Magical Reality in Stories by Gabriel Garca Mrquez and Mo Yan - Essay Example

 Plot Summary The Handsomest Drowned Man is a short story written by the Colombian writer, Gabriel García Márquez. The story revolves around a cadaver found by a group of children playing on the beach of a small fishing village. The background of the village plays an important role here. It is a small village with the number of inhabitants just enough to fit into seven boats. The land area is so scarce that they throw the dead into the sea instead of burying them. When the men attempt to find the identity of the dead man, the women of the village become conscious that the dead man is “the tallest, strongest, most virile and best-equipped”, and also beyond their imaginations. They associate him with a man named Esteban. As the men fail to find anything about the drowned man, the women rejoice and claim him as theirs. As the bewildered men observe the cadaver’s face, they too become overwhelmed by his handsomeness and size. The drowned man’s size was so big that they could not make him lie on any bed or table nor could they fit him with pants, shirts or shoes of any men of the village. The villagers arrange a grand funeral for him and as they throw him in the sea, they realize that their life will never be the same again. They will build bigger and stronger houses, plant flowers and paint walls with bright colors, so that any ship passing by will look at the vibrant village to comment “there is the village of Esteban” (Márquez). The Chinese culture is known for its unusual culinary arts and competitive drinking games. Mo Yan has explored these aspects of in his novel, The Republic of Wine. This cynical crime fiction is set in Liquorland which is a fictitious town in China where food and drink are presented in a sinister way. A renowned investigator Ding Gou’er arrives to investigate cases of cannibalism. The Bejing authorities have been informed that some restaurants serve culinary dishes containing human babies. The allegation is so horrible that Ding Gou’er’s boss tells him “we all hope there isn’t a word of truth in this accusation. Use any means necessary to carry out your mission, so long as it’s legal”. Ding Gou’er followed this instruction so much that he showed little restraint while pursuing the supposed culprits. However, his journey on this mission proved to be as much a disaster as possible. He got entangled in wine and from then on he rapidly went on a downward spiral from which he could not escape. He becomes compelled to participate in drinking games and was eventually served with a dish that he was sent to investigate. As he expresses horror, the officials soothe him by saying it is a popular dish with a fake baby boy. They further state that it is an important foreign exchange earner as foreign guests have nothing but praise for the dish. Struck by panic, Ding Gou’er shoots the boy in the head before collapsing. After getting further drunk, he gets an out of body experience as he feels his comatose body being carried by the serving girls to an underground hotel room. A demon then enters the room and strips his body of useful implements. There is another part of the story which consists of letters exchanged between Mo Yan and his fan, Li Yidou from Liquorland. Each letter of Yidou carried short stories which deals with the dark side of the town (Yan). Magical realism In magical realist fictions the readers need to probe beyond the realistic structure. The idea is to explore the hidden myths in the narration that often have dual meaning. In such stories, both the real and unreal, comprehensible and the miraculous exist together in a constantly form-changing reality. It remains upon the readers to grasp the apparently random structure of the narration (Arva, 60). It is believed that Gabriel García Márquez was the master of magical realism stories, and his work became the major source from where magical realism became a significant form of many stories written in the late twentieth century (Hart, 260). The art of storytelling has always hovered between truth and fiction, realism and romance. In essence, magical realism is the form of writing where mythical events are presented in a normal and factual manner. Using the genre of magical realism, Márquez has narrowed the gap between myth and reality. In his story, a man presented as larger than life character (in the perspective of the villagers) changes the lives of the “ordinary” men. The author has used myths to explain the unexplainable. The dead man’s real qualities and the wishful conclusions of the villagers – the difference of both has become blurred. The man was no doubt tall, strong and masculine. These are facts but the villagers interpreted that he had the ability to call fish from the sea by name or sow flowers on the driest rocks. As the villagers become fascinated by the dead man’s apparent handsomeness, they begin to imagine him having the qualities that they value. The utmost magical realism of this story is that the villagers associate the dead man with someone named Esteban even without knowing his real identity and then based on this they hope to make the village fragrant and vibrant with colors so that one day it would be known as Esteban’s village. Mo Yan too uses magical realism as his way of storytelling. His work is greatly influenced by the works of Márquez. Yan believes in deeply burying his thoughts and portraying them through the characters of his stories. In his story, fiction becomes real as the hero gains supernatural qualities as his consciousness becomes separate from his self. Yidou writes about his father-in-law wanting to learn to make a liquor made by apes, a toddler who escapes from a culinary institute. Both the authors have blurred the reality and fiction in a manner that readers believe the contents of the story as real. They have used unbelievable imaginations in their stories. While Márquez is a more careful writer taking care to weave each sentence with surrealism, Mo Yan seems wanton as if he writes as soon as thoughts enter his mind. References Arva, Eugene L. “Writing the Vanishing Real: Hyperreality and Magical Realism”, Journal of Narrative Theory, 38.1 (2008) 60-85 Hart, Stephen M. “From Realism to Neo-Realism to Magical Realism: The Algebra of Memory”, Romance Studies, 30.3-4 (2012) 251-267 Márquez, Gabriel García. The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World, Creative Company, 1993 Yan, Mo. The Republic of Wine, Skyhorse Publishing, 2011 Read More