OnFiction: Love of Literature

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In a recent issue of The New York Review of Books (16/07/09), Michael Greenberg begins his article by giving us a snippet of Gerald Martin’s biography of Gabriel García Márquez. It is a famous anecdote in which penniless Márquez and his wife are trying to send a manuscript of One Hundred Years of Solitude from Mexico to his potential publisher Buenos Aires.

The package contained 490 typed pages. The counter official said: "Eighty-two pesos." García Márquez watched as [his wife] Mercedes searched in her purse for the money. They had only fifty and could only send about half of the book: García Márquez made the man behind the counter take sheets off like slices of bacon until the fifty pesos were enough. They went home, pawned the heater, hairdryer and liquidizer, went back ...

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http://www.onfiction.ca/2009/07/in-recent-new-york-review-of-books.html