One Hundred Years of Solitude Symbols
The story starts with a relationship between two cousins, named José ArcadioBuendía and Úrsula. The two falls in love and escapes to a faraway town they discovered which they later on named as Macondo. Throughout the years, Macondo remains as a place untouched by civilization as the entire clan alienated themselves from the rest of the society.
Throughout the years, some improvements were seen and the town eventually opened up to its neighbors while interacting with the society. It was later on perceived as a flourishing town filled with glory, violence, wild sexual conquests and terror. Distress also added up to the story with the presence of civil wars and a series of battles between the government and its enemies.
The story eventually ends with a hurricane wiping out the entire town, bringing it back to its former days when it was nothing but a strange place unknown to the rest of the outside world.
The story offers a wild combination of events that depict a general view of how situations unfold in the society. Overall, it portrays plenty of symbols which are hidden in characters, plots, and events that represent the message that the author is trying to convey.
One Hundred Years of Solitude Meanings and Symbols
The Railroad
In the story, the railroad is built in order to link Macondo to the rest of the world. This symbolizes the arrival of the modern society to a place which, before it was discovered, was merely a town unknown to the rest of the society and even to its neighbors.
At the later part of the story, Macondo eventually starts to lose its magnificence, as symbolized by the railroad falling into ruins. This represents the fall of a great town which has experienced success at some point in time but eventually fell back to its pre-glorious days.
Yellow and Gold
Yellow is a color that was dominantly mentioned on the story plenty of times. Yellow is seen as an element of change in the novel. When José ArcadioBuendía died, yellow flowers were witnessed to be falling from the sky. Also, yellow butterflies were pictured to have been following Mauricio Babilonia around town. Whether positive or not, yellow is used as a symbol to depict a major change about to occur in the story.
Gold, on