is deeply perplexed when he realizes that he does not love her. He does not love her because he did not even know her. She leaves him again, quite soon.
The author has written quite admirably about Gabriel Marquez's affair with the Spanish actress Tachia Quintana and Gabriel's friendship with Fidel Castro and his empathy with liberals and leftists.
Gerald Martin writes well. He is especially good at describing the small villages and towns and banana plantations of Colombia and its rich topography. His descriptions of Colombia's natural beauty are vivid. This biography grips a reader's attention from the very beginning, and holds it to the very end: "One hot, asphyxiating morning in the early 1930s, in the tropical coastal region of northern Colombia, a young woman gazed through the window of the United Fruit Company train at the passing banana plantations. Row after row after row, shimmering from sun into shade."
Those who love Gabriel Garcia Marquez's novels will find this book quite helpful in understanding several of his puzzling obsessions. For example, the author explains why Gabriel has written almost obsessively about illegitimate children in many of his novels: his family had so many of them! This is truly a very detailed, fascinating biography, meticulously written.
Gabriel Garcia was less than a year old when his mother left him to the care of her parents. He was too young to have had any memories of her, and so when she returns six years later, he doesn't recognize her. He is deeply perplexed when he realizes that he does not love her. He does not love her because he did not even know her. She leaves him again, quite soon.
The author has written quite admirably about Gabriel Marquez's affair with the Spanish actress Tachia Quintana and Gabriel's friendship with Fidel Castro and his empathy with liberals and leftists.
Gerald Martin writes well. He is especially good at describing the small villages and towns and banana plantations of Colombia and its rich topography. His descriptions of Colombia's natural beauty are vivid. This biography grips a reader's attention from the very beginning, and holds it to the very end: "One hot, asphyxiating morning in the early 1930s, in the tropical coastal region of northern Colombia, a young woman gazed through the window of the United Fruit Company train at the passing banana plantations. Row after row after row, shimmering from sun into shade."
Those who love Gabriel Garcia Marquez's novels will find this book quite helpful in understanding several of his puzzling obsessions. For example, the author explains why Gabriel has written almost obsessively about illegitimate children in many of his novels: his family had so many of them! This is truly a very detailed, fascinating biography, meticulously written.
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
A true insight into what makes Gabo tick
28 Jun 2009
Format:Hardcover
I have long been an avid reader of Latin American literature, but this biography sent me running to the Internet to find out more details about people and places mentioned in Gabriel García Márquez' life. Gerald Martin does a superb job of letting the reader penetrate the backgroud and the events that produced what many consider to be the world's masterpieces in Spanish. I read the entire book in two days, and I will read it yet again...well worth your time. Extremely well done. I especially loved the last paragraph!
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Insightful Account of Latin America
6 Aug 2010
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
A riveting account of one man and his relationships with his home country and the intertwining cause and effects of the associated western world, which transpired so eloquently in the biography. It provided a better understanding of the inspirations of his many writings.
A. Spencer
Chicago
A. Spencer
Chicago
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