READING ANALYSIS WORKSHOP

TITLE: THE CHRONICLE OF A DEATH FORETOLD

AUTHOR: GABRIEL GARCIA MARQUEZ

In Chronicle of a Death Foretold Gabriel Garcia Marquez uses the device of an un-named
shadowy narrator visiting the scene of a killing and beginning an investigation into the
past. From the beginning of the text, the author sets up a dialogue between the past and
the present. García Márquez does not assert that the truth exists objectively in the
world and present a version of this reality to the passive reader as fact. In Chronicle of
a Death Foretold the narrator and reader are forced to choose between contradictory
versions of what constitutes the truth. His narrator is not all-knowing, but a shadowy
detective figure who actively invites the reader's participation in the detective process.
Juxtaposing viewpoints, making the most of the uncertainties of memory, García
Márquez's questioning narrator is perfectly suited for a non-fiction narrative where the
murderer or murderers are unknown. Where the truth is not straightforward. Working
quietly as a detective in partnership with the reader he tries to reconstruct from the
words and documents of others a true fiction, of what ‘really’ happened. For this work
is an investigation not only of the past and a small Colombian community, but also a
work which explores the dominant narrative in the lives of all human beings: the
chronicle of a death that cannot be escaped, and which will bring every individual
narrative to an end.

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs
 Literary Analysis: Using Elements of Literature

Read and analyze the definitions given below for the terms used to make literary
analysis and use them to move through your literary piece. You must justify your
answers without merely choosing among the different options provided, on the
contrary, you must support your answer adequately.

I. Character - representation of a person, place, or thing performing traditionally

human activities or functions in a work of fiction

 Protagonist - The character the story revolves around.

 Antagonist - A character or force that opposes the protagonist.
 Minor character - Often provides support and illuminates the protagonist.
 Static character - A character that remains the same.
 Dynamic character - A character that changes in some important way.
 Characterization - The choices an author makes to reveal a character’s personality, such
as appearance, actions, dialogue, and motivations.

Look for: Connections, links, and clues between and about characters. Ask yourself what the
function and significance of each character is. Make this determination based upon the
character's history, what the reader is told (and not told), and what other characters say about
themselves and others.

II. Figurative language - the use of words to express meaning beyond the literal
meaning of the words themselves

 Metaphor - contrasting to seemingly unalike things to enhance the meaning of a situation

or theme without using like or as
o You are the sunshine of my life.
 Simile - contrasting to seemingly unalike things to enhance the meaning of a situation or
theme using like or as
o What happens to a dream deferred, does it dry up like a raisin in the sun
 Hyperbole - exaggeration
o I have a million things to do today.
 Personification - giving non-human objects human characteristics
o America has thrown her hat into the ring, and will be joining forces with the
British.

III. Plot - the arrangement of ideas and/or incidents that make up a story

 Foreshadowing - When the writer clues the reader in to something that will eventually
occur in the story; it may be explicit (obvious) or implied (disguised).
 Suspense - The tension that the author uses to create a feeling of discomfort about the
unknown
 Conflict - Struggle between opposing forces.
 Exposition - Background information regarding the setting, characters, plot.
 Rising Action - The process the story follows as it builds to its main conflict
 Crisis - A significant turning point in the story that determines how it must end
 Resolution/Denouement - The way the story turns out.
IV. Point of View - pertains to who tells the story and how it is told. The point of view of a
story can sometimes indirectly establish the author's intentions.

 Narrator - The person telling the story who may or may not be a character in the
story.
 First-person - Narrator participates in action but sometimes has limited
knowledge/vision.
 Second person - Narrator addresses the reader directly as though she is part of the
story. (i.e. “You walk into your bedroom. You see clutter everywhere and…”)
 Third Person (Objective) - Narrator is unnamed/unidentified (a detached observer).
Does not assume character's perspective and is not a character in the story. The
narrator reports on events and lets the reader supply the meaning.
 Omniscient - All-knowing narrator (multiple perspectives). The narrator knows what
each character is thinking and feeling, not just what they are doing throughout the
story. This type of narrator usually jumps around within the text, following one
character for a few pages or chapters, and then switching to another character for a
few pages, chapters, etc. Omniscient narrators also sometimes step out of a particular
character’s mind to evaluate him or her in some meaningful way.

V. Setting - the place or location of the action. The setting provides the historical and
cultural context for characters. It often can symbolize the emotional state of characters.
Example – In Poe’s The Fall of the House of Usher, the crumbling old mansion reflects the
decaying state of both the family and the narrator’s mind. We also see this type of
emphasis on setting in Thomas Mann’s Death in Venice.
VI. Symbolism - when an object is meant to be representative of something or an idea
greater than the object itself.

 Cross - representative of Christ or Christianity

 Bald Eagle - America or Patriotism
 Owl - wisdom or knowledge
 Yellow - implies cowardice or rot

https://www.roanestate.edu/owl/elementslit.html
 LITERARY ANALYSIS CHART

Protagonist - Antagonist - Minor character - Static character - Dynamic character - Characterization

SANTIAGO NASAR VICARIO´S BROTHERS PLACIDA LINERO, because -Margot. Sister of the -ANGELA VICARIO, -I saw him in her
is his mother. She narrator and nun of the because around her the memory. He had
BAYARDO SAN ROMAN interpreted dreams town. story change and makes turned twenty-one the
Cristóbal "Cristo" Bedoya. the rising of the last week in January,
Friend of Santiago Nasar, -James. Younger brother santiago´s death. and he was slim and
accompanied him during of the narrator. pale and had his
the wedding of Ángela father's Arab eyelids
Vicario, held the night -Luis Enrique. Brother of and curly hair.
before his murder the narrator. (SANTIAGO NASAR)

-"He was around

thirty years old, but
they were
Type of character

wellconcealed,
because he had the
waist of P a novice
bullfighter, golden
eyes, and a skin
slowly roasted by
saltpetre. He
arrived wearing a
short jacket and
very tight trousers,
both of natural
calfskin, and kid
gloves of the same
colour." CHAPTER
2, PAGE 15, LINE 4-
7
 Metaphor Simile Hyperbole Personification

*"It also seems that he's * "It was like an *The autopsy, or well *"The Fatal Door."
swimming in gold.", apparition," Cristo the end, when Santiago CHAPTER 1, PAGE 7,
CHAPTER 2, PAGE 16, Bedoya told me., Nasar, after being LINE 15
LINE 3 CHAPTER 4, PAGE 62, "crucified" to slashes
LINE 25 walk with the viscera in * "Then the boat
*"He looked like a fairy," your hand. stopped tooting and
she told me. " CHAPTER *My mother gave him the cocks began to
2, PAGE 15, LINE 8 AND the final blessing in a *"I just saw them with crow," she told me.
9 letter in October: pig-killing knives," CHAPTER 1, PAGE 1,
"People like him a lot," Cristo Bedoya said. LINE 16
*"White man," she called she told me… CHAPTER CHAPTER 5, PAGE 64,
to him, "coffee will be 2, PAGE 16, LINE6 LINE 22 *"It was a breath of the
ready soon." CHAPTER Holy Spirit," she often
Figurative Language

3, PAGE 40, LINE 24 *"Don't be a savage," he *"He reminded me of repeated. CHAPTER 1,

told her. "Make believe the devil," she told me, PAGE 9, LINE 25
it was a human being." "but you yourself had
CHAPTER 1, PAGE 6, told me that things like
LINE 10 that shouldn't be put into
writing."… CHAPTER
2, PAGE 16, LINE 16
 foreshadowing suspense conflict Exposition Rising action /Crisis Resolution

On the day they were going Márquez mentions in an This is where things get Santiago is going to be This is where things get Santiago came to hit
to kill him, Santiago Nasar interview that what worried interesting. Now we learn killed. We don't know interesting. Now we learn the door several times
got up at five-thirty in the them most about this novel that Santiago is accused of why, or by whom, but we that Santiago is accused of with his fists but the
morning to wait for the boat was that the beginning deflowering Angela do know that his death is deflowering Angela twins had already
the bishop was coming on. caught the reader. It was Vicario. So her brothers inevitable. As the title Vicario. So her brothers arrived, he turned and
CHAPTER 1, PAGE 1, LINE 1. then when a copy of The want to kill him in order to says, that's the main want to kill him in order found them right there
Metamorphosis of Kafka reclaim their honor. At this thing you need to know to reclaim their honor. At and they began to stab
It makes sense that a novel came to his hands, which point it's pretty safe to say about this story. this point it's pretty safe him and they did not
with the title Chronicle of a starts talking about what that Santiago is in a really to say that Santiago is in a stop until he saw him
Death Foretold would be full happens to the main sticky situation. really sticky situation. fall on the floor
of foreshadowing. After all, character, something that
that's what foretold means. Márquez imitates in his The millionaire Bayardo
But Santiago's death isn't novel, as he begins by San Román, goes in search
the only thing that's talking about the close of games to choose as a
foretold. We know about his death of the character future wife. One day, he
mom's loneliness before it Santiago Nasar: "The day finds his beloved Angela
happens, and we learn when they were going to kill Vicario in a town called
Plot

about Bayardo's weirdness him, Santiago Nasar got up Riohacha. Tradition says
before we see it firsthand. at 5.30 in the morning to that the bride has to be a
All of this gives the novel a wait for the ship in which virgin until the day of her
feeling of being the bishop arrived. " This wedding so, her husband
predestined. Like all of the may seem absurd, because has the "honor" (you could
people in the town, we can there is a belief that if one say) of deflowering her.
fall into the thought that knows the end of the work, But the whole town falls
certain things are inevitable. it loses grace, however, and surprised when it observes
as Márquez explains, this is with the clean, white
not entirely true, that way of sheet, without any rest of
starting his novel is the one it.
precisely keeps its readers in
suspense, because knowing
that they will kill the
character, will seek to know
the reason and the way in
which this crime will be
carried out, and it is
precisely there where the
use of suspense, tension, of
this work lies .
 Narrator First person
In my opinion Garcia Now, the chronicle is
Marquez is not the narrator rounded by santiago´s best
in this case, because he friends that is telling the
wrote the story or the story in many spaces of the
chronicle, but he is not chronicle, but it seems that
telling the same. he spends most of his time
Nevertheless, is important enjoying the services of the
that he adopt character in town's prostitutes,
the story for telling the example: I was recovering
Point of View
facts. from the wedding revels in
the apostolic lap of Maria
Alejandrina Cervantes, and I
only awakened with the
clamor of the alarm bells,
thinking they had turned
them loose in honor of the
bishop. CHAPTER 1, PAGE 2
You can notice that he has
not all the knowledge or
vision.
Second person
The inside of the house In the story, this point of
barely had enough room view is give to us fot the
in -which to live, and so
the older sisters tried to
borrow a house when
they realized the size of
the festival. "Just
imagine,"Angela Vicario
told me, "they'd thought
about Placida Linero's
house, but luckily my
parents stubbornly held to
the old song that our
daughters would be
married in our pigpen or
they wouldn't be married
at all." CHAPTER 2, PAGE
24, LINE 8-12
We can observe reading
the story or chronicle, that
the second narrator focus
the reader in the place
and thinking of the main
idea.
Third Person Omniscient
(objective )
He's the first person
narrator, but the text
same character that almost reads like it's the
interprets the main third person omniscient—
character… the narrator talks almost as
if he is inside the heads of
all of the characters and
knows everything that's
going on. An omniscient
narrator probably comes
from his journalistic
investigation coupled with
his pre-existing biases. He
knows more than your
normal person would know
because he's collected a lot
of data, and he feels that
he knows even more than
that because he's biased
for and against certain
people.
 “Two Days of a Small
Town in the Caribbean
Region of Colombia”…

It is, maybe the place. In

Setting (s) the story is not named
but the previous phrases
focus on, some
Colombian city or town.
Might refers to a SMALL
TOWN.
 The weather
*According to the
narrator's sister, Margot: It
was Christmas weather.
(1.18)
*Victoria Guzmán said: "On
the contrary," she told me
when I came to see her, a
short time before her
Symbolism
Dreams When Pablo and Pedro Even the pig slaughterers *The river On one sense
Vicario are murdering have reservations about the river, which runs right
Focus on all the Santiago, it is Pablo‟s killing animals—imagine through the town, is a
interpretations dream for giving Santiago“ the only how they felt about figure for time in the
santiago´s mom: stab in the back ”(pg. killing Santiago. But even novel—it forges
118) that triggers his though they feel this way, interminably ahead while
“he is going through a scent, as evidenced by the brothers continue to simultaneously appearing
grove of timber trees the fact that Pablo then kill the pigs because it's to recur. Further, the
where a gentle drizzle was reports, “It smelled like their job. They have to. In river is the town’s only
falling, and for an instant him” (pg. 118) to the the same way, they connection to the outer
he was happy in his narrator after stabbing probably kill Santiago world, and it is a meager

death. "The sun warms
things up earlier than in
August." (1.11) Wait…was
it cold or was it warm?
dream, but when he him in the back. Pablo
awoke he felt completely stabbing Santiago‟s back
spattered with bird shit, is symbolic of betrayal
CHAPTER 1, PAGE 3 namely; that of Santiago
by the Vicario twins.
because it's their job. connection at that. While
They have to in order to it used to be that
defend their family's seafaring ships passed
honor. through regularly,
changes in the river’s
course have made that
impossible—and as a
result the town is left
isolated from the wider
world and struggling
economically. When
Bayardo San Román
arrives on his steamboat,
it’s as if he has come from
another planet.
 PERSONAL VOCABULARY BANK

Verb Noun Adjective Pronoun Preposition Example(s):

reference

reference

reference

reference

reference
Grammar

Page

Page

Page

Page

Page
function
-SPATTERED 2 STARCH 3 DISTRESSED 22

WAILING 50 ATTIRE 3 INHERITED 2

CAROUSING 50 PARTRIDGE 3 GOOD JUGMENT 4

SOAKED 10 WIDOWER 50 SCATTERED 27

FILCHED 58 OMEN 2

COPPER 1

STIRRUP 1

FAGGOT 64
Word
 EXAMPLES

*MY HAIR SPATTRED HIS FACE.

*MY BELT IS MADE OD COPPER.

*DID YOU KNOW ABOT HIM, THE FAGGOT?

*ALL MY TALENT IS INHERIT FROM MY PARENTS.

*I STARCHED ALL MY ENTIRE ATTIRE FOT THE WEDDING

ANALYSIS OF CHRONICLES OF A FORETOLD DEATH

JESSIKA VANESSA FERNÁNDEZ QUINTERO

ALEXANDER OÑATE

ENGLISH AND SPANISH TEACHING PROGRAM

UNIVERSODAD POPULAR DEL CESAR

INTERMEDIATE ENGLISH I

VALLEDUPAR-CESAR

20/11/17