A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings

A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings is a literary tale by Gabriel García Marquéz. The title sums it up. It's a tale about an winged old man that arrives in a town.

William Morris wrote about it in the Motley Vision, in the second part of his Magic Realism analysis.

Magic Realism

So, what the hell is Magic Realism?

Magic Realism is an artistic movement in which supernatural events occur in reality. The main characteristic is that the event itself is not seen as magic in this setting (the characters don't see it as magic), it's just "another event".

The term was coined by art critic Franz Roh to describe imagery of an altered reality, and it was also used by Arturo Uslar-Pietri to describe the literary works of Latin American writers, like Gabriel García Marquéz and José Saramago.

Much of the imagery described as Magic Realism is quite famous, like the works of Salvador Dalí, Rob Gonsalves and René Magritte. Tim Burton (movie director and designer) touches Magic Realism in some of his productions, being Big Fish the most proeminent example.

Why should it matter?

It should matter because Magic Realism usually helps us understand how someone sees (evaluates) something. Much of what we hear about turn into an exagerated stereotype, which leads us to (unfulfilling) expectations about something. Watching Big Fish is a great way to understand how something that we don't believe can be real, taking the "too much" out off it.

Kevin J. Maroney brought up an interesting answer by García Marquéz: that there's no magic in One Hundred Years of Solitude". Maroney also states that "Gabo uses magical imagery to help us rediscover the real world".

I've been editing and publishing a lens on Magic Realism on Squidoo.