spanish but not really

 One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez* is considered one of the best pieces of literature in the whole world, let alone Latin America as a regional category. I mentioned at the beginning of the term in the intro blog that this was the only novel in this class that I had read before, so this was a bit of a reread for me. Truthfully, it felt a little like reading it the first time and I can't say I followed it as easily as I would've liked to. Anyway,,, 3rd time lucky? maybe? This novel indeed exemplifies magical realism, in that things that would under any other circumstance be absurd are completely normal, such as a kid being born with a pig's tail. The confusing aspect is of course the fact that each generation of children bears the same names as those who came before them; the Jose Arcadios behave like the previous Jose Arcadios, the previous Aurelianos are like the new ones, etc. I wonder how much nominative determinism is at play here. Nominative dete...

 I liked reading this book. And I can completely see why some consider it the precursor to magical realism. Juan Rulfo's Pedro Paramo  is largely about the balance between hope and misery, and the way that people  have such strong hopes that their wishes will come true, while having to cope with the misery of realising it'll never happen. That's a bit depressing but I think it's an important part of life. The way that people cope with not getting what they want can determine their strength in getting past adversities and this novel is a good reminder of that. Pedro Paramo is a complicated character, being both a protagonist and antagonist at the same time. I definitely can't defend him as being a good person, him straight-up letting everyone die and all, but I kinda get it within the context of his character. Basically the only thing he wants in the world is for Susana to love him and be his, and so when she dies without his only wish being fulfilled, it's sort ...

 Truth be told, this was not the book for me. I disliked this one as much as I enjoyed the previous one. I definitely see the playful aspect of the book, and I can see why other people have enjoyed it - having read some of the blogs that are already up - but I think this style of play just isn't very compatible with my reading. The title of the book definitely makes sense to me though; reading it felt like going round and round a maze, momentarily feeling like I understand what's going on before turning the corner and seeing that I was going in the wrong direction the whole time. Perhaps if I were to read some of the stories a second time I would be able to better digest the themes and the happenings, but for the most part I felt like I was trying to grasp at straws to understand what was being said. All that aside, the two stories that were marginally easier for me to follow were Funes the Memorious and The Shape of the Sword. Perhaps it was to do with my mindset at the time o...