. Spinning .

Another thing I find in Marquez is an ability to put the human element into a very relative form amid the routine lives of his characters, so that we understand their behavior in more traumatic events.  I love this segment about Dr. Urbino and his wife, Fermina Daza in the early years of their marriage, which reveals a bit of gameplaying that endures in their relationship in condensed form in their early morning rising: he early, noisy; she later, pretending sleep.  But it displays one of those turning points in a marriage where control and compromise is established:

The truth was they both played a game, mythical and perverse, but for all that, comforting; it was one of the many dangerouse pleasures of domestic love.  But one of those trivial games almost ended the first thirty years of their life together, because one day there was no soap in the bathroom.  (p. 17)

Marquez has injected a bit of humor here, and yet truth, as the biggest annoyances are usually over the smallest but most persistent aggravations.  Dr. Urbino has risen and bathed in the dark of early morning, while Fermina is in her half-awake state in bed:

After a prolonged sound of starched linen in the darkness, Dr.  Urbino said to himself:  "I’ve been bathing for almost a week without any soap."

Then, fully awake, she remembered, and tossed and turned in fury with the world because in fact she had forgotten to replace the soap in the bathroom.  She had noticed its absence three days earlier when she was already under the shower, and had planned to replace it afterward, but then she forgot until the next day, and on the third day the same thing happened again.  The truth was that a week had not gone by, as he said to make her feel more guilty, but three unpardonable days, and her anger at being found out in a mistake maddened her.  As always, she defended herself by attacking.

"Well I’ve bathed every day," she shouted, beside herself with rage, "and there’s always been soap."

Sound familiar?  People, often fed up with other things that have accumulated over time, decide to take a stand and sadly, it’s often when they’re on the shakiest ground.

So Dr. Urbino and his wife carry this argument around for a while, allowing it to disturb their life much more that it should be allowed to do.  Dr. Urbino, who for four months has been sleeping in the study, falls asleep one night on their bed while reading.  Fermina attempts to wake him so that he will leave, but Dr. Urbino is only half awake and finds himself very comfortable in their bed.

"Let me stay here," he said.  "There was soap."

Gabriel Garcia Marquez just has a way with making the mundane exciting.  His characters are carefully drawn out–I can imagine him sitting there thinking about them until he has someone whom he knows the reader will want to think about.  Not understand, mind you, but definitely think about. 

I’m about seventy pages into the book, past the first chapter and into some backstory but I couldn’t stop reading long enough to sit and review it.  But this, the description of the main character of the first chapter, Dr. Juvenal Urbino is an example of the care that is taken:

His eightieth birthday had been celebrated the year before with an official three-day jubilee, and in his thank-you speech he had once again resisted the temptation to retire.  He had said:  "I’ll have plenty of time to rest when I die, but this eventuality is not yet part of my plans."  Although he heard less and less with his right ear, and leaned on a silver-handled cane to conceal his faltering steps, he continued to wear a linen suit, with a gold watch chain across his vest, as smartly as he had in his younger years.  His Pasteur beard, the color of mother-of-pearl, and his hair, the same color, carefully combed back with a neat part in the middle, were faithful expressions of his character.  (p. 5)

Now knowing that the suit is white (and dressed in white linen with a vest and a soft hat and cordovan boots – p.9), I imagine him looking somewhat like the Colonel of Kentucky Fried Chicken.  But there is that air of old-time elegance and class.  There is a meticulousness about him that tells by his dress that would extend beyond and into an integral part of his personality. 

But what is Marquez saying about Dr. Urbino in marking his appearance as "faithful expressions of his character?"  Marquez certainly wants us to go back and reread this short passage to come to understand the man.  In 100 Years of Solitude, Marquez did not give us such physical descriptions and yet we came to picture the characters, mainly by their behavior and their eccentricities.  I believe that he is doing the same here, but in the reverse.  Imagine, and therefore, know.

Though I didn’t mention it, my amazon.com order came in yesterday and I’ve already added and moved around things on my reading list (lower right sidebar) to reflect the changes.  It’s tough to stay away from them and I did some peeking, but Marquez was ordered specifically to read along with a buddy; Mark of Clearwater Reflections is going to read it as well now.  We’ll be starting in a couple of days so look for some good literary argument.  You’re all invited to join on in!

This should be fun!