The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World

The Handsomest Drowned Man in the World

Gabriel García Márquez

"Uses magic realism but has a reality behind it"

           The first thing that struck me when I first finished reading the story was that the fictional society is oddly similar to the modern society where lookism is rampant in our daily lives. Such conclusion was driven by the way people behave towards the dead man, or such attitude and how influential a single person can be. The evidences are emphasized in the following points.

             Just as the women finished cleaning up the body, they are shocked by the extremely handsome appearance of the dead man, establishing a blind stereotype of him: "But only when they finished cleaning him off did they become aware of the kind of man he was and it left them breathless. Not only was he the tallest, strongest, most virile, and best built man they had ever seen, but even though they were looking at him there was no room for him in their imagination."

              With the bias deeply engraved in their minds, the women are willing to do anything for the dead man, slowly becoming big "fans" of him: "Fascinated by his huge size and his beauty, the women then decided to make him some pants from a large piece of sail and a shirt from some bridal Brabant linen so that he could continue through his death with dignity." The "fans" in the story is quite similar to "fans" today, who intend to serve their favorite celebrities as gods or goddesses. There are cases in which these fans send expensive or otherwise valuable gifts such as laptops and drawings of the celebrity, the situation that is similar to the women making some pants from a large piece of sail and a shirt from some bridal Brabant linen.

            

              The women are slowly and thoroughly manipulated by the stereotypes they established themselves, now starting to freely imagine what he was like when he was alive. The speculation has no evidence at all, but they come up with specific words he would have said or detailed behavior he would have shown and how others would have reacted to him. According to the women, he felt sorry for his own size wherever he went, not sitting anywhere lest he might break the chair he sat on. Also, his big size made him uncomfortable, "condemned to going through doors sideways, cracking his head on crossbeams." The women also thought that if that magnificent man had lived in the village, his house would have had the widest doors, the highest ceiling, and the strongest floor, his bedstead would have been made from a midship frame held together by iron bolts, and his wife would have been the happiest woman.

             This state of the women, acting overly nice to the dead man and now making up whole stories of him when he was alive, reflects the desire to become familiar with every little detail of the handsome drowned man's life. The similar kind of desire is also shown by the "big fans" or "paparazzi" today, who are willing to sacrifice anything to get information on current state of the celebrity. The desire is exactly why the paparazzi and privacy exposure of celebrities have become one of the most critical problems in modern society.

             The women then assume that the man was good natured when he was alive, just by looking at his handsome outer appearance. The assumption, of course, does not make any sense, with no proof that can back up their stories. We make the same mistake today, automatically and unconsciously assuming that handsome or beautiful people have such good personalities. Furthermore, when the women come to learn that the drowned man is not from the neighbor area, they sighs, "Praise the Lord," "He's ours!"

              It is simply amazing how influential a single person can be. Given by the fact that the village people held the most splendid funeral for him and that they also "chose a father and mother from among the best people, and aunts and uncles and cousins, so that through him all the inhabitants of the village became kinsmen," the author is not only trying to emphasize the great impact the dead man has on the whole village, but also trying to lead the readers into thinking that this is ridiculous. By showing the ridiculous circumstances through the description of the story for the readers, the author may be trying to leave the readers laugh at the fictional society, thereby giving them a chance to laugh at, or look back on their own society. With rational thinking, worshipping a dead man and establishing kinship with the dead man are all extremely weird and in some ways grotesque. In this case, the author in this story most effectively delivered the lesson for his readers, both making up irrational and funny scenes to laugh at using magic realism, and emphasizing the huge impact the dead man has on the whole village, especially when the women thought, "… it seemed to them that the wind had never been so steady nor the sea so restless as on that night and they supposed that the change had something to do with the dead man," or in the last sentence, "… yes, over there, that's Esteban's village."