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  • Essay / Marquez's use of cyclical time in One Hundred Years of Solitude

    Narrative structures vary from novel to novel as a technique that aids plot advancement and enhances clarification of devices literary used throughout history. In the novel One Hundred Years of Solitude, traditional or linear narrative time structures and cyclical narrative time structures work simultaneously to emphasize the recurring destructive behaviors of the Buendía family. A linear narrative structure “follows a straight line — starting at the beginning, going toward the middle, and going to the end of the story”; follows a line of movement comprising an ongoing plot, with somewhat typical exposition, rising action, a climax, and a denouement. However, One Hundred Years of Solitude is not a novel that relies primarily on a linear narrative structure. In fact, the structure of this novel also includes a cyclical narrative. Cyclical time "runs through the story one event at a time to end where the story originates" and repeatedly brings the reader back to key events in the plot to emphasize the impact on the characters. In his novel One Hundred Years of Solitude, Garcia Marquez implements the technique of cyclical time to increase the intensity of recurring destructive behaviors across the generations of a small metaphorical village. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay Garcia Marquez uses the device of repetition, through the names and personalities of specific characters, in order to display an unusual series of chance events in a cyclical context. structure. These events are seen as distinctive and incendiary in the destruction of normal society. In the novel, there are a total of five characters who share the name José Arcadio and, as described by Ursula - one of the main characters in the novel - possess "impulsive and enterprising" characteristics associated with mischievous behavior, capable inviting trouble and often leading to a negative effect on the environment (Márquez 181). Marquez's establishment of recurring names and similar personalities across the characters causes the negative outcomes that occur during the plot cycles. Marquez once again presents repetition in the novel with the inclusion of twenty-two characters named Aureliano. These men are defined as possessing a “closed but lucid” mind, characteristics that contrast sharply with those of José Arcadio (Márquez 181). Marquez's reintroduction of Aureliano's characters ironically advances the plot as Aureliano attempts to restore Macondo to the village's previous state. However, this instead creates a crisis and sets up another subplot that triggers a new cycle. The reappearances of these two characters and their polar actions trigger the destructive behaviors that occur historically and repeatedly in the novel. These cyclical generations produce negative results for the people of Macondo, forcing them to repeat disastrous events that ultimately lead them towards their own demise. The destructive and recurring event of incest, also known in the novel as "original sin", introduces and concludes each narrative cycle. He embodies the unnatural actions that the majority of characters in the novel must endure. Incest further becomes the main cause of disastrous abnormal characteristics in the Buendia family. Due to the tragedy of a past incestuous event in the Buendía family when "[an] aunt of Ursula married an uncle of JoséArcadio Buendía, [and had] a son… grew up with a cartilaginous tail shaped like a corkscrew. and with a small tuft of hair at the tip,” Ursula and José Arcadio Buendía are exiled from their village of origin (Márquez 36). This action in the plot cycle was driven by the fear of Ursula's mother, who believed that pigtails were an inevitable consequence of incest. This incestuous event marks the beginning of the "original sin", thus initiating its recurrence in the plot of the novel. As the incest takes place within the Buendía family, it serves as a catalyst for the rebirth of each new cycle, notably foreshadowing the imminent destruction of the characters and the village. While the event of incest marks the beginning of each cycle, the consequences of incest - the pig's tail - serve as a symbol for the annihilation of a cycle that lasts only one hundred years. Throughout the incestuous events that occur during six instances among the novel's five generations of characters, none of the characters deal with the fate of a pig-tailed child. Thus, the cycle continues and regenerates throughout the plot, until the end of the novel when Aureliano and Amaranta's child Úrsula is born. When their child was born, they “turned him on his stomach [and saw] that he had something more than other men, and they bent down to examine him… [it] was a pig tail.” Ursula mentions in the novel that “the tail could be cut off when the child had its second tooth”; however, the couple was unaware of the family's history, so the resulting action led to the child keeping his tail permanently. The consequence of incest is the conclusion of the cycle of circular intrigue and torment of the Buendía family. Incest is an act that defies social norms; therefore this is the reason why the characters seem destructive and act as facilitators towards their own demise in the novel. As the story of the Buendía family plays out, the novel's characters become familiar with the absurdity of their current situations. However, such characters do not bring awareness to these irrational cyclical events. In the novel, “Ursula confirms her impression that time goes in circles” (Márquez 220). She feels “as if time had reversed and [they] had gone back to the beginning” (Márquez 335). Ursula is one of the few characters who notices the repetition of strange events in her village, but she takes no direct initiative to stop the cycle; just like other characters throughout the village's turbulent history. Likewise, José Arcadio Buendia becomes aware of the absurdity of time, apparently recurring, as he begins to realize the repetition of days. He even states: “that it is always Monday, like yesterday… look at the sky, look at the walls, look at the begonias… [t]oday it is also Monday” (Márquez 77). He notices the relationship between the past and the present which has not undergone change. Like Ursula, he does not attempt to put an end to recurring events or talk more about similar events; thus, José Arcadio Buendía allows these events to run through the plot and recreate misfortune after misfortune. Characters who recognize catastrophic events, but make no conscious effort to stop them; resemble the destructive naturalistic story of the metaphorical village. The advancement of the plot of One Hundred Years of Solitude relies on the regeneration of cycles within a linear narrative structure. At the end of the novel, when the Buendías are swept off the face of the earth by a hurricane, the last character, Aureliano, “wandered aimlessly through the city” (Márquez 413). Since the Buendías aim to retrace the history of their :.