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Loading... The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor (1955)by Gabriel García Márquez
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. This is a strange Marquez book - the words of a sailor telling a harrowing story of endurance - and one wonders how purely journalistic the writer is, and what he can't resist embellishing. ( ) This “journalistic reconstruction” of the story of Luis Alejandro Velasco’s trip from Mobile, Alabama, overboard, and back to Columbia suffered a little at the hands of an unimaginative translator. “The Story of This Story,” an introduction entirely by Marquez, was by far the most colorful section in terms of prose and description. The adventure of the story, however, was still engaging. As Velasco describes his time at sea, the detail is vivid enough to wrench the reader’s stomach with hunger, thirst, or pain. The last chapter, describing the aftermath for Velasco, crystallized his narrative voice and articulated elegant conclusions, bringing satisfaction to the contemporary nonfiction reader as the earlier chapters satisfy the adventure reader. The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor, by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (pp 106). This book is about Luis Alejandro Velasco’s 10-day float in a life raft after being one of eight men washed overboard from a Colombian Navy destroyer on its way home from Mobile, Alabama. Senor Velasco was the only one to make it aboard a life raft and, despite a four-day search, the only survivor of this 1955 tragedy. This is the story of his journey without food, water, or supplies, and his near miraculous survival. Over the course of the ten days he floated with the winds, and survived on part of a single fish and modest amounts of sea water, eventually drifting near death to shore near Uraba, Columbus. At first he was a celebrity, but became an outcast after his true account — at variance from the Navy’s — became known. This is afternoon’s read. Éste debía ser el reportaje sobre un hombre, Luis Alejandro Velasco, que estuvo diez días a la deriva en una balsa mecida por el mar Caribe. El entonces joven periodista de El Espectador de Bogotá escuchó el relato de los hechos de boca de su protagonista, y lo transformó, tal vez sin pretenderlo, en un prodigioso ejercicio literario, una narración escueta y vigorosa donde late el pulso de un gran escritor. La publicación por entregas del reportaje en 1955 supuso un alboroto político considerable -se revelaba la existencia de contrabando ilegal en un buque de la Armada colombiana, lo que costó la vida de siete marineros y el naufragio, más afortunado, de Velasco- y el exilio para su autor, que se vio abocado a una nueva vida.«Mi libro preferido, y el primero que escribí.»Gabriel García Márquez«Su narración más perfecta.»El País Ocho miembros de una tripulación del destructor "Caldas",de la marina de guerra de Colombia,habían caìdo al agua y desaparecido a causa de una tormenta en el mar Caribe. Al cabo de cuatro días se desistió de la búsqueda y los marineros perdidos fueron declarados oficialmente muertos,sin embargo uno de ellos apareció moribundo en una playa desierta del norte de Colombia que luego fue proclamado héroe de la patria. no reviews | add a review
Belongs to Publisher SeriesIs contained inLeaf Storm | The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor | No One Writes to the Colonel | In Evil Hour | One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez Is abridged inIs replied to inInspiredHas as a student's study guide
In 1955, Garcia Marquez was working for El Espectador, a newspaper in Bogota, when in February of that year eight crew members of the Caldas, a Colombian destroyer, were washed overboard and disappeared. Ten days later one of them turned up, barely alive, on a deserted beach in northern Colombia. This book, which originally appeared as a series of newspaper articles, is Garcia Marquez's account of that sailor's ordeal. Translated by Randolf Hogan. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresNo genres Melvil Decimal System (DDC)910.091636History and Geography Geography and Travel Geography and Travel Geography and Travel History, geographic treatment, biography Areas, regions, places in generalLC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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