'It's the carpentry of it all'

 

“Ultimately, literature is nothing but carpentry. With both you are working with reality, a material just as hard as wood.” – Gabriel Garcia Marquez

 

Colombian novelist, short-story writer, screenwriter and journalist Marquez, born on this date in 1927, was one of the most significant authors of the 20th century.   Winner of the 1982 Nobel Prize in Literature, he actually started his career as a journalist, writing many acclaimed nonfiction works and journalistic short stories before turning to fiction. 

 

Best known for his novels One Hundred Years of Solitude and Love in the Time of Cholera, he also was a fierce critic of Colombia’s intense and often corrupt political scene and not afraid to skewer politicians in his writings.

 

He often said the most important influencers on his writing were American authors William Faulkner and Ernest Hemingway.   “Faulkner is a writer who has had much to do with my soul,” he said, “but Hemingway is the one who had the most to do with my craft - not simply for his books, but for his astounding knowledge of the aspect of craftsmanship in the science of writing.”   Marquez was equally lauded by fellow writers for his keen eye to detail and skill as a master storyteller. 

 

“What matters in life is not what happens to you,” he said, “but what you remember and how you remember it.”