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Essay / A story of destiny, gratitude, divinity and family in a very old man with enormous winds
«... Elisenda, exasperated and unbalanced, shouted that it was horrible to live in this full hell of angels,” is a line that occurs near the end of “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” by Gabriel Garcia Màrquez. It accurately describes how humans can only experience divine power for a certain amount of time before they start taking it for granted and not realizing all the good things that come from it. Also, at different points in this story, the family that keeps an angel in their henhouse is blessed in many ways: their son was almost dead but was miraculously healed, they collected a large sum of money from the people who paid see the old man and ask him questions, and they were able to use the money to buy nice things. Although these things are great and their standard of living is greatly increased, the family never traces their fortune and well-being to the angel who gave it to them. The message that Garcia Màrquez is trying to convey to the reader is to be grateful for things that happen to you or your family through means other than your own means, even if it may be from a divine power and you do not don't know who to contact. THANKS. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an original essay The first way Garcia Màrquez conveys this message is through the healing of the child near the beginning of the story. Shortly after the angel appears, interrupting a family's life, their son is suddenly healed without explanation after being terribly ill. Elisenda, the mother of the son who had been cured, cared for this child as any mother would, but residing in a rural village without access to medicine or other medical supplies, there was little she could do. The angel's arrival is so shocking and unexpected to everyone that it seems like a coincidence that the son is healed at the same time the angel lands; “Soon after [the angel’s appearance] the child awoke without a fever and with the desire to eat.” While it might not be most people's first thought to thank the angel, this family could have attributed the fact that he was still alive to the major change that occurred when he got better: the arrival of the angel and the fact that divine beings have the power to heal people. Garcia Màrquez uses this incident to set the mood for the rest of this story, showing that the family will never truly be grateful for what they are blessed with and views the angel less as a bringer of good fortune and more as an inconvenience. their daily life. Garcia Màrquez then shows the importance of being grateful by showing the family hoarding the money they received. “Pelayo and Elisenda were content with fatigue, for in less than a week they had filled their rooms with silver and the line of pilgrims waiting their turn to enter still stretched beyond the horizon; » this quote shows how much the family benefited from the presence of the angel in their garden. Although having wealth and being happy to have it is not in itself thankless, the fact that this family simply accumulated the money and did not even attribute it to the divine being they had stuffed in their henhouse is thankless. If the family had linked his new prosperity to what had caused it (the arrival of the angel), they might have been able to appreciate him more and would have housed him somewhere a little nicer than a henhouse. Furthermore, if the family had realized that they had almost nothing to do with the money they received, other than charging.