Reading Group - Love in the Time of Cholera

March 03, 2022 Post a Comment

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message 1: by Lori, Super Mod (new)

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Response to Lisas question in 'no-spoilers'

I was looking at spark notes the other mean solar day- information technology says something almost that first affiliate, it does innovate i of the main characters only i recall its also supposed to set the tone/theme of the novel with the dead guy having a kind of clandestine obsessive love over a long period of time - here...ill paste what it said. Oh..and i have to say i really liked being completley taken past surprise that the medico died of a sudden at the end of the chapter - i didnt know hed be reintroduced but i quite liked the twist

this is from spark notes about affiliate i

Love in the Time of Cholera is written in modular, non-linear form, pregnant that the events and other elements which announced in the get-go chapter of the novel are non explained until much later on in the book, when the author provides the reader with the complete background almost a certain character, event, or thought. The explanations that appear subsequently in the book lend significance to otherwise meaningless, mysterious elements of the novel. Notwithstanding, to empathise their significance, it is vital that the reader identify such mysterious elements and question why they may be meaningful to the text as a whole.

In this first chapter, the death of Jeremiah Saint-Amour is prominent, and surely has a sure significance, though, as of withal, it is not evident. Near curious is that Saint-Flirtation's suicide is the first that Dr. Urbino has seen that has not been triggered by a tortured beloved, but by an astute fearfulness of aging. The reader is provided farther clues about Saint-Flirtation's importance when Dr. Urbino is described as having an unusually emotional reaction to his death. Likewise notable is the unfinished chess game in Saint-Amour's dwelling house, for information technology not only represents his unfinished life, but besides presents questions that are answered subsequently in the novel. Why, for example, is Dr. Urbino so passionate nearly chess? And why had Saint-Flirtation asked his lover to recollect him with a rose? Was it merely a poetic gesture or a meaningful allusion? The nigh pressing question the chapter raises regards Saint-Flirtation's letter: What are the secrets the letter contains, and why does Dr. Urbino conceal them from the commissioner and the medical student? And why, in contrast, does he so desperately desire to share him with his wife, the even so unnamed adult female who is before long to go one of the book'due south central characters.

This chapter introduces us to Dr. Urbino. Conspicuously, the Doctor is a man of peachy power, esteem, and wisdom, for he is able to convince the commissioner to break the rules so that they may agree Saint-Amour'southward funeral on that same afternoon. Likewise, he tin only find ane man, Saint-Amour, who is a skilled enough chess player to provide him with worthy competition. Though the reader does not know exactly what Dr. Urbino has done to achieve such revered status, his prestige, power, and influence are axiomatic.

There are three essential clues in the first affiliate that foreshadow events that occur later in the novel. The first is the appearance of Jeremiah Saint-Amour's hugger-mugger lover. Although the author gives her no proper name, Saint-Flirtation's love is significant in relationship to a later secret matter between Fermina Daza and Florentino Ariza. Saint-Flirtation's fear of crumbling, and his lover's annotate that he had not even seemed alive during his last earthly months also foreshadow future events. These elements in detail create a foundation on which a thematic fear and loathing of the realities of onetime historic period and expiry is built. Urbino'due south idea that the city has undergone drastic alter since the days of his youth serves as a like straw for the thematic animosity towards aging and the unwelcome metamorphosis it necessitates.

and then now nosotros can all experience similar literature students once more :)

I take to say that I enjoyed this book, but more often than not because of the dazzler of the language. I wasn't all that impressed with the actual story.

Was I supposed to like Florentino? Because I didn't. He left a trail of devastation behind him in his quest to fill the emptiness in his life. Two people died because of him? How many illegitimate children did he have? As an illegitimate child, he should know how hard information technology is growing up in that time. I recall there was mention of at to the lowest degree one, simply I don't remember reading that he took any responsibility for it. Did he break up whatever marriages and and so exit women to fend for themselves? I have to recall it happened. And then at the end, the whole thing with his ward, America Vicuna. I know it was a unlike fourth dimension, just it actually simply freaked me out. Not only was she only 14, but he was responsible for her. Her parents had trusted him to take intendance of her. And he sleeps with her? And so she kills herself? I was hoping that she'd left a alphabetic character spelling it out. I merely didn't like him. But one time he and Fermina finally start getting together at the end, I relented a little flake. He seemed and so sweetness and then good for her. But I even so don't like him.

message 4: by Jaime (new)

I but finished this yesterday and I really didn't care for it much...I mean it was ok...but I didn't really bask it and probably wouldn't reccommend it. I sort of felt it more of a struggle to become through.

I didn't really feel for the characters and didn't like that Florentino was off sleeping w/ all these girls while he kept professing his dear for Fermina. I was also surprised that Dr. Urbino was sleeping w/ someone else while married to Fermina. That just made me like his character a little less.

All-in-all I estimate I just was not really expecting that stuff when I picked up the book...and so information technology was a piddling disappointing for me.

JG wrote: "I have to say that I enjoyed this book, merely mostly because of the dazzler of the language. I wasn't all that impressed with the bodily story.
Was I supposed to like Florentino? Because I didn't. ..."

Really, Gabriel Garcia Marquez said that if yous expect upon information technology as a simple love story, and so you've missed a lot of the book. The story is a nighttime i. To romanticize Florentino is to miss what the volume is maxim. Love isn't this perfect and pure thing. It's not the romantic ideal that Florentino imagines it to be, which is proven past the fact that he'due south anything merely the romantic ideal he imagines himself to be. Their love is non perfect. It's flawed. All dearest is. If you come abroad thinking that information technology was this perfect love story, and then you've missed the indicate. Florentino is a dark character. So, in truth, is Fermina. And Urbino...which is i of the reasons Urbino is somewhat repelled by the secret life of his friend who commits suicide at the start of the book. His friend's relationship holds a mirror upward to his ain.

I completely agree with y'all Jill! Honey in the Time of Cholera is much more than a love story. None of the books that I've read by GGM are that elementary. They all have a complex significant and can be interpreted in many ways.

My whole problem with Beloved in the Fourth dimension of Cholera is that it is not a love story at all. It is a story of obsession.
Love stories do not necesssarily crave white steeds and beautiful sunsets but they do require some sympathy for the connection between the 'lovers'.

As an anti-dearest story Wuthering Heights e'er springs to mind because for me it is a story of passion rather than dearest. Only although Cathy and Heathcliffe behave abominably towards i another and to those around them, their human relationship is compelling and believable.

In Honey in the Fourth dimension of Cholera a singularly unattractive and morally generate man stays true-blue in a spectacularly hypocritical way to the 'love of his life' - a petty, petulant woman who when immature led him to believe she loved him and so rejected him out of hand without a moment's consideration in favour of a wealthy husband and position in lodge.

The comparison of their human relationship to Cholera I find quite apposite equally it is a vicious disease that, through severe dehydration, not only weakens but dehumanises the sufferer.

I simply recently finished this book and thought I would get ahead and post my thoughts to this thread. I am disappointed to not see more comments. At any rate, I also was not highly impressed past the story. I wanted to strangle Florentino. His pining away for some idealized dearest drove me crazy. The way he carried on with his life rather disgusted me. He just seemed like a reclusive pervert. And the whole matter with American Vicuna reminded me so much of Lolita.

Did it drive anyone else crazy that throughout the book he kept using get-go and last names for the main characters rather than simply first OR last names?

I have to acknowledge that I did like the latter third of the book -- when they are both former and their real romance actually starts. The images of this old couple holding easily, getting to know each other and falling in love I found to be very touching. While the ending could be seen as a flake sappy, I rather liked that information technology left things up in the air in kind of a romanticized platonic kind of way.

While it will definitely not be 1 of my favorites, the writing was great and in that location are definitely certain scenes that will linger in my mind.

I read this book a few years ago and I actually like it. It is not only a love history, information technology is a portraid of the differents means (not always sweet and perfect)that men and women see the feeling of real dearest.

I haven't read this volume in a few years, merely I remember being very impressed. I am surprised at the negative feelings toward the volume only considering people did not agree with the main characters' morality. But I guess I should await at it to mean that people aren't blindly praising it.

Anyway, every bit unnerving as it might sound, I couldn't help only relate to the nature of the characters. Dear (or what i calls love even if it isn't) can bulldoze people to human action in crazy, despicable ways...to devastation and self-destructive habits....Simply I think that is the grotesque beauty of the volume.

Andrew - I similar your point almost how the volume showed the myriad ways that dearest can impact people and make people human action. That definitely comes through. For me, the morality of the chief character didn't really bother me and so much - anybody is what and who they are. It was more than the very narrow, almost introspective focus of the plot effectually obsessive dear and the lives involved. It was that narrow obsessiveness of Florentino for Fermina that bothered me. But, I think that says more about me (and my stubborn refusal to let anyone or anything external control my life) than it does nearly the book.

Have yous read other Gabriel Garcia Marquez books? If so, how exercise you lot experience this ane compares to some of his others?

I have non read other Marquez books - though I plan to - but I take read a number of his brusque stories. Those were very...weird. Especially in his early ones, they evoke that sense of magical realism, in which the mundane is entangled with the surreal/supernatural. One, "Eva Is Inside Her Cat," takes place over 1,000 years, if I retrieve correctly, but it is limited to i character, one location.

I retrieve that sense of reality being dizzying and frightening is reflected even in the non-magical "Love in the Time of Cholera." If y'all expect at all these love diplomacy and dysfunctional relationships every bit a way of looking at both the cruelty and the pleasure inherent in life, as taking the prosaic details of life and transforming them into something epic like Florentino's "obsessional dear," the characters might not seem and so offensive.

I accept just read Marquez's 100 years of Confinement. I demand to try some of his other work. This book is and then different from 100 years in that 100 years had then much going on in it - so many characters and different plot threads in improver to the magical realism. The complexity in this book is definitely much more subtle. This is i of those books that a group discussion can help you lot run across different angles and perspectives within it.

message xiv: by Tango (new)

I read this ane a few months ago. I was distracted past the quote from Oprah on the encompass of my copy claiming 'One of the greatest love stories I accept ever read.' This description is so incorrect. I liked Dr Urbino much more than Florentino (for me this was the real love story with all of the ups and down of their human relationship). Whereas Florentino's 'love' was really an unhealthy obsession, but i that Garcia Marquez decided to ultimately reward him for.

Tango - I like your statement about an unhealthy obsession that Florentino was rewarded for in the finish. I kind of felt the same way. I estimate some other way to look at it, though, is that persistence (especially obstinate persistence...) pays off in the end.

message 16: past Jill (last edited Mar 28, 2009 10:45PM) (new)

Hi. I read this concluding summertime. I think throughout the story, GGM compares honey to illness. "Beloved sick" meant different distorted scenarios for various characters. We don't actually empathize with anyone.

I disagree that the catastrophe is happy. Although Fermina and Florentino are finally together, they are too one-time. He fifty-fifty comments that she smells old and is not longer attractive once they finally have sexual activity. The deteriorated shore line reflects the main characters themselves. Just as in their lives from the start, the only way they can exist together is segregated from the residuum of the world declaring themselves to be "ill" with Cholera. They deserve each other.

Jill

While the ending may not be happy in a traditional sense, it is happy in its own way. Some might perceive love as being in a different world - two people separated from society by their love. While both Florentino and Fermina realize this is not an idealized dear, it has transcended from being something explicit (such equally physical allure) to something more intangible, instinctual, subtle. They are going against the grain of society past perhaps being too old to fall in dear. But actually, they find sustenance and comfort in having someone to spend their final days with. And then, I would agree that GGM is perhaps comparing love to illness but I don't agree that the ending is wholly unhappy.

message eighteen: past Nancy (new)

What a cute transporting read, from the very first folio. Fifty-fifty better than the vivid movie.

I only finished this and was really unhappy with the fact that Florentino concluded up winning her over. I completely hold with those who mentioned that it was an unhealthy obsession, and actually it continues equally they stop up more than or less imprisioned on a boat nether the cholera flag, so that he has managed to possess her abroad from the world. I honestly would accept been happier if when she refused to talk to him on the phone that was the end of it.

However, is some ways I would call this a honey story, not between the two of them, more to the fact every bit dear exists all forms, often where you least expect it. For Florentino, at that place were many women in his life that loved him despite the way he treated them. Fermina didn't seem to expect honey in her life, yet she was fiercely loyal to her aunt, and constitute slap-up love with both her married man and sunday.

I both liked this book and hated information technology. This is not a love story. It's similar calling Wuthering Heights a love story. They're both obsession stories. I agree with Esther, though, that Heathcliff and Catherine were more conceivable than Florentino and Fermina.

Florentino was incredibly unlikeable, especially the ickiness with Americana at the end. But even earlier that he got a woman killed and barely hesitated to keep doing what had gotten her killed (sleeping with married women).

The simply upside was the writing was beautiful and it had the same kind of wackiness every bit Catch-22. In fact, it felt like a weird combo of Catch-22 and Wuthering Heights.

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