“Chronicle of a Death Foretold” by Gabriel Garcia Marquez – The Triumph of Evil

Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (Book Cover)
Amidst the many questions we ask ourselves when man-made tragedy beseeches us, the following one is often found amongst the forerunners: why has no one stopped it?

The human nature can certainly be a curious one, and in Chronicle of a Death Foretold Gabriel Garcia Marquez explores that aspect of it. We follow the journey of a man who returns to his hometown twenty-seven years after the brutal and public murder of Santiago Nassar.

Those responsible were absolved by the Priest and only served three years in jail. Life then went on as normal in the town. The questions driving our inquisitive protagonist can be summed up as follows: why did no one intervene when all knew the murder was happening beforehand, and whether or not Santiago Nassar was indeed even culpable in the first place of the crime he was accused of.

This book is a rather short one, and reads like the careful reconstruction of a murder mystery from the perspective of a sleuth who is trying to get to the core, the essence of what drove the happening and what prevented the people from intervening. From the reader's perspective, the whole ordeal starts off as a murder mystery, but the how and even the why are quickly given away in the beginning.

It gradually develops into an examination of the many other people in the town who were somehow involved in the murder, let alone by knowing it was going to happen beforehand. This chronicle ends up being one about human nature, and our propensity for inaction where the fates of others are concerned, amongst many other things of course.

It goes without saying that from a technical point of view Marquez is irreproachable in his writing, bringing to life that secluded corner of the Earth right before our sense, taking us on an odyssey through a time and place long-forgotten, one where a single unfathomable happening stands out all the more terrifying with the idyllic lives led by the town's inhabitants and their ultimate indifference towards the whole thing. There is certainly plenty of food for thought to be found in here, and even a little horror if the human nature is what you find to be truly abhorring in this world.

Chronicle of a Death Foretold by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (Book Cover)
In the end, Chronicle of A Death Foretold is a short and profound murder mystery that takes a very different direction from other novels labeled as such, and is certainly a welcome addition to the library of anyone seeking to penetrate the inexhaustible secrets of the human mind.


Gabriel García Márquez (March 6, 1927 – April 17, 2014)

Gabriel García Márquez 

(March 6, 1927 – April 17, 2014)


Gabriel Garcia Marquez was a Colombian novelist, poet, journalist and screenwriter. Many consider him to be one of the most influential authors of the 20th century, having given birth to remarkable classics such as One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera.

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