“Furthermore:
all the many people he ran into after leaving his house at five minutes
past six and until he was carved up like a pig an hour later remembered
him as being a little sleepy but in a good mood, and he remarked to all
of them in a casual way that it was a very beautiful day. No one was
certain if he was referring to the state of the weather” (4).
Is
this an example of naturalism? How do you think the attention paid to
the weather in the first chapter relates to the narrative problem of the
novel?
I do not believe that Santiago’s nonchalant observation is necessarily an example of naturalism. Naturalism, a rhetorical device that an author employs to highlight nature’s indifference to human suffering, is often a fundamental aspect of many novels in which the story’s setting is divulged by an omniscient third-person narrator whose account is ordinarily concrete in detail and objective in tone. Because the writer of this story is unreliable in that he chronicles the observations of those present and incorporates his own skewed perceptions into the tale, it is unlikely that the impersonal technique of naturalism is used. Furthermore, the fact that the characters’ recollections of the weather differ greatly largely discounts the possibility that naturalism plays a role in the report of Santiago’s murder for several reasons. In one notable example, though the people that Santiago directly addressed may distinctly remember him commenting on the beauty of the day, eavesdropping bystanders may just as emphatically recall a disdainful remark lamenting the day’s dreariness. Had the fateful hour been gloomy, the occurrence would be considered a pathetic fallacy, in which the climate corresponds with the mood, or, in this case, the fate, of the protagonist. The uncertainty surrounding the day’s conditions suggest that other details of the story may be erroneous as well. It is this inconclusiveness that presents the problem of the narrative. The novel maintains some air of journalism, with terse diction and a matter-of-fact tone, but the illusion of consistent accuracy is diminished by the conflicting viewpoints of the characters. The opposing versions of the same tragedy lend to the story a feeling of infuriating enigma, leaving the novel seemingly incomplete by the omission of an entirely unbiased and factual report of the events that took place that morning.
ReplyDeleteYes, I believe this is an example of naturalism. The weather, although referred to several times, has no impact on the outcome of the murder, or any of the other characters stories, such as Bayardo San Román’s interrupted first night as a married man. The state of the weather is immediately discussed after this paragraph, and is concluded that no one is quite sure as to whether it was a rainy, “funereal” with a “drizzle” or if it in fact was a “radiant morning.” This being said, no matter the final conclusion of the weather, the events that occurred happened either way. To say that the weather did affect the events would be ludicrous as the events, as later told in the story, had been predetermined for a long time coming. Angela had planned whom she would blame for her impurity, as well as a well thought out reason for why. The event simply occurred as they pleased, in a chain reaction beginning with the wedding. This meaning if the wedding had been postponed so would have been the murder, being that Angela would remain undiscovered until the first night of her marriage.
ReplyDeleteThe weather is mentioned sporadically through the first chapter where the book is still elusive as to whether or not Santagio Nasar die, and the details of the wedding, other than the significant cost, have not been yet included. Yet when the weather is suggested to be unpleasant (Santagio “didn’t seem to be chilly…”) it leans the reader towards worse thoughts, yes he will be murdered, yes something must have gone wrong with the wedding, of course the Pope didn’t come on land because, it is raining after all. But the opposite is also true, “Many people coincided in recalling that it was radiant morning with a sea breeze...”. This can lead the reader to a more optimistic view, but unlike the decided state of the weather (gloomy with a drizzle) it is considered to be untrue. When the weather is viewed as clear skies and a quaint breeze, it often leads the reader to believe that nothing wrong can happen. In truth though, the weather on that day cannot be clearly remembered without some disagreement, again proving that the events would have occurred just the same either way.
Because the weather can often easily lead the readers opinion as to how the rest of the story will play out, I believe it relates quite well to the narrative problem. At the beginning of the story, the biggest narrative problem is will he be murdered? Perhaps a dark, rainy forecast would predict his stabbing. Although on the other hand wouldn’t it be ironic if there were rainbow and butterflies as he is brutally stabbed to death? Or perhaps the bright skies will provoke the killers to reconsider and wait a day, allowing for Santagio Nasar to be forewarned and protect himself, or at least escape such a dramatic fate. By the end of the beginning chapter, all of these questions have been answered, except for a defined state of the weather.
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ReplyDeleteThis passage can be viewed as an apt example of naturalism, while it also is representative of the main narrative problem of the novel. Multiple people described the day as beautiful, and those were mainly the people who had heard Santiago call it so. It’s beauty in the face of death show naturalism in that the weather was virtually indifferent to the fact that Santiago was to be murdered. Multiple other people, though, described the day as dreary. A possible explanation for the different accounts could be that the assault had taken so many years ago that the memories of those who had been present might have become skewed over the years. As a result, the sad memory is remembered as a sad day all around, including the weather.
ReplyDeleteNo matter what the weather would have been, rain or shine, the day’s events would have still played out in likely the same manner, showing again the indifference of the weather. Rain or shine the wedding would have still taken place and Bayardo would have still had been lied to by his new wife. People would have held the same feelings no matter the weather, and it is impossible to tell what the weather really was.
The attention to weather in the first chapter brings in the main narrative problem, by showing the narrator’s obsession with every small detail that may or may not be true. Instead of focusing on the facts to figure out what happened, the narrator includes rambling stories through a stream of consciousness technique ranging in different amounts of importance. The vast majority, though, could have been left out such as the types of guns Santiago owned or the history of how his father came to purchase his house.
Many stories and details were not even his own, and the problem then becomes piecing together multiple stories that no one can verify. You have to take supposed facts with a grain of salt, such as if it was raining or not, and focus on the story behind them. Although if proven true the small details could be important, the main problem they cause is that of an unreliable narrator.
I do not think that this passage, nor any passage in the book regarding weather, is an example of naturalism. Examples of naturalism in literature highlight nature’s indifference to humankind. An example of naturalism is a funeral that takes place on a bright, sunny day. The people at the funeral are in shambles emotionally, but the weather does not reflect the misery that the family and friends of the deceased are experiencing. In my opinion, the weather aspect of the book is the opposite of naturalism. In order for a passage to be considered naturalism, nature must ignore the actions of human beings, but in Chronicle of a Death Foretold, human beings do not care about the weather. It seems as though half of the town remembers that it was raining and half of the town remembers that the skies were clear. Even the killers have different recollections of the weather on that fateful day. Either the sky was clear or it was rainy on that day, and because public opinion is split fifty-fifty, half of the population of the town is wrong about the weather. In my opinion, no one remembers exactly what the weather was like. The weather was not as important as seeing Santiago Nasar himself. The people remembered the core event, but arbitrarily filled in unimportant details. As we all know, what we remember about an event and what actually happened are not necessarily the same event. Sometimes, we remember things that we never saw and forget things that we saw in broad daylight. Perhaps, half of the people in town wanted it to be raining on that day because it would make the scene more dramatic. Eventually, the original desire will be lost, and all that remains is a memory in which Santiago Nasar was killed on a rainy day. Perhaps some of them genuinely remembered what the weather was like. Either way, this proves that this passage is the opposite of naturalism because the more important part of the passage is what the people thought about the weather, not the weather’s indifference towards the people.
ReplyDeleteThis passage is consistent with the unreliable narration of this story. The narrator is writing all of these things down twenty seven years after Santiago Nasar’s death, so time has already stolen many of the details from the people who remember it. It is only natural that people do not remember what the weather was like on that day. After all, why should they? The weather took a passenger’s seat to Santiago’s death and Bayardo San Román’s humiliation.
Upon first glance, this passage can mistakenly appear to be employing the rhetorical device naturalism with the mention of Nasar's mood and the weather. On deeper reading, however, I concur with Gregory and Sydney that it can be determined that the narrator is not, in fact, utilizing naturalism, which emphasizes the role of environment upon human characters as well as its indifference to humankind. In this excerpt, rather than nature being indifferent to humankind, specifically the feelings of Santiago Nasar, it instead correlates with it. It states within the context that Nasar was "in a good mood," which parallels his remark "that it was a very beautiful day," mirroring rather than differentiating. If anything, this passage could be held as exceedingly ironic in that Nasar is in such a genial, content mood and that the weather is "beautiful" as opposed to dismal and Stygian, as one would assume on the eve of his death. This point is promulgated upon further reading preceding this passage where it is seen that no one person is entirely certain or in agreement on the state of the weather outside, causing reason to believe that there was no intention of the device naturalism in connection to the weather referred to here.
ReplyDeleteThat is not to say, however, that naturalism was not utilized in numerous other instances throughout the novel. Simply because the story wasn't told by an absolutely omniscient third-person narrator does not necessarily dictate that the "impersonal" tactic of naturalism cannot be used or make it unreliable; one man's voice with the addition of other perspectives tell the story, but Gabriel García Márquez is the author. The device is employed in multiple occurrences, for instance in the "medicinal leaves on her temples" (6) and the importance of Santiago's father passing down "the good arts of valor and prudence" (7). The prevalent topic of weather united with the tactfully uses of naturalism underscores the things that the characters do, act, and what they say. This brings us back to the narrative problem within the novel. In addition to the striking observation of the markedly different recollections of the weather regarding this passage, there are numerous instances throughout the first chapter pertaining to weather rife with contradiction and ambiguity. For instance, Santiago's mother's opinion on the weather, cited on page 8, states that the only thing she was interested in "was for her son not to get soaked in the rain, since she'd heard him sneeze while sleeping," while the cook recounts a different scenario recalling: "it hadn't rained that day, or during the whole month of February (8)." This level of vagueness leads it challenging to wholly put trust in one perspective, giving the readers the need to comb the discrepancies to find some semblance of truth, only to realize that everyone's truth is somewhat different, and correct in its own right.
This is not an example of naturalism. Instead, the weather is used throughout the book as a metaphor or image for the reader to view the inconsistency of human memory, one of the main themes of the book. The attention paid to the differing views of the weather throughout the first chapter especially serves as a reminder to the reader about how unreliable the accounts of the characters really are (which is the “narrative problem” as the question states). Using the weather is a really clever ploy by the author, and really helped me the reader understand this theme.
ReplyDeleteUsing the device of naturalism is often used to dramatize important scenes (in this case the death of Santiago), and thus is unnecessary as the focus of the book is not on Santiago’s death itself, but instead on the “chronicle” or investigation of his death. Dramatizing (through a device such as naturalism) Santiago’s death would take away from the point Marquez is trying to make.
Marquez is delving into human nature, mainly our memory, especially in times of tragedy. Marquez attempts to explain how our brain deals with tragedy, how we try to reason how such terrible events can occur, how our memory works in these situations. And what we find is is that in our human nature we need an explanation to get over such terrible events, no matter if it is truth or not, to keep our sanity (which we saw in the book as many of the accounts and interviews of the death are ambiguous, inconsistent, distorted, and sometimes completely made up, yet they are still believed by each character).
In regard to the actual meaning of the literary device naturalism, this small passage does not display the fundamental components that would support its definition. The day isn't said to be storming intensely or even said to be cloudy. Naturalism would occur if the weather was very nice and sunny to complement Santiago's mood, or if it was ominous and poor despite his mood. I think this passage shows signs of irony instead of naturalism. His pleasant mood and shown tendency to wish everyone well on this certain morning contrasts greatly with the fact that in just an hour he would be brutally stabbed to death by the two brothers. The way in which the scene is set up with his good mood and the statement that in just an hour he would be "carved up like a pig" seems almost paradoxical.
ReplyDeleteThe attention paid to weather by the narrator shows that there was a noticeable difference in the apparent good mood one would expect out of Santiago on any given day. As far as the narrative problem in relation to the weather, if the narrator could have remembered details about the day or the weather then it could be easier diagnosed that Marquez was using naturalism in this excerpt. Also, the truth of the statements about the weather and about Santiago could be tainted due to the different perceptions of the narrator.
I don not believe that this is naturalism for a couple of reasons. First, people that saw Santiago said that he was in a good mood, and he thought it was a beautiful day. This is not naturalism. The weather is being anything but indifferent to Santiago, it is in fact matching the mood that he is in. Secondly, the reader is not sure exactly what the weather was like on that day so there can be no naturalism. If the reader knew that there were no clouds and a rainbow in the sky, then this passage could be inferred to have naturalistic qualities, but we do not get that information. The only description of the weather that can be considered accurate is Santiago saying that it is a beautiful day, and this is paralleled with the good mood that Santiago is in, so this specific description is definitely not naturalism.
ReplyDeleteI do not think this is naturalism.
ReplyDeleteFirst, the citizens of the town do not have a generally similar recollection of the weather. Some say it was sunny, some say cloudy, and others recall a "light drizzle." Since there is no apparent focus on the weather during the day of Santiago Nasar's death we can assume the weather was not important factor on that day. Even Santiago Nasar himself seemed to have no apparent concern for the weather.
Second, some recalled a rainy day. If the day were to be rainy this would be the opposite of naturalism. Scenes involving naturalism show a stark contrast between the affair and the weather for example, the sun shining accompanied by a gentle breeze in the midst of an grisly battle, or a rainbow shining on the wreckage after a storm . Rain would mirror the grim demise of Santiago Nasar.
Lastly, the people of the town seemed to have no emotional regards for the weather. If this were to be naturalism, a state in which weather has no apparent concern for the present occurrence, the recollection of the weather would spark a more passionate response. The unusually beautiful weather would have been noticed by all.
I believe that in the first few pages of this novel there are definite examples of naturalism. The fact that Santiago was so content with the beauty of the day while all the while it has already been foretold that he is about to be brutally murdered is almost an exact definition of naturalism. It is defined by an underlining of irony and the idea that the world will keep turning and the sun will keep shining regardless of the petty, insignificant pain humans may be facing. It was brilliant of Marquez to begin the telling of this tragedy with naturalism as not only is he able to use a common, yet profound device to add to the novel’s literary significance, but it presents the reader with how the rest of the novel is going to be laid out: many different accounts of the same story all coinciding here, twisting there, but painting a detailed image of Santiago Nassar’s last day on earth.
ReplyDeleteI found it interesting, though, that although Santiago found the day to be beautiful, the sources claimed it was a day reminiscing of a funeral. The reader must ask whether the weather really was grey and lugubrious or if the source’s minds have been tainted by time and have had their memories stained with the morbid events that come later that morning. I like to believe it is the second and Marquez chose to add this section of the book to, as Gregory mentioned, add to the theme of uncertainty and unreliability in the narrator and his sources. If, however, Marquez intended the first option to be true, that the day indeed was ominous, then we must wonder why Santiago would find a sinister feeling day beautiful. It can be argued that this is symbolism in which his ill perception of the sky parallels his being utterly unaware of his soon to be fulfilled fate.
I do not believe this is naturalism. The most important factor behind this argument is the quote above. Santiago is in a "good mood" and it was a very "beautiful day", the opposite of naturalism. The weather matches Santiago's mood, therefore the weather is not indifferent to Santiago and his fate. This does show some irony however because Santiago is in a good mood before he is about to die and seemingly the only person not knowing that Santiago is going to be killed is Santiago. One would have thought that someone would have alerted Santiago to his fate. If the end had not been revealed to us, then the reader would grow more and more agitated with the characters because no one will tell Santiago of his fate.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that the accounts of the weather never line up continually decreases the credibility of the recollections and of the narrator.
I personally do not feel that this is an example of Naturalism. I do feel that, as often as the case of literature, that the weather had an effect on the moods and actions of the people. In books such as Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, the relationship of nature and man is directly proportional and eventually, nature appears totally indifferent (and sometimes in direct opposition) to man.
ReplyDeleteIn Anthony Swofford’s memoir Jarhead, nature (and specifically the sand) is the catalyst for both mental and physical turmoil. This is something that is not present in this work.
There are definite inconsistencies of the weather in this portion of the novel. The reader is given different details regarding the weather: some say it was nice, others say that it was not. These varying interpretations could have been influenced by the death of Santiago as some described it as grey and almost funeral-like. I agree with Martha in saying that there was little bond between the weather and the people. The weather appears as simply a detail (and possibly a tone-setter).
In general, Naturalism draws a heavy bond between nature and those that inhabit it. I feel that nature had a greater influence on another novel we read, Mama Day. This detail regarding the weather has meaning, but not in the sense that it influences the characters. The detail of Santiago referring to the day as beautiful can serve as irony to the reader. He felt that the day was beautiful, and was eventually was killed on that very day. The weather/nature didn’t directly kill him, therefore I do not feel that it is Naturalism.