Home Reading Report No.

A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings

By: Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Submitted by:
Hisola, Belinda Heloise C.
Grade 10B

Submitted to:
Ms. Jesselle M. Cortes
English Teacher
Author’s Background:

Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Colombian novelist, short-story author, screenwriter, and journalist Gabriel José de la
Concordia Garca Márquez is affectionately referred to as "Gabo" throughout Latin
America. He received the 1972 Neustadt International Prize for Literature and the 1982
Nobel Prize in Literature. Recognized as one of the most influential writers of the 20th
century, particularly in the Spanish language, he pursued a self-directed education that
led him to forego law school in favor of a career in journalism. While pursuing his legal
education at the National University of Colombia, Garca Márquez started his career as a
journalist. He contributed to El Universal in Cartagena between 1948 and 1949. He
authored a "whimsical" column for the Barranquilla newspaper El Heraldo from 1950 to
1952 under the pen name "Septimus." During this time, he actively participated in the
Barranquilla Group, a loosely organized community of writers and journalists that served
as a major source of inspiration and motivation for his literary career. He collaborated
with role models like Ramon Vinyes, who was portrayed by Garca Márquez as an
elderly Catalan who runs a bookstore in One Hundred Years of Solitude.
Setting:
The story takes place in Pelayo and Elisenda’s backyard.
Characters:
Character 1: The Old Man
an elderly man with wings who shows up one day in Pelayo and Elisenda's yard.
Character 2: Pelayo
Elisenda’s husband and the discoverer of the old man. Pelayo is a common peasant
who is reluctantly willing to house the old guy with wings in his chicken coop despite his
poverty.
Character 3: Elisenda
wife of Pelayo. Elisenda persuades Pelayo to charge the villagers to see the elderly
man, but afterwards thinks of him as a bother.
Character 4: Father Gonzaga
The village priest. He was skeptical of the dirty old man on whether he was an angel or just a
mortal.

Character 5: The Neighbor Woman

Pelayo and Elisenda’s bossy neighbor. The supposedly wise neighbor woman actually seems
more like a silly know-it-all.

Character 6: The Spider Woman

The Spider Woman now possesses the body of a huge spider and the head of a
dejected young woman as punishment for the sin of defying her parents.
Summary:

Exposition:
Pelayo finds a homeless, confused old guy with unusually enormous wings in his
courtyard one day while killing crabs in a rainfall that has persisted for several days, The
elderly man speaks incomprehensibly and is filthy, with signs of senility, Pelayo and his
wife, Elisenda, reach the conclusion that the elderly guy must be an angel who
attempted to transport their sick child to paradise after speaking with a neighbor.
Rising Action:
The elderly man is kept by Pelayo and Elisenda in their chicken coop, where he soon
starts to draw large numbers of interested onlookers, as soon as people learn about the
old man's presence, they start traveling here and there to consult him for guidance and
treatment.
Climax:
When a traveling freak show enters the village, the throng begins to thin out people
throng to hear the legend of the "spider woman," a woman who, after disobeying her
parents, was converted into a gigantic tarantula with a female head, the sorrowful story
of the spider woman is so well-known that people easily forget the elderly guy, who had
only given his travelers a few meaningless semimiracles.
Conflict:
When Pelayo discovers the elderly guy in his yard, Him and his wife are being put to the
test to see if they will be kind to the elderly man, Pelayo and his wife ignore the elderly
guy, confining him in the chicken coop and not providing for him.
Falling action:
Despite this, the admission fees Elisenda collected have made Pelayo and Elisenda
immensely wealthy, as several years pass the boy grows older while the old man stays
with them in the chicken coop.
Resolution:
Just when Pelayo and Elisenda are convinced that the old man will soon die, he begins
to regain his strength, One day the old man stretches his wings and takes off into the
air, and Elisenda watches him disappear over the horizon.
Point of View:
Third Person (Limited Omniscient)
The narrator in Marquez's "A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings" is not identified. The
story's narrator is referred as being "third-person omniscient”.
Theme:
The Coexistence of Cruelty and Compassion
“A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings” examines the human response to
dependent, weak, and different people. the idea of not treating others who are different
than you in a harsh manner but instead to treat them with how you would want to be
treated.
Symbolism:

The old man and his wings

The story represents the strange or foreign that seems to be entering the society. The
angel in the story, though, is not treated the same as other creatures sent from heaven.
In this view, the angel represents people's faith in their respective beliefs.
Volcabulary Words:
Proliferate - Grow rapidly
the science fiction magazines that proliferated in the 1920s

Befuddle - Be confusing or perplexing to

He was to do this because his brain not befuddled by panic.

Hermetic - Completely sealed or airtight

My father has a hermetic seal that ensures perfect waterproofing.

Cataclysm - A sudden violent change in the earth’s surface

The country barely survived the cataclysm of war.

Iridescent - varying in color when seen in different lights

The cream colored siding looked iridescent in the moonlight.

Stupor - marginal consciousness

He fell back onto the sofa in a drunken stupor.

Magnanimous - noble and generous in spirit

I was prepared to be magnanimous, prepared to feel compassion for him.

Grandeur - the quality of being magnificent or splendid

His paintings capture the beauty and grandeur of the landscape.

Frivolous - not serious in content, attitude, or behavior

I do not raise that in any frivolous spirit, but it seems to me to be somewhat important.

Deign - do something that one considers to be below one's dignity

I wouldn't deign to answer that absurd accusation.
Comprehension Questions:
1. In the beginning of the story, why was “the world” sad? How was it described?
The description of the relentless rain: "The world had been sad since Tuesday."
All of the descriptions, including the swarms of crabs that invade Pelayo and
Elisenda's home and the muddy sand of the beach, look "like powdered light" in
the rainy grayness.

2. Who were the first people to see the “very old man with enormous wings?” What
was their initial reaction upon discovering him?
They stared at him for so long and so intently that Pelayo and Elisenda quickly
overcame their surprise and discovered him to be familiar. They dared to speak
to him, and he replied in an incomprehensible dialect in a strong sailor's voice.

3. How was the “very old man with enormous wings” described in paragraph 2? In
paragraph 11?
He was dressed like a ragpicker. There were only a few faded hairs on his bald
head and very few teeth in his mouth, and his pitiful state as a drenched great-
grandfather took away any sense of grandeur he might have had. His massive
buzzard wings were forever entangled in the mud, dirty and half-plucked.
4. Who said that the “very old man with enormous wings” is an angel? Why did the
people believe her?
Pelayo and his wife, Elisenda, conclude after consulting a neighbor woman that
the old man must be an angel who attempted to come and take their sick child to
heaven. The old man is assumed to be an angel because of his wings.

5. What was the verdict of Father Gonzalo and the church about the nature of the
“very old man with enormous wings”?
Father Gonzaga believes that this man could not be an angel, because of his
appearance first of all. We are told that the old man was "a pitiful man who
looked more like a huge decrepit hen among the fascinated chickens." Secondly,
Father Gonzaga greets the man in Latin. The man's failure to respond shows that
he "does not understand the language of God or know how to greet His
ministers." Lastly, he has nothing of the divine about him, and is far too human
Sources:
https://www.ndsu.edu/pubweb/~cinichol/CreativeWriting/323/
MarquezManwithWings.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabriel_García_Márquez
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Gabriel-Garcia-Marquez