Gabriel Garcia Marquez Read Online Free PDF Page B

it at a cocktail party?) the most beautiful woman in the world. Apparently, there was a kind of
coup de foudre
between the most beautiful woman in the world and you. You arranged to meet her next day at the entrance to a bank. You kept the appointment, but just when everything looked set for something special to happen between you and the most beautiful woman in the world, you turned tail and ran. Just like a rabbit. Since she
was
the most beautiful woman in the world (you thought) it was bound to be more than just a banal affair and, as all your friends know only too well, Mercedes and your marriage are more important to you than anything else. Do we take it, then, that heroic sacrifice of this kind is the price to pay for a happy marriage?
    GARCÍA MÁRQUEZ : The only thing wrong with your version of that old story is that the dénouement had nothing to do with conjugal happiness. The most beautiful woman in the world was not necessarily the most desirable, in the way I understand a relationship of this type. After a brief conversation,something in her personality just made me feel that in the end her beauty would not compensate for the emotional problems she could cause me. I’ve always found women to be incredibly loyal if the rules of the game are established from the start and if you keep faith with them. The only thing which can destroy this loyalty is the slightest violation of the established rules. Maybe I felt that the most beautiful woman in the world hadn’t heard of this universal chess game and wanted to play with different colored pieces. Or perhaps I felt that, after all, she had only her beauty to offer and that this wasn’t enough to start a relationship which would be good for both of us. So you see, there was a sacrifice, but it wasn’t all that heroic. The whole episode lasted only half an hour, but it did leave behind something very important—a short story by Carlos Fuentes.
    MENDOZA : How important have women been in your life?
    GARCÍA MÁRQUEZ : You can’t understand my life without appreciating the important part women have played in it. I was brought up by a grandmother and numerous aunts who all showered me with attention, and by maids who gave me many very happy childhood moments because their prejudices, while not fewer than those of the women in the family, were at least different. The woman who taught me to read was very beautiful and graceful, and I used to like going to school just so I could see her. All through my life there has always been a woman to take me by the hand and lead me through the confusion of existence, which women understand better than men. They find their way more easily, with fewer navigational aids. I’ve begun to feel almost superstitious about itby now: I think nothing awful can happen to me if I’m with women. They make me feel secure. Without this security I couldn’t have done half the worthwhile things I’ve done in my life and, in particular, I think I wouldn’t have been able to write. This also means, of course, that I get on better with them than with men.
    MENDOZA : In
One Hundred Years of Solitude
, the women establish order while the men introduce chaos. Is this how you see the historical role of the two sexes?
    GARCÍA MÁRQUEZ : The allocation of roles between men and women in my books was quite unconscious and spontaneous before
One Hundred Years of Solitude
. It was the critics, especially Ernesto Volkening, who made me conscious of it. I wasn’t too happy about having it pointed out, because now I no longer create female characters with the same spontaneity as I used to. However, analyzing my own books in this light, I have found that it does in fact correspond to my view of the historical role of the sexes: namely, that women uphold the social order with an iron hand while men travel the world bent on boundless folly, which pushes history forward. I’ve come to the conclusion that women