Urban Onramps

Yes, I am re-reading “The General in His Labyrinth” by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

From the back jacket:

“General Simon Boliver, one of the Western Hemisphere’s supreme heroes, embarks on a seven-month voyage down the Magdalena River. Forced from power, made old and ill by the pressures of war, passion, victory, and betryal, the General examines his life, confronting the phantoms of his past, reliving the campaigns that brought him renown, and remembering the women he loved for a night or a lifetime. On a journey that is at once a fantasy of triumphal progress and a nightmore of loss and delusions, we come to know the Liberator — the dazzling orchestrator of political and military intrigue, as well as the lover, the libertine, the fighter capable of heroism, mercy, and ruthlessness.”

I feel at peace as I read it. Such a great man came to such a relatively ignoble end. It’s like reading through Ecclesiastes, a reminder to me that we are God’s children first, and that titles and achievements are illusory in the long run.

posted Jul 28, 2008, 6:06pm by Rodolpho Carrasco