In Memoriam: Oscar Hijuelos and Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Oscar Hijuelos (photo by Dario Acosta)
(1951-2013)

When browsing the City University of New York alumni magazine, I learned of the sudden death of Pulitzer Prize winning author, Oscar Hijuelos at age 62 this past autumn.  Shocked and deeply saddened, I had looked forward with great anticipation to each new work from the Cuban-American author, whose mastery of language was intoxicating and whose storytelling dexterity was a reminder of the oral folkloric tradition of Latin American.  In my favorite of his novels, "The Fourteen Sisters of Emilio Montez O'Brien"  I recall Hijuelos describing the overwhelming feminine scent of the women in a small Pennsylvania house so overwhelmed a pilot that he is quite literally pulled from the sky to the ground below by his desire.  This piece of magical realism owes something to the master of that genre, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, but Hijuelos is no less adept at the technique.  Every Hijuelos book was a joyous read and I returned to many of them again and again.  Oscar Hijuelos gone too soon.

The Works of Oscar Hijuelos

Hijuelos won the Pulitzer Prize for this 1989 novel set in NYC in the 1950's

(1983) 

1993

1999

For Young Adults
2008

1995

Memoir - 2011

2002

Sequel to Mambo Kings - 2010

Oscar Hijuelos Obituary - The New York Times

Yesterday, at age 87, Gabriel Garcia Marquez passed away.  His skills as a storyteller had been compared to 19th century greats like Dickens and Tolstoy in the depth, breadth and detail he gave each character, scene, setting.  Enthralling readers across the globe, his works transcended ethnicity, race and religion, yet his imagery and otherworldly creations were inherently Latin America south of the equator.  Marquez was not only a novelist, whose books became unlikely best-sellers (there was a time in the mid-1980's when every person I saw carried a copy of "Love in the Time of Cholera"), but a political journalist who reported on the military juntas who presided over the governments of much of Latin America in the 1960s and 1970s. Marquez went into exile, from his native Columbia, when his critical writings of the government placed him in danger of being imprisoned or worse.  Marquez left a great legacy of literature (fiction and non-fiction) if not creating magical realism, than becoming the maestro of the genre.  

Gabriel Garcia Marquez
(1927-2014)

(1967)

Novella  (1981)

Novella (2004)

(1989)

(1985)

(Quote from "Love in the Time of Cholera")

(1975)


 Non-Fiction (1996)   

 Non-Fiction (1986)

Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Obituary for Gabriel Garcia Marquez - The New York Times