Writing of Love in the Letters of Separation In Love in The Time of Cholera (1985[1988]) By Gabriel Garcia Marquez

A ‘writerly’ production, Love in the Time of Cholera b y Marquez with its love letters invites the reader a s producer of the text, as a co-author to investigate the infinite possibilities of the dimensions of lo ve as dramatised in the novel. Love in the Time of Cholera is a profound lov e story, an ode to unrequited love and its extraord inary final consummation, an investigation of a rejected lover’ s obsession, a saga of the day to day happenings of a marriage based on the idea of stability and a pluralistic delineat ion of love as sickness and obsession has not been s en from the perspective of “ourselves writing” (Barthes 1973:5). In this paper I argue for a re-reading of the text for ‘rewriting’ it and for placing the reader as not the producer of the m eaning, “but merely a privileged site where meanings interweave.” (Stafford & McManus 2004:78). Florentino Ariza falls in love with the young Fermina Daza and expresses his love through letters and telegrams for fifty one year, n ine months and four days. His letters are ‘a dictio nary of compliments, inspired by books he had learned by heart because h e had read them so often’ (Marquez LTC 40, quoted i n Simpson LRB 1988). On the other hand, the letters of the young Juvenal Urbino are seen by Fermina as “brief and pro per” (Marquez LTC 82-83) and she is “impressed by [their] simplici ty and seriousness” and recognises that they are wri tten with “a physician’s handwriting.” (Ibid.) The romance of Flor entina Ariza and Fermina Daza continues before the ti me she gets married to Dr. Juvenal Urbino, but Florentino Ariza’s one-sided epistolary romance continues until after Fermina Daza’s husband’s death, when Florentino Ariza declares his lo ve to Fermina Daza. As septuagenarians, they go toget her on a ship and their love goes on and when the Captain of t he ship asks and Ariza replies, “Forever” (Marquez L TC 228). The novel with its dynamic and spiral narrative unfo lds a complex love triangle, with its rich language. The very opening line of the novel: “It was inevitable...” (Marquez L TC 7) is ironical in its foreshadowing of a plot that is open-ended and unpredictable. It has been remarked in a brilliant study by Bell (1993: 50) that, letters have been use d as a “central narrative device defining the emotional ambivalence ” of Florentino Ariza but the textual evidences sugge st that Ariza does not reflect any ambivalence but shows singular devotion to meet Fermina Daza through the half centu ry of his interminable waiting. Against this background the pap er will investigate, how the different aspects of lov e are manifested through letters in Love in the Time of Cholera. The paper will further explore the different aspects in Florentino Ariza’s choices of relationships for survival for a prospec tive union with Fermina Daza for which, he has been wai ting so long.