If we say that the Colombian writer Gabriel García Márquez is the contemporary Latin American writer most familiar to Chinese readers, I think no one will raise any objections.This is not only because he was the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1982, and he was the chief representative writer of Latin American new novels, or "literary explosion" in the 1960s and 1970s, but also because his world-renowned novels were still in the early 1980s. It was translated into Chinese (so far there have been four Chinese translations), and has been distributed in large quantities in our country; and his other works such as "Dead Branches and Fallen Leaves", "Evil Hour", "The Fall of the Patriarch", "No One Gives Him The Captain Who Wrote Letters, The Moment of Death, Kidnapped,,,, Love and Other Devils, and almost all of his short stories have been translated into Chinese.It can be said that García Márquez is one of the writers who "follow" translation and "follow" research in my country. In this way, it is easy to understand that his influence on Chinese readers is extensive and profound.

For this little collection we have selected his novellas and short stories, "The Innocent Erendira and the Cruel Grandmother", all of which are unique masterpieces of his style. Let's start with an introduction. On September 11, 1976, on the third anniversary of the Chilean military coup, García Márquez declared a "literary strike" in protest, vowing not to publish novels until Pinochet fell.A silence is five years.It was not until 1981, when it was rumored that in view of his literary value, that as long as he published another new work, he could win the Nobel Prize in Literature, Marquez finally ended his "strike" and published a new work.Once the novel was published, it caused a huge sensation in the Spanish-speaking countries.The first edition of Columbia "Black Sheep" Publishing House alone printed 1.05 million copies and sold out within two weeks.The agency has also jointly printed 300,000 volumes with the Mexican "Diana" publishing house.At the same time, Argentina's "South America" ​​Publishing House and Spain's "Bruguera" Publishing House also printed a large number of books.Reprints were soon followed in Colombia and Spain.The total circulation is in the millions of copies.In addition, this book was translated into many languages ​​including Chinese in the year it was published.This situation is regarded as a miracle in the history of Latin American literature and publishing.García Márquez was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature the following year.

It describes real events that happened in 1951.Bayardo San Román, who came from a prominent family, came to a small town on the Caribbean Sea and fell in love with Angela Vicario, who was from a mediocre family.The rich man who "swimmed in money" bought the most luxurious house in the town for his bride and held a luxurious and grand wedding, thinking that he had bought happiness with money and unlimited power.However, on the wedding night, he found out that the bride was not a virgin. Frustrated, he divorced her back to her natal family a few hours later.The girl's mother was very annoyed, and immediately beat her daughter severely, and then called the girl's two older brothers to ask who broke her chastity.In desperation, the girl blamed it on a man named Santiago Nasser. The two brothers took the butcher's knife and brutally murdered Santiago Nasser, an innocent man, indiscriminately.A tragedy happened.

This kind of subject matter is almost untouched in Latin American literature, yet the facts it reflects are commonplace on the continent.An unmarried woman must remain a virgin or be abandoned; men, on the contrary, seem to be in and out of brothels as a teenager.This kind of "civilized product of patriarchal society-male chauvinism", the stereotype that women are men's tools, still seriously exists in Latin America.Critics believe that if García Márquez has dealt with a major theme through his masterpiece of magic realism, that is, with the history of the rise and fall of a Colombian family, it shows the culture, history, In all aspects of politics, if the tragedy of magic and reality, love and war, life and death is included, then through a small subject, that is, a murder in a small town, it bitterly mocks the powerful, ruthlessly exposes and criticizes The ignorance of feudal ethics, feudal thought, feudal concept, feudal superstition and vendetta reveals the social reality of Latin America profoundly from one aspect.This is where the social significance of this work lies.

As far as the artistic characteristics of the novel are concerned, García Márquez, who is famous in the literary circles all over the world for his masterpiece of magic realism, adopts the documentary method instead of his traditional writing method and style.Some critics said that if Truman Gabor and Norman Miller in the United States wrote reports in the style of novels, then García Márquez wrote novels in the way of reports.This is not without reason.However, it is not a news report in the usual sense, but is narrated in the first person, organically connecting complicated events and many characters together, and telling the story of this murder case through exquisite artistic cutting and ingenious conception. The background is set before and after a spectacular and gorgeous wedding, supplemented by the grand event of the bishop passing by the town by boat, with the activities of four families as the main line, interspersed with various types of characters from all over the town, with amazing imagination and creative talent , sublimating a commonplace phenomenon into a shocking tragedy, revealing a universal philosophy.In addition, the novel also breaks the traditional pattern of detective literature, instead of intentionally creating many suspense and mazes, it points out who is the victim in the first sentence, and then explains the reason for the murder and who is the murderer; The four words "publicity in advance" are meticulously carved, which can be described as original.He does not win by subjectively arranging twists and turns, but by coincidences one after another to keep readers' interest at the highest level.In this regard, García Márquez wrote in his literary talk "The Fragrance of Guava" published in May 1982: "In the book, I focus on discovering and expressing a series of Big and small coincidences. I described that tragedy should be avoidable, but at the same time I designed many coincidences to make it happen.” Also, it can be said that the author inherits the And carried forward the characteristics of ancient Greek tragedy.The "murderer" and "accomplice" of the tragedy are not one or two people, but all "related people".Latin American and Spanish literary critics spoke highly of it, thinking that this book alone is enough for García Márquez to compete with Garcilaso de la Vega, a great literati in the Spanish Golden Age, and one of the three ancient Greek tragedy writers. Comparable to Sophocles.

García Márquez himself said of him: "After I read the proofs, I never looked at the book again. I really didn't have the courage to reread it. My favorite is my latest book, namely ""The reason why it is my best work is that what I hope to write is achieved 100% and accurately. In my other works, I am drawn by the characters in the book and the theme I want to express. But in the novel, I wrote everything handily." "The Innocence of Erendira and the Cruel Grandmother" occupies a very important position in García Márquez's short stories.The author describes the story of a 14-year-old girl who was forced into prostitution by a money-grubbing black-hearted grandmother with delicate brushstrokes.The plot of the work is vivid and touching, which makes people tear up, and it is hard to put it down after reading.