G.G. Marquez, Essay Example

“A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” by G.G. Marquez

The subject of the story “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” by G.G. Marquez is the encounter of a family with an old angel. The subject does not seem controversial; it is thought-provoking. The thesis of the story is the pragmatic attitude of people to the miracles. Pelayo and Elisenda did not guess the identity of the old man form the first sight, due to his unattractive appearance of a ragpicker with dirty and half-plucked wings. When they learned who he was, they “dragged him out of the mud and locked him up with the hens in the wire chicken coop”.

The conversational tone of the story and the realistic way of depiction, sustained by various types of grammar structures, create the impression of authenticity of these events. The logical transitions from one idea to another, subjects of the story, and smooth development of action, without any abrupt junctions, endow the story with characteristics of a parable genre. Throughout the story, readers are looking forward to face the moral which remains unspecified. The story has few dialogues. It does not distract attention from the flow of events accompanied by descriptions.

Through people’s indecent treatment of the old man (they placed him in a coop, they showed him for money, they eve threw stones at him) the author condemns such inhuman behavior which is merciless, even to the angel. Besides, the author shows how much the perception through appearance matters for people. The following connotative phrase discloses people’s character: “That was how they skipped over the inconvenience of the wings and quite intelligently concluded that he was a lonely castaway from some foreign ship wrecked by the storm”. People can skip over the angel’s wings.

The stylistic devices help to reveal the subject of the story. The narration is developed coherently with the help of depictions and analogy. The depictions of angel intensify the representation of him as the embodiment of decrepitude. The analogy between the angel and various circus entertainments brings down to earth the notion of supernatural and miracles. The reduction of the image lies in the angel’s feebleness. It is also underlined by informal words (dungheap).  Emotionally evocative language of the story fulfils the function of creating specific impression (the exposition associates with “kill”, “stench”, and “groan”). The events succeed in chronological order, beginning from the arrival of the angel and ending by “imaginary dot on the horizon of the sea”.