Handsomest Drowned Man

In Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s short story, “The Handsomest Drowned Man In The World,” village women and men care for a drowned man who washed up from the sea. The drowned man later becomes a symbol of greatness for men, women, and children of the village. The effect the drowned man has on the village relates to a theme of the short story: namely, that people have an inherent need to believe in something greater than themselves. Marquez conveys this theme by utilizing tactics such as setting, characters, a protagonist, symbolism, and imagery.
Marquez describes the place where the men, women, and children live in as a village, a word which helps to represent and bring about the setting of the short story. Marquez states, “The village was made up …show more content…
As discussed in the previous paragraph, the village is a desolate place, and, with the drowned man’s arrival, thoughts and feelings begin to stir amongst the women. They began to analyze Esteban’s body leaving them “breathless” (Marquez 2) because Esteban was the “tallest, strongest, most virile and best-built man they had ever seen.” (Marquez 2). Women in the village were so fascinated about him that “they secretly compared him to their own men.” The drowned man is more than a stranger or a human to the women; he was a figure they praised. Reverence and passion for the drowned man grow on these women, they shout, “Praise the Lord, they sighed, he’s ours!” (Marquez 2). It also causes them to sob, “for he was the more destitute, most peaceful, and most obliging man on earth…” (Marquez 2). The drowned man in the eyes of the women is a beautiful figure whose masculinity and tallness demonstrates authority. Village women’s thoughts, attitudes, and feelings began to change once they began to realize that Esteban is an important figure who they should …show more content…
The children first thought Esteban was an “enemy ship” then a “whale” until they realized he was a “drowned man” who washed up from the sea. Marquez utilizes imagery to depict several different images of Esteban. In order, to symbolize how different Esteban is compared to the villagers. As a result, the villagers recognized that Esteban did not belong in the village because they had never seen someone like him, so he became someone special to them. They began to change their lifestyles by picturing how Esteban lifestyle would be. Therefore, the villagers decided “they would have wider doors, higher ceilings, and stronger floors, so that Esteban’s memory could go everywhere. In other words, they praised Esteban and wanted to live up to his standards, because the villagers saw him as someone greater than