MEXICO CITY (AFP) ― Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the Nobel-winning Colombian author who used magical realism to tell epic stories of love, family and dictatorship in Latin America, died Thursday at the age of 87.
Known affectionately as “Gabo,” the author of “One Hundred Years of Solitude” and “Love in the Time of Cholera” became one of the most popular Latin American novelists in the world and the godfather of a literary movement that witnessed a continent in turmoil.
The journalist was a colorful character who befriended Cuban leader Fidel Castro, got punched by fellow Nobel laureate Mario Vargas Llosa and joked that he wrote to make his friends love him.
Politicians and celebrities mourned his death, the cause of which was not immediately revealed.
“One thousand years of solitude and sadness for the death of the greatest Colombian of all time,” Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos wrote on Twitter.
Colombian pop star Shakira said: “Your life, dear Gabo, will be remembered by all of us as a unique and singular gift, and as the most original story of all.”
The writer had made fewer public appearances in recent years and was hospitalized for pneumonia on March 31, returning to his Mexico City home a week later to recover there.
His wife Mercedes and two sons were reportedly by his side at home at the time of his death.
Born March 6, 1927, in the village of Aracataca on Colombia’s Caribbean coast, Garcia Marquez was the son of a telegraph operator.
He was raised by his grandparents and aunts in a tropical culture influenced by the heritage of Spanish settlers, indigenous populations and black slaves. His grandfather was a retired colonel.
The exotic legends of his homeland inspired him to write profusely. His masterpiece, “One Hundred Years of Solitude,” was translated into 35 languages and sold more than 30 million copies.
The book, published in 1967, is a historical and literary saga about a family from the imaginary Caribbean village of Macondo between the 19th and 20th century ― a novel that turned the man with the mustache and thick eyebrows into an international star.
Garcia Marquez wrote the novel after moving to Mexico City in 1961, taking a long bus ride from New York with his wife, Mercedes Barcha, and son Rodrigo.
koreaherald@heraldcorp.com
