Poetics & One Hundred Years of Solitude

Aristotle's view on history and poetry that he describes in Poetics reminds a lot of the way Marquez views history and how he uses literature. Aristotle describes poetry as being higher than history, for it poetry is able to convey universality. On the other hand, Aristotle describes history as not nearly being as "high" because it merely states facts. Poetry allows for one to see the commonality of the universal condition. This reminded me of Marquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude in that Marquez clearly believes that literature is much higher than history. Although Marquez incorporates history into his novel, he views literature as much higher than history. He does not include historical accounts to retell the past; instead, he believes that magical realism through literature is maybe the only way there is to actually represent the reality of life. Marquez believes literature has the power to unify people by depicting reality and trends that all people experience; however, Aristotle and Marquez believe history does not have the capability of doing this. Marquez reveals in his novel the universality that literature can reveal to the reader about trends or themes in human nature. Aristotle and Marquez both set literature above history because they both believe literature has the power to convey so much more than history does and that literature has the power to convey one of the hardest ideas in life, reality.