One of the few constants in One Hundred Years of Solitude is the
character of Ursula. Although she does eventually die, it wasn’t clear to me
when reading the book that even that would happen. Ursula is an incredible
grounding force. By taking care of everyone and everything around her, she
tethers everything to herself. In many ways, I think Ursula’s death plays a
large part in the deterioration of Macondo, as her presence held many aspects
of Macondo together.
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2 comments:
I agree with this, Liz. Ursula as a grounding force is a great example of the "men waver, women survive" concept. Ursula provides for her family's livelihood and is truly the one to advance Macondo and increase the city's wealth and standards. On the surface, it looks like the actions of prominent men (her husband, her sons, etc.) solely change the course of the city's future, but I would argue that Ursula's actions certainly play a significant role as well. For instance, Ursula's candy animals stimulated the first true entrepreneurship, and it is through those very candies that the entire town suffers from insomnia/memory loss. Most importantly, Ursula attains her power and is able to exert such an influence on Macondo not through the means of violence, as men in her city do, but by earning the respect of her peers. Another important point to note is that Ursula does not use violence or defiance to transcend the traditional mother/wife duties. She does not blatantly rebel but rather uses her day to day tasks at home to establish her position as matriarch.
Preach it, Liz. I love Ursula. While she wasn't exactly renowned as a great beauty like the late Remedios or Rebéca the martyr, she was so much more than that. Not to say Ursula is better than the other two, but she had her own presence. In the midst of her husband's descent from compos mentis and Macondo's transformation, Ursula keeps the house clean and tells it to her family like it is. She's practically fearless, save for her understandably negative feelings about the incestuous aspect of the Buendías. Incest poses a multitude of threats to an individual's (who was born out of incest) development. Off-putting personality traits, physical deformities and other birth defects represent some of the dangerous outcomes of inbreeding. Ursula looks out for these signs in her own children and even warns her husband before they consummate their marriage. In Paradise Lost, John Milton's portrayal of Eve was rather derogatory, subservient. If in 100 Years, José is Adam and Ursula is Eve, then Eve, in the context of 100 Years, is the stronger of the two. That is not to say Adam (José) is entirely weak, but he does indulge the gypsies, dabbles in magic and science and helps steer Macondo to modernity and away from serene solitude. Ursula was fine with the way things were. She was untroubled (for the most part) in Paradise. And to me, when Ursula dies, it feels as though a part of Macondo's heart went with her.
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