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  • Rahona y Sieburth Sobre Cronica

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    Gonzalo_Hernàndez_Baptista
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    Rahona y Sieburth Sobre Cronica

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    Rahona y Sieburth Sobre Cronica

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    7 vistas14 páginas

    Rahona y Sieburth Sobre Cronica

    Cargado por

    Gonzalo_Hernàndez_Baptista
    Rahona y Sieburth Sobre Cronica

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Descargue como PDF o lea en línea desde Scribd
    Marcar por contenido inapropiado
    de 14
    ‘OMO XXX * NUMERO3 © OCTUBRE 1996 REVISTA DE ESTUDIOS HISPANICOS WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY ELENA RAHONA STEPHANIE SIEB Keeping a Crime Unsolved: Characters’ and Critics’ Responses to Incest in Garcia Marquez’s Crénica de una muerte anunciada Gabriel Garcia Marquez's Crénica de una muerte anunciada (1981) focuses on the brutal murder of a young man named Santiago Nasar by the brothers of the girl he had allegedly robbed of her virgin- iy, Angela Vicario married Bayardo San Romdn, On their wedding night, Bayardo returned her to her parents’ house because she was nora virgin. When her brochers demanded to know who had deflowered her, she named Santiago Nasar. The novel begins with cercainties; we know who killed Santiago and why, we know exactly what time he got up that day, what he wore, and where he was at every moment. Yer by the end of the novel, certainty has given way to confusion, It becomes clear that Santiago did not, in fact, rob Angela of her virginity. Yet the towns- people, who all knew the murder was about to be committed, did noth- ing to stop it. Twenty-three years later, che narrator and the townspeople are sill eying to make sense of how this innocent man could have been allowed to die. Garcia Marqued’s novel was published in 1981. Until 1993 most critics either ignored the question of who deflowered Angela, or argued that the point of the story is that we cannot know. Some have argued that the novel isan inversion of the detective formula, since we begin swith all the answers and end up having none. In fact, many have argued that mystery and insolubilicy isthe ultimate message of Garcla Marquez’s text.! In 1993 John Christie identified the perpetrator who deflow- cred Angela as her father, Poncio Vicario, and pointed out many of the plot decails and narratorial comments which make this interpretation convincing. In the present essay we would like to delve deeper into the incest interpretation, showing how those aspects of the text which seem evita de Bes Hii 30 (1896) 434 Elena Rahona and Seephanie Sieburth mysterious or insoluble can be explained by taking into account typical responses to incest both on the part of the survivor and on the part of witnesses or bystanders, In this case the witnesses include both the char- acters in the novel and the critics of Garcia Marques’ text? ‘Our contention is that the novel consists of two stories, one covering up the other. One is the story of the murder of a man. The other is the story of incest perpetrated upon a young woman. We will show that part of the function of the murder story, with all its incrigu- ing details and mystery, is to obscure the incest story which underlies it. In a text where substitutions abound, the murder story covers up and substitutes for the incest story as the focus of the novel. Yer che story of che man’s murder remains unintelligible until we are willing to read the woman’ story, the incest story, which underlies ic Aswe will demonstrate, the dynamics of incest play themselves out in chis text with great coherence. Once the reader has recognized the subtle bur insistent signals chat point co Poncio Vicario as the man who deflowered Angela, the many aspects of the novel which have hith- certo seemed strange or inexplicable become transparent. The incest ex- planation will permit us to answer questions which Christie's article did nogaddress, such as the following: Why did Santiago Nasar have to die? Why did Angela choose him if he was not the perpetrator? How do we explain the marked change in Angela's character over time? Why did Bayardo San Roman not read Angela leters? Why are the townspeople mited in a kind of timeless paralysis? Finally and most importantly, why did it cake cwelve years for the incest story to be uncovered by the critics, who have illuminated so many other aspects of this rich novel? Angela's father, Poncio Vicario, is situated at the very core of this text, As Christie indicates, the following passage in the text points ww Puncio’s uusecu centrality. It oceurs during the wedding party at che Vicario home: La imagen més intensa que siempre conservé de aquel domingo indeseable ue la del viejo Poncio Vicario sentado solo en un aburete en centr del pavo. Lo haban puesto abi pensando quizis que ea el sia de honot, y lr invades topecaban con dl lo confndian com ofr, lo carbiaban de lugar para gue no etorbara,y &l movi la cabeza nevada todosladoscon una expresin tricia de ciego demasiado reciente,

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