Flower Symbolism In Chronicle Of A Death Foretold

Universally accepted as symbols of beauty, flowers are often used to symbolize love. Although beautiful, they are of a delicate nature that can only survive temporarily in this world. Often people observe their magnificence in the seclusion of gardens, where they are rarely left to grow freely. Contained within flowers are manifold functional uses, but their purpose is confined to being observed for their beauty, much like what was expected of women. In Chronicle of a Death Foretold, a man investigates a peculiar death several years after it has occurred. Throughout the novel, women of the novel are are controlled and judged for their qualities. Gabriel Garcia Marquez uses the motif of flowers to symbolize women and their virginity to demonstrate the confinement of women in society.
One such example of the motif is the the names of female characters. Particularly, Marquez names characters after flowers to illustrate the heavy protection of women and their virginity. For example, Marquez’s female characters have flower names such as “Divina Flor, who was just coming into bloom” (5). Divina Flor is specifically related to flowers as her name translates to divine flower. Through the …show more content…
Brazenly, Pedro and Pablo Vicario gave pigs “the names of flowers” instead of human names before they butchered them (31). Pedro and Pablo gave pigs a flower name, a characteristic the pigs share with the female characters. By naming pigs after flowers, the author compares pigs to women through the brothers. Although society considers a woman’s virginity sacred, Marquez juxtaposes women with slaughtered pigs. Therefore, the author demonstrates the brothers’ viewpoints on women. If they treat animals same as women, the women are no better than animals to them. To these men, women are expendable and valued only for the sake of being abused and