“I had a very confused memory of the festival before I decided to rescue it piece by piece from the memory of others” (43).
We
will pay a lot of attention to the reliability of narrators in all the
books we read. Discuss what you think are the biggest problems with the
narrator’s reliability, and how an understanding of these problem can
lead to a greater understanding of the novel’s themes.
Throughout the novel, the reader is bombarded with the perceptions and opinions of a first-person narrator who, despite obvious attempts to remain impartial in his investigative reporting, relates an account that consistently includes conjecture, personal bias, and conflicting versions of the fateful event. Perhaps the most glaring problem with the narrator's reliability is that the storyteller himself is a mere bystander, an observer whose credibility is marred by the human propensity for error. Unlike the definite, unprejudiced facts and insights provided by an omniscient, third-person narrator, the details outlined by an onlooker are sure to be rife with misconceptions, oversights, and exaggerations. Therefore, the reader is left to wonder which of the story’s components actually occurred and which were imagined by the writer and his compatriots, lending a facet of uncertainty to the novel’s tone.
ReplyDeleteFurthermore, the unreliability of the narrator is promulgated by the bias that comes as a result of the closeness between the victim, Santiago Nasar, and the storyteller. The bond present between the two, evident in the fact that the pair spent the last night of Nasar’s life together, produces a narrative tarnished by a tendency to champion the victim, even if this sway is subconscious. Indeed, for much of the novel, the writer subtly implies that Santiago is not guilty of the crime for which he is so brutally punished. In one poetic passage, the author refers to the declaration of Santiago as the individual responsible for the transgression against Angela Vicario as a “well-aimed dart.” This metaphor carries with it the implication this act was carefully calculated, with Angela using Santiago as a scapegoat, pinning the blame on someone who could conceivably have committed the sin while protecting the man truly responsible. The final flaw in the narrator’s reliability is the lack of one proven account of what occurred before the murder. Instead of compiling his research into one comprehensive and conclusive report, he presents several individual accounts that often conflict with one another on trivial matters, such as the weather. The discrepancies between the stories could perhaps insinuate that the writer has little regard for the lesser details that comprised the day of the murder.
When the reader takes into account the unreliability of the narrator, the underlying theme of uncertainty that permeates the novel becomes more apparent. Throughout the narrative, the reader is left with questions. Who is truly responsible for the crime for which Nasar pays the ultimate penalty? Why were Nasar’s fellow citizens wholly untroubled by his predicament? It seems only natural that the enigma that surrounds the novel’s plot continues by means of the wholly unreliable nature of the narrator.
The narrator throughout the book relies on other people’s memories to bring his story to life. In doing this, the chances are great that many of these people, over the span of time, have memories that have become fabricated. This becomes a problem because no one can quite remember what happened. There was such a large amount of confusion on the day of the murder that no one knew more than a tiny part of the story, and it is not possible for all of the accounts of the day to fit together, like the narrator attempts to make happen. Because of this, many stories conflict, such as in the first chapter when everyone recounts the weather differently.
ReplyDeleteLittle is known about the narrator, and even his own memory of the day has probably been vastly altered and enhanced over time. This is, in itself, problematic along with the possibility that in telling the story he may have a biased opinion on the situation. He was a friend of the victim so facts may have unknowingly to him become distorted due to his having to deal with the loss of a companion.
He often includes stories about other characters within the novel, yet even less truth is known about those he writes about. A small backstory is usually provided, yet even those are often provided by another character within the story. Although the narrator has supposedly been studying the case for years, it is hard to completely rely on him with secondhand facts and small tidbits rescued from the court case. It is hard to tell, really, what is fact and what is simply speculation. With so many different views and stories from throughout the community from that day, it is difficult to know who to trust, as well as to keep up with the events in the story.
In understanding that the narrator was often changing perspectives to tell the story through others, one can attempt to greater understand the themes of the novel. The different perspectives, although causing problems, show some of the themes, such as that of honor. It would be hard to understand why the brothers had to kill Santiago, and why Bayardo was so mad at his wife if it were not seen from their perspectives. Their explanations help to reveal the theme of honor by explaining why they did what they did, to preserve their, and their families’, honor.
Another theme throughout the novel was that of the townspeople and their daily routines that all seemed to be altered on the day of Santiago’s death. Without the view of alternate people we would not have been able to see this. The varying of routines throughout the novel is what gives way to Santiago’s death, such as his leaving through the front door, which he hardly ever does. Many other people, such as the twins, had also varied in their daily routines when people noticed they were sharpening knives earlier than they were usually awake, something that should have been viewed more seriously. The compilations of these events, which we were able to see through the varying viewpoints, eventually led to Santiago’s very foretold death.
Finding the narrator reliable is a huge part of comprehending and believing a story. If you are constantly questioning whether something you’ve just read is fact or fiction, the story is usually very hard to follow. The narrator in Chronicle of a Death Foretold is very reliable for his own part, meaning he isn’t putting his own spin on what he has been told, but rather just transmits it to the reader. Although just one narrator, he is telling the voices of many. He knew Santiago personally for a long time before, so the details including what he wore and why he wore it aren’t surprising or come off as stalkerish. The narrator is subtle with these details though. The majority of the story is told as if the narrator were not a part of the story, but rather in a god like position, just looking down and observing. I first noticed when I realized all of the blips and shorter stories that compose the book begin, or sometimes end with, “she told me” or “he told me.”
ReplyDeleteThe reliability is definitely spotty in places. Because the narrator is compiling several people’s stories, there are always some differences. The first disagreement of truth occurs on the second page when the characters are attempting to recall the weather. Although a trivial detail, it immediately raises the readers suspicion as what else could be disagreed upon. This suspicion continues to raise as one notes that in most cases, the event being discussed could only be witnessed by one or two people. Most parts of the story are relying on a single person’s memory. The most concerning factor of the issue of unreliability is the time after the events occurred. Twenty-seven years passed. I can barely remember what happened five years ago, nonetheless twenty-seven years prior. This detail is easy to overlook though, nestled on the first page and not brought back up frequently. The supporting characters help hide this fact as well, they use assertive language, not saying, “Well, I suppose this could have happened..” or even bringing up how long ago the event occurred.
In conclusion, I find the actual narrator to be very reliable. He is in no way adding his own spin or biased views to the story. The other are where the problem lies. They are the ones that being asked to look back for more than a quarter of a century. Although a murder in a small town is a memorable event, the distortion of the story and deterioration of the facts occurred at some level.
There are a few major problems with the accuracy of the narrator in this novel. The first is that Santiago Nasar was killed twenty seven years before he recounts the story. The narrator is revisiting this strange incident from his past by piecing together his story with the pieces he gathers from talking with others. The time that elapsed between the crime and the narration of this story leads to significant problems in the accuracy of his story. One obvious factor that may affect the accuracy is that people may have forgotten the details of the event, because it has been so long since the crime. People probably talked to each other about the events of the day, and what one person tells another may affect what he remembers about the Santiago’s death. If this phenomenon occurred, it would not only change what people remembered, but it would also cause the inaccuracies to be spread throughout the community. Another problem is that some people who may remember important details about his death have died since the incident. We know for a fact that Victoria Guzmán died, and there are many others that he mentions throughout the course of the book that died before he was able to talk to them.
ReplyDeleteAside from obvious factors that may affect the narrator’s accuracy, the author gives us a few hints that we may be dealing with an unreliable narrator. The first is that there is no consensus about the weather. Many people think that the weather was “funereal” on the day of Santiago’s death, but some do think that the weather was nice (4). This is a clue that shows us that some of the details of the story may have been marred by time. The second clue comes from Divana Flor. The narrator talked to her on two separate occasions, and the second time, she changed her story due to her mother’s death (11). After her mother died, Divana told the narrator that her mother did not warn Santiago because she wanted him to die. This shows that not every person that the narrator talks to will be truthful with him. If one person is willing to lie to him, then there are certainly many others. For example, someone may not tell him how much they knew about Santiago’s death because that person does not want the narrator to think it was his or her fault. When Márquez reveals that one person lies, he is telling us that any of the people in town could be lying to protect themselves, even the narrator himself.
While reading the novel, the story recounted by the narrator reads as a fun, tentative fable that is now being recapped through a biased and first-person filter. I concur with Janet, however, in that the narrator isn't merely conjuring up invalid facts to add a level of interest in the story, but is simply relaying what he knows and experienced to the reader in his own voice, causing many of the unsure details to be the fault of others. The reliability is still quite questionable in many respects, one major one being that it has been twenty seven years since Santiago Nasar's death, creating room for inaccurate memory recall and splotchy, unexplainable gaps in the plot line.
ReplyDeleteThough this unseen, seemingly omniscient narrator strives to tell the story with as much accuracy and remaining as unbiased as possible, his close relationship with Nasar proves this to be difficult in many cases, as well as his recounting of "eyewitness accounts" of other members of the village, in turn leaving the memory fueling the story not only filtered through time and memory, but the viewpoints of multiple people. One of the most revealing lines of the uncertainty is on page 29 when the narrator states, "Three people who had been in the boardinghouse confirmed that it had taken place, but four others weren't sure." More people did not see it than those who did. This contradiction among witnesses is prevalent in multiple instances throughout the duration of the book and leaves the reader to wonder what his purpose was in including them, if it's not completely factual information. Is it just to suggest that it could only possibly be true, or maybe to emphasize the importance of fate in the destiny of those involved? It remains up to the reader's own interpretation.
In understanding and accepting the faults intrinsic this unseen narrator's recount of the story, we can then begin to appreciate the memories as they are and the importance they hold, such as leaving us with a more in-depth understanding of the roles of fate, culture, and honor. All characters in the book were intertwined with similar cultural and honorable norms, apparent in the fact that the twins didn't want to kill Santiago, but were forced by the enduring force of family honor. Amidst the multiple perspectives, lengthy time lapse, and complications in the contradictions between spectators, the important thing to bear in mind is that the intention in retelling the story and the message carried with it is not, in any respect, diminished.
The quote above is a perfect example demonstrating how unreliable the narrator is. Why did he have a "very confused memory of the festival"? Because he as many of the other townspeople were drunk. His attempt to recall Santiago's death is futile. One, he is recounting the event twenty years later; two, he was drunk the day of the tragedy; and three, the accounts of the townspeople are ambiguous and inconsistent.
ReplyDeleteThese problems best contribute to understanding one the themes in the novel: gossip. Garcia Marquez delves into the human nature of gossip and memory. We see a transformation and distortion of the memory of Santiago's death. From disagreements on what the weather was like to not knowing Santiago had gone into his fiance's (Flora Miguel) house whilst in plain site, the narrator and citizen accounts are wholly unreliable. People tend to exaggerate and highlight certain parts of stories, and after so many years little truth is left, yet we believe it as truth. This is the root of rumors, lies and gossip. The only fact the reader undoubtably knows is true is that Santiago is dead. The rest, however, is left up for speculation but not verification. Sometimes the truth will never be known as much as human nature wants to know and attempt to provide a reason, we will never know; and this is what I think Marquez tries to convey to the reader, that not all truth can be known, which is only verified by an unfulfilled and unanswered ending.
First of all, I love the Dali selection The Persistence of Memory.
ReplyDeleteThe problem with the "pieces" of information regarding the festival is the subjectivity factor. With different people with different points of view, the events that transpired will all be perceived a different way. These different perceptions could contain a degree of truthfulness, but a faultless recount of the festival from anyone is very unlikely. So, bit and pieces will be added or left out from the beginning of the night until the end all based on perceptions. Also, memory works in a mysterious way. Most of the time it seems that an individual's memory consists of good things or very important things. Lesser details perceived often fade very fast when revisiting a scene with your mind, but these same lesser details to someone could in fact be large details truthfully, but distorted due to the perception. From the memories of others, though, the narrator gathers what they think is the bulk of the story. The problems of reliability do indeed expose one thing: what stuck out to each person. This knowledge really exposes the gullible and lazy theme of the book. All these people remember countless individuals knowing of the plot to kill Santiago, and these individuals either did not believe such a thing could happen, or would not make an extra effort to go out of their way to possibly save Santiago's life. So, this unreliability in a sense has pros and cons, like most everything in life.
The narrator himself admits that he does not remember a certain event well and had to rely on accounts from other people. How do we know if he remembered other events correctly. If he was confused about one memory, he very well could have been confused about several other memories. We see early on that people are uncertain about what happened on the day of Santiago's death because of conflicting stories. If the narrator had to piece information together from these same people, then there is a good chance that the information he gathered is not completely true.
ReplyDeleteIn most occasions, it is better to have multiple people give their accounts of an event, but this is not one of those scenarios. The people recalling what happened only lead to more confusion because they are completely unable to get there stories straight. It would be better to just have one reliable and unbiased person recall what happened. Unfortunately, it appears that no one is reliable in regards to telling this story, so the reader must take what they are told with a grain of salt.
Chronicle of a Death Foretold is based on a story recalled by memories. The actual story would have taken place at least twenty years previous. Even the narrator states that some of his memory is fuzzy. The readers rely on the narrator so if the narrator doesn’t know all the details neither will the reader. The narrator is filling in the missing pieces by other islanders who knew of the events to come that day. As mentioned before, the event took place at least twenty years prior and if the narrator is missing some of the story then so would the others.
ReplyDeleteAlso, the islanders could be lying because they want to hide their involvement of the death of Santiago. For example, Victoria Guzman had told the narrator that she hadn’t known the twins were waiting to kill him but her daughter later stated that her mother did know. She hid this knowledge because she wanted to hide the fact that she wanted Santiago died. Thus, when readers rely on people to fill them in on the story, it will be questionable on whether it is fully truthful or not.
The novel’s themes are recalling the event and the actions each islander took when they found out what the Vicario twins were going to do. If we know that the narrators recounts are a little flawed then the readers understand that each person has a slightly different story because they may not remember or don’t want to remember the entire truth.
The narrator compiles his story from many witnesses, whether they be bystanders or the killers themselves. This allows for a margin of error, yet I think it is not the narrator who should be distrusted. We can assume he, the narrator, to the best of his ability has taken all logical information from every witnesses story and correctly assembled the facts into one account. If our time is spent distrusting the narrator our chances of walking away with a muddle "moral of the story" is greater. If one is to question any person in the story it should be the witnesses themselves.
ReplyDeleteTime unfortunately had the chance to seep in to the individuals minds and change or even erase details. Recalling any aspect of an affair 27 years prior, unless properly recorded soon thereafter, greatly affects any story no matter how tragic.
Also personal relation to the victim, Santiago Nasar, can heighten some aspects. The desire to fabricate a story in order to facilitate a stronger emotion upon the audience is greater than telling the less desirable truth. Therefore a friend to Santiago's story may be more dramatic than the killers recollection of the sequence of events.
There are times where even trivial details are argued upon causing even more question upon the validity of the story. In the beginning some say the weather to be sunny and to others it was raining. Though this is no important detail, other details that hold a higher regard to the story's development could have been argued over like this one.
In short, I agree with Janet's view of the narrator. When all attention is focused on distrusting the narrator of the story or questioning the validity of the details, the magic of reading a tragedy will wain and enjoyment of the story will be lost.
There are a few factors that contribute to the narrator’s unreliability in Chronicle of a Death Foretold: his drunkenness before the scene of the crime, the large amount of time that has passed, and his not actually being with Santiago for the majority of the story. However, the fact that the narrator has admitted to not being perfectly able to recount the details of this murder, gives the novel ethos by showing the reader that this tale has been verified by many instead of simply one author. In my opinion, the narrator in this novel was not particularly unreliable. The writing felt factual and concrete and the sources all agreed on the same passage of events and the narrator was very honest not only about his own actions, but the actions of those around him which gave him and his story credibility and understanding.
ReplyDeleteI disagree with my classmate, Sydney, about the underlying theme of uncertainty. When I read this novel and noted the “misconceptions, oversights, and exaggerations,” I did not immediately distrust the author for writing a story that was a bit fantastical. Instead, I thought that these details furthered the idea that fate was in complete control of Santiago Nassar’s death. Fate and premonition are huge themes in Chronicle of a Death Foretold and every random aspect of this book that seems too perfect to be true is not a sign of an untrustworthy story teller, but of the tight strings “fate” has on our every move. For this reason I did not think the narrator unreliable, but for time and emotional attachment: yes.
In this novel the reader is immediately made aware of the friendship between the narrator and Santiago. Because of this, the narrator discusses many times Santiago’s attractive completion and charming personality and other descriptive details that paint Santiago to be a generally well-liked, sensible, and amiable young man. Were this story told by someone who had never known Santiago, or even someone who despised him, the murder would not have hit the reader so hard. The events leading up to the murder are so full of the hope of escape that it is excruciating to watch Santiago, a character the reader has been made to like, walk straight into his death. This positive opinion of Santiago was crafted in the minds of the readers by the narrator and adds to the narrator’s unreliability; how can the reader properly judge the situation with a biased view of the main character?
The narrator admits in this passage that he does not remember the event very well. Although this may seem to give the author some ethos, there are many factors that contradict his credibility of telling a true story. The author's ethos is lost for many reasons: one is nearly the whole town was drunk from the wedding party the night before and many of the main characters slept little, if any. Second, the death of Santiago is being recounted twenty years later. This fact I believe constitutes the most unreliability to the story's truth. Recounting details from one specific day after that amount of time causes the reader to feel less confident in the viability of the stories. Finally, the fact that all of the accounts are different also urges the reader to question the viability of the characters and the narrator.
ReplyDeleteAlthough all of these factors do hurt the narrator's ethos, this does add two aspects that are missing in the novel, mystery and suspense. Due to the fact that the author reveals the fate of Santiago in the beginning of the novel, this does give the reader a factor of the book to ponder and attempt to piece together.
In this passage, the narrator admits to having an unreliable memory with regards to details. Part of me looks at this and thinks “then why the heck are you trying to tell the story?”. I then take a step back and think about Marquez’s intentions of this statement. A first-person narrator does not always appear as a “mortal” source that has mistaken or unclear memories. So there must be reason behind Marquez’s choice regarding a shaky narrator. I feel that one of the best explanations of this is that it gives a very realistic and humanistic aspect to the novel. Who could remember every detail about an event that happened twenty years ago? Marquez could have simply chosen to use narration that was untainted, and many authors have chosen to do so. I don’t feel that this makes their works any less admirable, but I feel that this make Marquez’s more admirable. To produce a recollection of events that is so realistic must be difficult and is something that should be lauded.
ReplyDeleteI can’t help but think of William Faulkner’s The Sound and the Fury. His four-part masterpiece is comprised of very realistic, as well as individualistic, interpretations of the events throughout the life of the Compton family. One of the sections is from the point of a mentally-handicapped member of the family and provides an in-depth/realistic experience of life. This style can sometimes be difficult to read (Faulkner’s more so than Marquez’s), but is rewarding and forces the reader to delve into the book. This can also allow for reader interpretation.
Marquez’s choice of narration is also beneficial because the narrator was a friend to Santiago. This even furthers the idea of the narrator’s relevance. Only a friend could tell this story appropriately (and “appropriately” doesn’t mean accurately, it means more of a realistic and meaningful experience regarding the story of Santiago’s death).
Also, a somewhat aside detail: I feel that the “premonition” blog can be reasoned by this narration style as well. The first thing that comes to someone’s mind before telling a story that is already happened is the point at which the story is aimed (in this case, the death of Santiago). Therefore, the narrator felt appropriate to tell us about Santiago’s death before divulging the details surrounding the situation.