One Hundred Years Of Solitude Gender Analysis

Traditional gender roles exist in Gabriel Garcia Marquez’ novel One Hundred Years of Solitude, but traditional distribution of power between the genders does not. In analyzing each character and their life, it’s easy to see how Marquez presented each in terms of his own view on gender constructs. Marquez portrays femininity and masculinity very differently. But why would Marquez choose to make such a clear distinction between the roles of each gender? Marquez sees women as spiritual and overpowered by traditional standards, and men doomed by their own obsessions. Men are wily and therefore vulnerable, whereas women are dignified and durable, and survive for much longer.
We all know that the Buendia men in are a mess when it comes to self-control.

This is why Marquez depicts them as the weaker gender. A constant theme with these men is obsession that literally consumes their life. Most of the obsessions wither boil down to either knowledge or power, both of which lead to downfall. The first male character to experience downfall via obsession is Jose Arcadio Buendia, the husband of our favorite BAMF, Ursula. Jose’s obsession began with very innocent questions about, well, everything. He had a passion for learning and was always keen to discover something. New technologies and the unknown intrigued him. But, as they say, “curiosity killed the cat”. His desire for knowledge drove him crazy, and he spent the tail end of his life like a dog- tied to a tree for his own safety and speaking a language nobody else could understand. He ventured into what can be called “dangerous territory” for the Buendia family because he did not restrain his inquisitiveness, desire, or enthusiasm.
Jose Arcadio Jr., the first son of Jose Arcadio and Ursula, was dictionary-definition macho- muscular, huge in size, and well endowed in the downstairs area.

He was every bachelor’s dream self. He traveled the world with gypsies and got every tattoo he could think of. He drank, slept around, and women idolized him. Unfortunately, his personality wasn’t as fabulous. He defied his mother’s direct orders and married his adopted sister, Rebeca. In a fight with Pietro, he states, “Fuck nature two times over” (92). He doesn’t care about what the laws of nature, the actual law, Ursula, or his family has to say about his marriage to Rebeca because he has no wish to control his desires. He has always been able to get what he wanted, and he doesn’t plan to stop that type of behavior any time soon. Because he defies Ursula, he gets banished from her house, and eventually killed- supposedly by an act of God against his actions, but the exact circumstance is unclear. What we do know is that Jr. overindulged in every desire he had, and he died for that. We can contrast this with the fate of Remedios the Beauty, who is the feminine-stereotype equivalent of Jose Arcadio Jr. Remedios ascended into heaven instead of receiving an almighty punishment. This contrast is a perfect example of Marquez’ views on

gender.
Colonel Aureliano Buendia, the brother of Jose Arcadio Jr., seems to be different from the rest of the Buendia men- at least at first. He is the longest-standing male character of the novel, which should mean something. He is very attached to the war he fights, which keeps him separated from other emotional circumstances that would eventually lead to obsession. He seems to take the path of life opposite to what his brother chose. He had a child bride, and when she died in childbirth, he mourned without becoming obsessed. However, when he does lose his sanity, he has no chance of ever returning to it. The war and the death of his young wife start to take a toll on him, to the point where he attempts suicide. He managed to resist emotions, which is what his longer lifespan can be attributed to, but once they got the best of him, he was brought down just as quickly as any other Buendia man.
Buendia women, on the other hand, are an entirely different story. Take Úrsula Iguarán, number-one bad-ass and OG mother. This book could not exist without her. She basically founded Macondo and then ran it from her house until she died. Even though her husband was technically the mayor of Macondo, we all know that “behind every successful man is his wife.” As described in the novel, “Úrsula’s capacity for work was the same as that of her husband. Active, small, severe, that woman of unbreakable nerves who at no moment in her life had been heard to sing seemed to be everywhere, from dawn until quite late at night, always pursued by the soft whispering of her stiff, starched petticoats” (9). Úrsula is equal to her husband, Jose Arcadio Buendia, instead of as inferior- a very important example of Marquez’ gender roles. Her word is Buendia Family law. Failure to follow these commandments results in immediate action (see José Arcadio Jr. marrying his adopted sister). Ursula’s longevity is a physical symbol of her own strength and power. This can be contrasted to the short life of every male character in this book. Proof of her absolute power is shown by the failure of Macondo so shortly after her death- nobody could ever fill her shoes.
Amaranta, Ursula’s daughter, is another example of a power female. However, she is not naturally powerful; she gains her power through manipulation. The most obvious example is her reaction to the marriage of Rebeca and Pietro. Amaranta is a woman fueled by jealousy and anger. The proposal damaged Amaranta’s pride, and she takes pride about as seriously as her father did (he killed a man over pride two chapters into this novel). Amaranta will stop this marriage, and not only that, but she drives Pietro to suicide afterwards as the manipulative little cherry on top. After it all, she burns her hand and wraps it up- which at first seems like a penance or sign of remorse, but is also a symbol of her virginity, and therefore her power over her own life. Following this, she remains a virgin and refuses all offers of marriage, staying true to what her bandage symbolizes, and keeping her power. Amaranta also has “fate power”. For example, she knows that she is going to die, and sews her own funeral shroud, symbolizing that she has power enough to know when her life will end. Not only this, but she knew when Rebeca’s life would end, too. “One afternoon, when she was sewing on the porch, she was assailed by the certainty that she would be sitting in that place, in the same position, and under the same light when they brought her the news of Rebeca’s death. She say down to wait for it, as one waits for a letter, and the fact was that at one time she would pull off buttons to sew them on again so that inactivity would not make the wait longer and more anxious. No one in the house realized that at that time Amaranta was sewing a fine shroud for Rebeca” (277-8). We know that she hated Rebeca and wanted her to die. She basically sewed this wish into reality. Amaranta could have played into anyone’s fate, yet she chose not to wear out this ability- a stark contrast to what Buendia men do when they are handed power. Amaranta pulled all of this off through manipulation and pride, and if that doesn’t sound like power to you, I don’t know what does.
Amaranta Úrsula is the Buendia woman to end all Buendia women, and she is named after the other two most powerful girls in this novel, clearly not by accident. She is a combination of all of the powerful Buendia women of history- “active, small, and indomitable like Úrsula, and almost as pretty as Remedios the Beauty, she was endowed with a rare instinct for fashion. When she received pictures of the most recent fashions in the mail, they only proved that she had not been wrong about the models that she designed herself and sewed on Amaranta’s primitive pedal machine” (379). Amaranta Úrsula is Úrsula reborn, free from tradition, and a modern woman. She ignored all prophecies regarding incest, and married her nephew, which resulted in a child with the tail of a pig- literally Ursula’s worst nightmare. This sealed the fate of her child, even if it was unintentional. Amaranta Ursula sewed clothing for her child, just as Amaranta had done with a funeral shroud for Rebeca, to seal her fate.
She allowed herself to feel any emotion that came to her and was no longer suppressed by tradition as previous Buendia women had been. This ultimately led to the apocalyptic end of the Buendia family tree- brought on entirely by Amaranta Ursula’s actions alone.
Ursula’s life work was to prevent the pig’s-tail curse, yet it only took a pair of booties to bring it all crashing down. She kept everything in line by suppressing the incestuous sexual desires of women in her family. This tradition ties down those women with the hope of preserving their lineage and delaying a horrible prophecy. The Buendia women carry the strength of the family because they can control their emotions and desires- unlike the men. Úrsula’s longevity comes from this restraint. Ursula achieves her goal partially because she does a very good job at holding her family together while she is alive, even if it all fails once she passes away.
Overall, Marquez’ depiction of women and men in this novel makes his views on gender roles extremely apparent. His females are wise and strong, allowing them to endure life’s curveballs. They have the power single-handedly maintain or destroy the family. They even
have a mysterious control over fate. On the other hand, Marquez shows men as flawed and unable to live a complete life. They have no self-control, and this leads to their own demise.
Marquez’ view on power division between genders is obvious because of the way that he choses to depict his characters.