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In “The Handsomest Drowned Man in
the World,” Marquez mockingly portrays the process in which people in the
village eulogize the dead body just by looking at his external features. As
soon as the women see the body, they all agree that he must have been a guy
called Esteban. They feel satisfied to know that he does not belong to any
other villages, and sigh, “Praise the Lord. He’s ours!” Even the men, who at
first think “the fuss was only womanish frivolity,” recognize that “it is not
necessary to repeat” that “he was Esteban,” when the dead man’s face is revealed
under the handkerchief. After the holy funeral of the man, in which the women
linger over trivial decoration because they don’t want to let go of him, the villagers
know that “everything will be different from then on” because they will make
Esteban’s memorial spread anywhere.
Most
of the analysis that I could find online argue that this story shows how the
village gets “inspired” and “positively influenced” by the existence of Esteban.
But, I completely disagree with this cliché explanation. I doubt that Marquez
tried to depict that Esteban, the magically enormous dead body, had a positive
impact on people. Rather, I contend that the whole story was a satirical
mockery of people’s pursuit of ostensible values in life. That the villagers begin
to praise the drowned body for its physical qualities (plus their mythical
belief and imagination purposefully projected on him) shows how they only value
external aspects; that they claim their lives’ being changed after meeting
Esteban portrays how easily people can get affected and change their overall
perspective on life.
On
the similar road, Marquez further criticizes the pretentious lives of people in
“A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings,” through the depiction of their changing
minds depending on the ostensible qualities of matter. At first the townspeople
including Pelayo and Elisenda pay much attention to the so-called angel, for he
has interesting physical features and is said to cure people suffering with
strange diseases. By selling the tickets for meeting the old man, Pelayo and
Elisenda earn a lot of money. Consequently, the old man with wings becomes
nothing more than an animal in a circus show. People soon pay much more
attention to a “frightful tarantula the size of a ram and with the head of a
sad maiden” because she has more interesting stories to tell and responses
better. They treat the old man and the spider woman not as other human beings, but as different kinds of entertainment; they are not interested in what kind of "people" the man and the woman are, but how much they can get them interested. That the townspeople change their interest with so much frivolity,
depending only on the external features shows people’s capricious beliefs and how they lack the ability to look at people beyond the outlook.
Even
Father Gonzaga and the Catholic Church are only focusing on whether the old man
can speak Aramaic, the language of Jesus. Despite the common expectations on
church to be leading ordinary people to a higher place in terms of mental
complication, the church described in the story is only pursuing superficiality.
Like the portrayal of Catholic Church in “Araby” by James Joyce, church in the
story only maintains empty formalities and vanity. It not only seeks those
pretentious values, but also greatly influences people with its absolute power
of religion. Marquez mocks the reality of church in his times, which only bore
conservative authority rather than practical aids.
Throughout
both stories of magic realism, Marquez tries to deride people’s behavior in
which they don’t understand the greater significance of life, but just stay
with myopic vision of the world, following what they can get through their
senses and getting strong influences from superficial aspects of life.
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