One Hundred Years of Solitude, Ch. 7-8

1. proliferation (page 151): to increase in number, multiply




2. Aureliano and Colonel Gerineldo Marquez are captured and sentenced to death, however, they are saved by Jose Arcadio. He leads the Liberals again, but he has lost the support of many Liberal party officials. While he is fighting he realizes that he is no longer fighting for anything except for pride. Meanwhile, Santa Sofia de la Piedad has two children, Jose Arcadio Segundo and Aureliano Segundo. Jose Arcadio is found dead, and it is undecided as to if he killed himself, or was murdered by Rebeca who will shut herself inside their house for the rest of her life. Gerineldo Marquez finds himself in love with Amaranta, she again turns him away. Jose Arcadio Buendia is no longer tied to the tree, as he has passed away. Chapter eight begins with Aureliano Segundo having an unhealthy attraction to Amaranta, who is almost like his mother as she has raised him. The two of them take it too far when they get caught almost kissing, this is when Amaranta decides she must end whatever was going on between them. Aureliano Segundo joins the Liberals fighting, but soon returns home in hopes to marry Amaranta. Many children, all fathered by Aureliano at some point during the war show up at the Buendia household to be baptized, they give all the children the name Aureliano.





3. I found the character of Colonel Aureliano Buendia to be particularly interesting in this section. He used to be a strong man who fought with conviction, a local hero in the town of Macondo, but after his realization that he was no longer fighting for anything except for pride in the war he became somewhat of a a hopeless character. Also, his attempt to kill himself was due to a combination of two things, the fact that after many years of fighting he had accomplished nothing, and also it was an attempt to end his solitary lifestyle. Through these things is Marquez intending to create a pathos for Aureliano? Aureliano seems to remember nothing from his past, and the people of Macondo don't remember him either, and for that matter they don't even remember the Buendia's who used to be a very well-known family in the town. After Ursula saves him from his attempted suicide, he has nothing left but to resort to the solitude of his own mind.


4. a) At the end of chapter seven, yellow flowers rain down marking the death of Jose Arcadio Buendia, is this piece of magical realism to be taken literally?



b) Is the incest that occurs in this novel supposed to show that for the Buendia's history will just continue to repeat itself?



c) Since Marquez frequently employs the repetition of names, but then he also gives other descriptions of his characters such as physical ones, is this to set them apart from the others with the same name?