Introduction
“The handsomest drowned man in the world”, written by Gabriel Garcia Marquez is one of the short-stories that was written in 1968 which has magical realism in it to entice the reader. The author uses captivating language to create attention to the readers. Marquez uses figurative language/symbolism to capture the minds of the readers and flavor his work. He uses a number of them such as imagery, symbolism, similes, metaphor and personification among others in order to bring out the intended message to the readers.
Imagery
Imagery is use of descriptive language that appeals to all five senses of the human being. It is used to deepen the understanding of the readers. The author uses imagery in his work in many ways. For instance, the title “The handsomest drowned man in the world” is one form of imagery where the author tries to create the appearance of the drowned man in the reader’s mind. He also describes the corpse in a way that the readers could take that description to figure out how it appeared when he says “He had the smell of the sea about him, and only his shape gave one to suppose that it was the corpse of a human being, because the skin was covered with a crust of mud and scales” (Marquez 2).
Symbolism
Symbolism can be defined as the use of symbols to represent ideas or qualities. The author uses drowned man also known as “Esteban” as a symbol of hope and change to villagers where he used to live before drowning. Esteban was perceived as a champion of mankind because of his distinctive characteristics from other human beings. The author says that “men and women become aware for the first time of the desolation of their streets, the dryness of their courtyards, the narrowness of their dreams as they faced the splendor and beauty of their drowned man”(Marquez 3).
Simile
A simile is the nature of comparing one thing with another of different kind. For example, the author uses simile when he says, “They walked about like startled hens, peckling with the sea charms on their breast some interfering on one side to put a scapular of the good wind on the drowned man”(Marquez 5, 6). The author compares the walking of the women with that of hen to bring out a clear definition of how they behaved.
Metaphor
Metaphor can be defined as a situation where a word or a phrase is applied to an object or action to which it is not literally applicable. The author described fully how the village appeared when he stated that, “The village was made up of only twenty-odd wooden houses that had courtyards with no flowers and which were spread about on the end of a desert-like cape” (Marquez 2).
Personification
Personification is giving human characteristics to non-human thing. Marquez in his work personifies things in order to put his points clear to the readers. For instance, he says that “The captain would say in fourteen languages, look there, where the wind is so peaceful now that it’s gone to sleep beneath the beds, over there, where the sun is so bright that the sunflowers don’t know which way to turn, yes over there, that’s Esteban's village” (Marquez 4).
Conclusion
The author has magnificently used figurative language/symbolism in the manner of capturing the reader’s attention and also to help the reader understand in form of creating pictures in their mind as they read the short-stories.
Work cited
Marquez, Gabriel Garcia. "The Handsomest Drowned Man In The World." A famous tale in the magic realism genre. MyObject, OpenWorld (1984).
