Paradise Of Disaster: The Magical Landscapes Of Under The Volcano And Cien Años De Soledad

Abstract

Gabriel García Márquez has said that Malcolm Lowry's Under the Volcano is the book he has read the most. Its "magic" intrigues him. García Márquez, of course, has written Cien años de soledad, a masterpiece of magic realism. Why is it that Under the Volcano interests García Márquez? This paper, as a kind of explanation, seeks to examine the affinities between these two twentieth-century masterpieces. Both novels are most characterized by their marvelous, "magical," landscapes. Both Lowry and García Márquez use the landscape psychologically, symbolically, poetically, and thematically. The magical events as reflections of the characters are a psychological use of the landscapes. The landscapes symbolically represent the world, Eden or Paradise, and Hell. Poetic language heightens the "magic" of both landscapes. And finally, both novels have themes of solitude and the incapacity to love that, when combined with the landscapes, create a powerful message about man and his place in an Earthly Paradise.