23 pages • 46 minutes read
Gabriel García MárquezA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Early in the story, the narrative pauses its forward action to give a detailed description of the cage. When a literary work showcases the details of a visual art form, it is called ekphrasis. This type of description exists in literary works as old as Homer’s ancient Greek epic The Iliad, in which the filigree and figures on Achilles’s shield are described in elaborate detail. García Márquez’s description of the cage highlights the act of looking and evaluating, which the characters of the story constantly engage in as they determine who has wealth, status, and value in the community. It also emphasizes the unique beauty of the cage and the skill its creation required, heightening the stakes of Balthazar’s payment.
Information about the characters, their histories, and their actions reaches the reader through a third-person omniscient narrator. An omniscient narrator knows everything about the action and scenes of a story, and can impart information to the audience that the characters themselves do not know or cannot see. This technique was used in many 19th-century realist works, in which narration moralized the conflicts and drama of stories to impart the writer’s views.
By Gabriel García Márquez
A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings
A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings
Gabriel García Márquez
Chronicle of a Death Foretold
Chronicle of a Death Foretold
Gabriel García Márquez
Death Constant Beyond Love
Death Constant Beyond Love
Gabriel García Márquez
Eyes of a Blue Dog
Eyes of a Blue Dog
Gabriel García Márquez
In Evil Hour
In Evil Hour
Gabriel García Márquez
Innocent Erendira
Innocent Erendira
Gabriel García Márquez
Leaf Storm
Leaf Storm
Gabriel García Márquez
Love in the Time of Cholera
Love in the Time of Cholera
Gabriel García Márquez
Memories of My Melancholy Whores
Memories of My Melancholy Whores
Gabriel García Márquez
News of a Kidnapping
News of a Kidnapping
Gabriel García Márquez
No One Writes To The Colonel
No One Writes To The Colonel
Gabriel García Márquez
Of Love And Other Demons
Of Love And Other Demons
Gabriel García Márquez
One Hundred Years of Solitude
One Hundred Years of Solitude
Gabriel García Márquez
One Of These Days
One Of These Days
Gabriel García Márquez
Strange Pilgrims
Strange Pilgrims
Gabriel García Márquez
The Autumn of the Patriarch
The Autumn of the Patriarch
Gabriel García Márquez, Transl. Gregory Rabassa
The General in His Labyrinth
The General in His Labyrinth
Gabriel García Márquez
The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World
The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World
Gabriel García Márquez
The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor
The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor
Gabriel García Márquez