Sula, pg 163-end

1. careened (page 164): to cause to heel over.


2. This section begins with Nel looking back on her past and the past of Medallion. She concludes that although there are more job opportunities than there were before they seem to have lost their sense of community. Nel also realizes that she has spent all of her time and energy raising her children after her husband left, she is overcome with despair when she discovers that there is nothing left for her in the Bottom. She goes to visit Eva in the nursing home, who definitely does not look like the Eva she once was. She has also become rather senile so their conversations weren't very coherent. Eva accuses her of killing Chicken, then Nel tries to say that it was all Sula's fault but Eva reminds her that she did nothing to stop it, only watched it happen. She secretly does feel guilty for Chicken's death and decides to go to the cemetery where she finds Shadrack. Nel sits at Sula's grave and cries out to her, overcome with grief.




3. Death is obviously a very prominent theme in this novel, as it is in many other literary works that we have read in this class. I think that part of the reason that death is not considered to be a theme that is discussed too much is because everybody at some point experiences death and the effects that it has. Such as, grief. The way that Nel and Sula deal with the death of Chicken is very interesting to me. At the funeral, Sula is described as sobbing out loud, she is visibly upset by this death. Nel on the other hand remains quiet the whole time. Is this just showing the differences between the girls' personalities or is there any significance to this? Also, on National Suicide day when they visit the construction site and many die, yes, there is some pathos being developed for the characters but for the most part it was just accepted by the community. Why does Morrison do this?

4. a) Was visiting Sula's grave Nel's way of admitting that she was not necessarily the "good woman" she was perceived to be?

b) Was there any significance to the fact that the accident at the construction site happened on National Suicide Day?

c) What was the importance of Sula's death to Shadrack, if any?

Sula, Part Two (up to pg.162)

1. insouciant (page 96): lighthearted unconcern; nonchalance.



2. As soon as Sula returns to the Bottom she is judged by the style of her expensive clothes. Eva ridicules her for not being married, Sula then tells her that cutting off her own leg does not give her the authority to control other people's lives. Sula accuses Eva of murdering Plum, she retorts with the fact that she watched Hannah burn to death. Sula threatens to kill Eva, and later when she becomes Eva's guardian she admits her to a nursing home which causes others to believe that she is evil. Nel and Sula eventually start spending more time together, and through Nel's husband Jude's teasing of Sula the two eventually engage in an affair which is one day discovered by Nel who walks in on them. She feels extremely angered and betrayed by her best friend and husband because Jude leaves her and their children. The community gossips about Sula, and even credit many random accidents to her. Sula has frequent affairs, including with white men. When she has a passionate affair with Ajax, he leaves her after his discovery that she wishes to marry him. Sula soon becomes very ill and Nel decides to visit her and take care of her. She also questions why she had an affair with Jude and they talk about each other's loneliness. Sula soon becomes very remorseful and pained as she remembers watching her mother burn to death and not doing anything about it. She suddenly realizes that she has stopped breathing, her heart stopped and all she wants to do is tell Nel that death is painless. At first the community believes that her death will bring good things to them, however, then there is a brutal frost killing many animals and crops and also causing people to lose valuable days of work. Without having Sula as a common enemy for the town, the people also begin to fall apart until it warms up the day before National Suicide Day. Shadrack feels lonely, remembering the only visitor that ever came to see him which was Sula. The next day, he does not feel like participating but he ends up leading a march to the construction site to vandalize it because they were not allowed to have the jobs because they were black. The site collapses, and many people including the Deweys drown.

3. I think the way that love is portrayed in this novel is very interesting. First of all, Morrison introduces a concept that is new to me. It is not necessary to like somebody in order to love them. I am not sure if I agree or disagree with this statement. However, it is exemplified when Hannah tells Sula that she loves her, but does not like her. Hannah then goes on to suggest that she did in fact feed her children and put clothes on their back, isn't that enough? Does this prove that she really loves them or simply took care of them because she felt obligated to as their mother? Also, Eva raises Plum with plenty of love and care but then she ends up killing him. This event left me baffled, can this be considered an act of love? Just as I was starting to think that Eva was a terrible, heartless mother she makes an attempt to save Hannah when she is being burned by the fire. What is Morrison trying to say here? In addition to this, Nel and Sula were best friends for years, practically inseperable and then Sula has an affair with Nel's husband? How can Sula have loved her, as a friend, and still betray her like that? Romantically speaking, Sula sleeps with many men having meaningless sex with all of them, and the second she wants more out of her relationship with Ajax, he leaves her. What is Morrison suggesting here?


4. a) Has Morrison taken a stance on evil in this novel? This question was asked in the class activity we did, and I couldn't help but wonder is Morrison simply accepting of evil in the world? Is she concluding that there is good and evil in everybody, in every community? Or neither?

b) Was the community correct in thinking that Sula is evil? Immediately after her death they thought good things would happen to them now that she, and the evil brought to the community were gone. However, then the brutal frost comes and destroys the crops and livestock putting many people out of work. Is this Morrison's way of saying she is not evil?

c) Is Sula and Nel's relationship an example of the idea that you do not have to like somebody to love them? Although Sula betrayed Nel, she still comes to visit her when she is sick and offers to take care of her. Also, she is described to be weeping at Sula's grave. To me, this could mean that she loves her but does not necessarily like what she did.

Sula, Part One

1. fastidious (page 7): having high and often capricious standards; difficult to please.


2. This novel begins with Eva's abandonment by her husband and she had to rely on the kindness of her neighbors for things like food for her family. She also has a son who is called Plum, who at a very young age had problems with his bowels and it was up to Eva to cure him. After this, she left her children under the care of a neighbor, promising to return later the same day but did not end up coming back until eighteen months later. Upon her return it is discovered that she has come across a lot of money and also has lost a leg. Her ex-husband, BoyBoy, comes for a visit and she is able to be a polite host, but when he leaves with another woman she looks forward to being able to hate him. Eva creates a boarding house with her money where she, her daughter Hannah, granddaughter Sula, and three adopted children whom she calls "The Deweys" live. When Plum returns from the war, she comes to his room in the middle of the night, covers him in kerosene and burns him to death. In 1922, it becomes evident how Nel and Sula are such good friends, they are complete opposites but fit together quite well. Sula stands up for Nel when she gets bullied, cutting off the tip of her finger in order to scare off the boys who were bullying her friend. She also stood up for a little boy named Chicken when Nel picked on him, she was playfully swinging him by the arms but he came loose from her grip and flew in the river where he drowned to death. Hannah begins to question Eva about if she ever loved her or any of the other children. She gets angry and retorts with the fact that she did in fact clothe them and feed them, Hannah also asks about why she killed Plum. Eva cries and says she had to do it because he wanted to be a child again. Later, Eva sees Hannah catch on fire and tries to jump out the window to cover her body and save her, they both are severely burned but Hannah dies on the way to the hospital. Meanwhile, there is a man named Jude Greene who longs for a manly job as opposed to his job as a waiter at a hotel. He is rejected from a so-called "man's job" because he is black. He and Nel get married and Nel has decided to take the role of a wife who needs her husband to take care of her. Sula leaves for college, and does not return for ten years.


3. I think that Morrison's style of writing in this section is very interesting. I am not sure if it was intentional or not, but it seems that Morrison is almost mocking symbolism. For example, when Hannah tells her about the dream she had where she was wearing a red dress at the wedding, and then she dies in a fire, and then it is concluded that it "must mean something." As in, the fact that she was wearing a RED dress and then died in a FIRE is supposed to be symbolic of something. Also, I find Morrison's technique of characterization to be very intriguing. The way that she describes Sula and Nel as two different people physically, and also their personalities are complete opposites. This becomes especially evident when Nel is being teased and Sula steps in to defend her. Sula has a very bold personality, where as Nel prefers to keep to herself. It is through this way that Morrison seems to suggest that together the two girls could almost be one person.


4. a) After Chicken's death, when Sula goes to Shadrack's house and he simply says, "Always." What does he mean by this?

b) Is there any significance or meaning to the fact that Sula left her belt behind at Shadrack's house?

c) Is there any significance to the way that the characters in this novel react to death? Such as, Sula and Nel with Chicken or Sula with Hannah?

One Hundred Years of Solitude, Ch. 19-20

1. pernicious (page 382): highly injurious or destructive; deadly.


2. Amaranta Ursula returns from Europe with her husband, Gaston, and is determined to restore the town of Macondo. While she is there she discovers that nobody remembers their family, and also that she is falling in love with Aureliano II. With Gaston gone trying to fulfill his dream of establishing an airmail service, Amaranta Ursula finally gives in to Aureliano II and they are lovers. Meanwhile, the affair between Aureliano II and Amaranta continues even though the Buendia house is falling apart due to red ants. The two of them have a child named Aureliano III and since he is a result of incest, he is born with a pig's tail. Amaranta Ursula bleeds to death after giving birth. After her death he takes comfort in alcohol and with a prostitute, and he neglects the child to the point where it has died and he discovers the corpse is being fed on by ants. Depressed by his realization that this is the end of the Buendia's he locks himself up in the house and deciphers Melquiades' messages. He learns that it is a detailed history of the whole Buendia family and it mirrors his life as it is in that exact moment. Also in that moment, a wind stirs and rips the town away, erasing it from memory.


3. The last paragraph of the novel, the last sentence in particular was very interesting to me, "Before reaching the final line, however, he had already understood that he would never leave that room, for it was forseen that the city of mirrors (or mirages) would be wiped out by the wind and exiled from the memory of men at the precise moment when Aureliano Babilonia would finish deciphering the parchments, and that everything written on them was unrepeatable since time immemorial and forever more, because races condemned to one hundred years of solitude did not have a second opportunity on earth." It is because of this last paragraph that Aureliano Babilonia realizes that because of the Buendia's and other character's choices that this is why they were condemned to solitude. He understands that because of his ancestor's decisions, he and many others will not have a second chance. Had several characters not had children as a result of incest or even attempted to make connections with others, they could possibly have had another chance at a different life. It is made especially evident in the last paragraph that the Buendia family's decisions and lack of progress is the reason behind their isolated, and solitary lives.



4. a) Because of the fact that Marquez did not intend for the title to be taken literally, makes me wonder, was I supposed to take some of the other events literally, or figuratively?

b) Was there any significance to the fact that Aureliano Babilonia (a descendant of Colonel Aureliano Buendia) was the one who deciphered Melquiades' messages?

c) Is Amaranta Ursula also unable to fall in love (not lust) due to her name which as we discussed in class is similar to "before love"?

One Hundred Years of Solitude, Ch. 17-18

1. intransigent (page 345): characterized by refusal to compromise or to abandon an extreme position or attitude.


2. Once the rain has stopped Ursula tries to restore the Buendia household, but what she finds is that Jose Arcadio Segundo has been in his room all of this time trying to decipher Melquiades' messages. Aureliano Segundo is having a hard time with money, and he is also spending less time with his children. Ursula continues to go farther into her past and eventually she dies at a very old age, and so does Rebeca. Soon after this a great heat wave comes over the town and all of the people in Macondo begin to reminisce of the town's former glory. Aureliano Segundo is trying his hardest to earn money so that Amaranta Ursula can go to school in Europe, but he is finding that in his old age it is more difficult than he expected as he is dying. His brother Jose Arcadio Segundo is also dying and his last mission is to teach his son about Macondo's history and hope that he will pick up where he left off with Melquiades' prophecies. Aureliano Segundo is finally able to send Amaranta Ursula to school in Europe, and at that instant both him and his twin brother die. At the funeral, their coffins are switched and they are buried in each other's graves. Aureliano Segundo's son is working on Melquiades' messages and he figures out that they cannot be deciphered until they are one hundred years old. Since the Buendia's are poor, they are supported by food given to them by Petra Cotes, Sofia de la Piedad gives up on taking care of the family and just walks out on them one day without saying one word. Fernanda del Caprio is only writing to her children in Europe, and she dies alone. After her death her son returns to Macondo hoping to inherit money, but when he discovers there is no money, he searches for the money that Ursula hid, and he eventually found it. He uses his money to have parties, and is visited by the last son of Colonel Aureliano Buendia who is shot by the police like his brothers. However, four of the people that he was having parties with shot him in his bath and stole his money.

3. When I looked back on what has happened so far in this novel, I found the title to be even more interesting. The story started even before the town of Macondo was created, and ended when Ursula was well over one hundred. I was also curious at the idea that Ursula outlived many of her children, grandchildren, and even great-grandchildren. Was Marquez trying to tell us something about Ursula as a person, such as her great strength? Granted, Ursula did not come to the town as an infant, but there were generations, and generations of Buendia's also I feel that many of the characters should be older than they really were. It was through this that I realized that Marquez did not literally mean one hundred years, it was figurative. The town of Macondo, including the Buendia's, were condemned to a long period of time of solitude and isolation, therefore showing that they are incapable of making any progress, it does not mean one hundred years precisely, as the title would suggest.

4. a) What is the deeper meaning of the incest that occurs in the novel, is it simply to show that the characters are unable to make connections with others? Or is there more?

b) Rebeca, the adopted daughter of Ursula dies at almost the same time as her. Is this Marquez's way of again saying that ages and numbers in this novel are not to be taken literally?

c) The Buendia was once a well known family in Macondo, but after the war is over Colonel Aureliano is no longer seen as a local hero, and almost nobody even remembers the family. Does Marquez intend to say that the same thing happened to his family after his grandfather returned from war?

One Hundred Years of Solitude, Ch. 15-16

1. conflagration (page 295): a large disastrous fire

2. Meme is so upset my Mauricio's paralysis that she is a mute. Fernanda takes her to the city where she is from, and then Meme joins the convent. Many months after this a nun from the convent brings a baby to the Buendia house, Fernanda pretends that the child is not Meme's and hides it in the workshop. Jose Arcadio Segundo has been organizing a strike for the banana plantation workers to protest the poor working conditions. The government invites them to a meeting "to resolve things", but it ends up being a trick and the government shoots them all and throws the bodies in a train that will go to the sea. Jose Arcadio has been mistaken for dead and manages to jump off the train and go back to Macondo, there he realizes that nobody remembers the massacre and they do not believe his story. The government is denying that this ever took place while they continue to search for leaders of the strike, including Jose Arcadio who they eventually find in Melquiades' old room. The room is so old and decrepit that that is all they pay attention to, they don't see Jose Arcadio who will continue to study the gypsy's manuscripts alone in that room having gone insane. The rain that starts on the night of the massacre does not stop for five years, Aureliano Segundo begins to take care of his children and Meme's. Aureliano Segundo's fortune is quickly wiping away as all of his livestock have died in the flooding, he makes it his mission to find the fortune that Ursula hid somewhere in the backyard. Fernanda makes it her mission to torture Aureliano Segundo and also to contact telepathic doctors to cure her of a disease. When the rain stops and the banana plantations are gone because of it, the town goes backwards in memory.

3. I find the number of biblical allusions in this novel to be very interesting. Most of the novel seems to mirror the occurrences that take place in the book of Genesis. First of all, Ursula and Jose Arcadio Buendia are similar to Adam and Eve seeing as how they were responsible for giving names to many things, and Jose was tied to a tree which was supposed to represent The Tree of Knowledge. Because of this event, Jose and Ursula and their descendants were condemned to lives of solitude. Also, the flood that took place in this section was very significant in comparing One Hundred Years of Solitude to the happenings of the Bible. In the Bible, God flooded the Earth to show that the sins of humanity were already wiped away. It was sort of a cleansing, or purification, just as the flood that happened after the Banana Massacre cleansed the town of Macondo. In a way, it also wiped away the government's sin of trying to cover up what happened to the banana plantation workers.

4. a) Since the massacre is wiped from the memories of the people of Macondo, is Marquez trying to allude to the idea that it was actually erased out of our history too?

b) Are there other events, similar to the Banana Massacre that the government, or media has tried to cover up?

c) Who are these doctors that Fernanda is trying to contact? Are they even real?

One Hundred Years of Solitude, Ch. 13-14

1. languid (page 245): drooping or flagging from or as if from exhaustion; weak.


2. This chapter begins with Ursula noticing that she is growing much older and time is passing very quickly, she continues to obsess over Aureliano Segundo's son becoming the pope. When he and his sister leave the house it becomes emptier and Fernanda takes even more control over the Buendia household. Aureliano Segundo then moves in with his lover Petra Cotes except when his daughter comes home from school, then he decides that he needs to be a father. Jose Arcadio Segundo reappears to talk with Colonel Aureliano Buendia, who has given up making fish, which used to be one of his favorite things to do, and eventually he dies. In chapter fourteen, Fernanda and Aureliano Segundo have another child named Amaranta Ursula. The elder Amaranta has a premonition of her own death and announces it to the town. She also offers to deliver letters from the people of the town to their dead loved ones, and as she predicted she dies. After this death, Ursula goes to her bed and does not leave it, however, there she establishes a relationship with Amaranta Ursula. Meme, the oldest daughter of Fernanda and Aureliano Segundo creates a bond with her father over a mutual dislike of Fernanda. Meme becomes friends with American girls and learns a little bit of English, around the same time she meets and falls in love with Mauricio Babilonia who is always followed by yellow butterflies. Fernanda catches the two of them kissing and keeps Meme locked in the house, but when she finds out that he has been sneaking in she has a man guard the house who eventually catches him and shoots him so he is paralyzed forever.


3. The political or social path, or lack of, that Macondo has taken I feel is very important to the novel as a whole. Whenever a political or social advancement is made in the town of Macondo, the characters resist the change. For example, when the magistrate comes to the town and tries to dictate what color the houses must be painted, the characters run him out of town. When the Wandering Jew appears in the streets of Macondo, the people in the town are scared of him and try to avoid him at all costs. Politically speaking, the town has again failed to move forward when the Liberal party is unable to win the war and Colonel Aureliano Buendia has to convince his men to stop fighting. He realizes that they are simply fighting for pride, and nothing else. Overall, Macondo does not make much of a path over time as they resist all political and social changes that take place in Macondo.





4. a) In this section the color yellow appears when it is said that Mauricio Babilonia is always followed by yellow butterflies. However, the color appears many times in the novel, is what is the symbolism behind this?

b) What is the importance of premonitions in this novel, such as the one that Amaranta has in this section about her own death?

c) Is Marquez intending to make a point about women by the types of female characters he chooses, such as how controlling Fernanda is in these chapters?