The General in his Labyrinth

Introduction Introduction

The General in his Labyrinth

Introduction Introduction

By: Kalile E. and Rossana f.By: Kalile E. and Rossana f.

Who is Simon Bolivar• Monumental figures in history

• Memorialized

• - Statues: Central Park, Avenue of Americas, Middle of Washington DC, Plazas

• - Money Currency: Bolivares Fuertes

• - Country: Bolivia (others)

• Mythic proportions

• - Great Influence, Amazing accomplishments, Learned from failures, Romantic

Love life • - Dramatic short marriage – had to break up due to independence from spain

(women was Spanish)

• - Heartbreaker

• - During War w/Spain he had a love affair with Manuela Saenz for 8 years

• Born in Caracas - 1783/1830

• He died of Tuberculosis- age 47

• Summarized his life in a quote- “He who serves revolution, plows the sea”

• He was a contradictory man

• Named Liberator in the City Council of Caracas after a successful campaign- 1813 to recapture Western Venezuela from the Spanish (proclaimed independence for the second time)

• 1813- declared “War to Death” against Spaniards

• Following year – the Congress of 2nd republic (Venezuela )- granted him dictatorial powers in both civil & military affairs

• He was a bloodthirsty tyrant and merciless killer

• Bias against local politicians

• Americans turned on him when he wrote the constitution of Bolivia that said he was going to end slavery and the president was going to be a life term one and was going to be able to choose his own successor

• They called him the George Washington of South America

• North American president William Harris said that Bolivar wanted to turn Gran Colombia into Monarchy

• Called North American system ‘A government so sublime that it might more nearly befit a republic of saints’

• 1811- Thomas Jefferson said that ‘ the cruel arts of their (the Latin Americans) oppressors have enchained their minds, have kept them as incapable of self-government as children

• Privileged American born descendants of European- spaniards were called Criollos (creoles)

• Spanish - Local white landowners and aristocrats

• English - Children of great ethnic and cultural jambalaya pot of New Orleans

• Peninsulars( Spaniards living in Spain) and Creoles had economic conflicts.

• During the Bourbon reforms the peninsulars in america attempted to deprive creoles of certain social and economic rights

• Jan 1799 (15 years old) Spain > education

• Fell in love w/Maria Teresa Rodriguez del Toro y Alayza

• 1801 Bolivar proposed marriage

• 1 condition

• traveled to Paris

• 1802 retuned to Spain > Maria and Bolivar married

• Venezuela

• Jan 1803 Maria Teresa died

• Reason of involvement in the independence

The Start

• Garcia Marquez > description of event

• The San Mateo Plantation- lost his father (3 years old), mother (9 years old), wife (20 years old)

• Wife died 8 months after the wedding (fever or domestic accident)

• Birth into history

• Neither- death or trying replacing her

• Dreams

• Buried her at the bottom of a watertight oblivion = living w/out her

A New Simon Bolivar (preparation)

• Madrid to Paris

• Napoleon as emperor

• deeply moved by (Napoleon) > w/out aristocratic birth became the most powerful ruler in Europe

• Studied >impt. political works & philosophical thinkers (Montesquieu to Spinoza) / American & French revolutions - preparing him for his birth into history

• Italy- met w/ Simon Rodriguez (childhood tutor)

• Rome- Simon Rodriguez knew Bolivar’s future

• 1804-1805 Bolivar became to see himself taking an active role (in the movement to achieve independence)

• 1807 Bolivar returned to Vnzla

• Mexico, Vnzla, to Buenos Aires colonies > taking action against representers of the Spanish crown

• 1810 latin americans- beginning of war for independence

• Act of rebellion against Bonapartist monarchy & in favor of local autonomy

• Broke in Caracas (April 19), Buenos Aires (May 25), Bogota (July 20), Dolores, Mexico (Sep. 16), Santiago, Chile (Sep.18)

• Great Britain (protection and support denied)

• England - met w/ Francisco de Miranda (Precursor of Independence)

• End of 1810, both reached Caracas

• Separation > Miranda - (imprisoned him)

• Lost strategically Puerto Cabello to the monarchists = oblige to go into exile

• Escaped Vnzla, reached Cartagena in Nueva Granada

• 1812 Antonio Jose de Sucre, victory over Spanish forces (Ayacucho)

• 1824- Bolivar involved in constant warfare

• Battles/Conquering Andes on horsebacks and frontiers

• (Culo de Hierro= Iron-Ass) by soldiers

• Endless political and diplomatic > Independence (northern portion of South A.)

• Santander > Bolivar’s nemesis

• (Cassandro) secret name = New Granada general Francisco De Paula Santander

• Became his: great friend one time, greatest gainsayer, chief of staff, the man he appointed president of Colombia during (cruel campaigns for liberation of Quito, Peru, Bolivia)

• Santander brave and effective (academic training) 2nd man in the movement of independence/ 1st in legal codification of the Republic

Gabriel Garcia Marquez (Writing) • Period were Bolivar’s life fills history books > tireless writer & personal history writing by

(Daniel O’Leary) a officer / Garcia searched through 34 volumes

• Garcia Marquez focused > Bolivar’s final days, travels along the Magdalena R. from Bogota to the coasts (sail for Europe & into exile)

• Last voyage of Bolivar > least documented period

• no writing left > 14 calamitous days

• No straight-linear narration (beginning - end) / he wrote circular- creates its own momentum

• Spiral witting- chronological (diagram of memory)

• “News of a Kidnapping” >1st published in the UK

• Violence & narco-traffickers (Medellin Cartel) was not the purest Columbian fiction

• Memoir > “Living to Tell the Tale”

• Fiction & journalism

• In The General in His Labyrinth, Garcia’s technique: reflects symbolically,

• -subject theme of the novel

• -Bolivar’s condition at the end of his life

• Bolivar’s end: fatally ill, achievements > denied by people for whom he fought his wars & won victories, failures & mistakes followed him, his power & glory were stripped was by ingratitude, obliged to leave the continent whose independence he has sacrificed his youth, health and fortune...

• Best friend (Manuela Saenz) & worst enemies (Francisco de Paula Santander) - were not there with him

• Bolivar weight was 88 pounds, weighted 10 pounds less before he died

• Measured 4 centimeters less /Feet & hands were small

• The General in His Labyrinth- journey is a multiple rebirth, 1st into own physical death, then into the immortally of his fame, finally endless changes in the world’s image of him

• oldest of his portraits (anonymous miniature painting in Madrid) he was 16 years old / another in Haiti (32 years old)

• Aristocrats in Lima called him Sambo

• Painters began to idealize him

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