Trivia Quiz for Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel García Márquez (1985)
From the “Classic Novels (and Movies)” book club of West Seattle
A. Stability Amidst Instability
1. The lives in this novel are fraught with instability wrought by civil wars, financial fraud, epidemics, environmental degradation, and huge variations in weather. Which of the following is not depicted?
a. Lorenzo Daza explains to his daughter: “’We are ruined,’ ‘Total ruin, so now you know.’”
b. Florentino Ariza realizes: “Human beings are not born once and for all … life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves.”
c. One of Florentino’s lovers is robbed but does not report it because she is a princess in exile.
d. Although they initially mourn their husbands, “The world is full of happy widows.”
2. Despite the ambient instability, persistence emerges as a central theme in the story. Which quote does not appear in the book?
a. “Always remember that the most important thing in a good marriage is not happiness but stability.”
b. “His father had been right when he repeated to his dying day that there was no one with more common sense, no stonecutter more obstinate, no manager more lucid or dangerous, than a poet.”
c. “’We’ll grow old waiting,’ he said.”
d. “If only the picture could change, and I could always be what I am now!”
B. Secret Connections & the Voyeurism Which Allows Us to See. Match the secret to the character.
The characters: a. Florentino Ariza; b. Fermina Daza; c. Barbara Lynch; d. Juvenal Urbino
The Secrets:
3. “chess became an incurable addiction that tormented him until the day of his death”
4. he was “a solitary man in need of love, a street beggar as humble as a whipped dog”
5. “she cried only in rage … she could never forgive her weakness in crying”
6. she wore a full skirt and no underwear on the days when she would receive her lover at home.
7. Love in the Time of Cholera takes place in a city with official squares and statues that resemble many a Latin American locale, but the most important actions transpire behind closed doors, out of sight, or in the dark. Which of the following is not a site of significance in this novel?
a. the Music School
b. the brothel near the port
c. under the almond trees in the Park of the Evangels
d. Leona Cassiani’s office in the R.C.C. (River Company of the Caribbean)
8. Some of the secrets revealed keep their power to surprise readers even today. Which of the following is not a secret from this book?
a. One of Florentino Ariza’s lovers, Andrea Varón, shares enemas with him.
b. Fermina Daza discovers her husband’s infidelity by smelling not perfume, but the human odor of another woman on his clothes
c. Florentino Ariza seduced his ward, then a schoolgirl age 13, in what is called his “secret slaughterhouse.”
d. Fermina Daza harbors a passion for her chambermaid, Flora, and an insatiable desire for eggplant.
C. Maxims and Wisdom
9. As in many old-fashioned novels, maxims or moral lessons run throughout Love in the Time of Cholera. Which of the following maxims is not found here?
a. “Every person has a right to take care of themselves. He always did.”
b. “Wisdom comes to us when it can no longer do any good.”
c. “Music is important to one’s health.”
d. “Love becomes greater and nobler in calamity.”
D. Sensual Style
Gabriel García Márquez is known for his “magical realism,” but one may arguably claim he is more of a sensualist, so strong and enduring are his bodily images.
Match the sensual quote to the thing evoked (designated as X). The things include: a. “the fate of unrequited love”; b. “the certainty of death”; and c. “masculine honor”.
Sensual quotes:
10. “At nightfall, at the oppressive moment of transition … a tender breath of human shit, warm and sad, stirred X in the depths of one’s soul.”
11. “It was inevitable: the scent of bitter almonds always reminded him of X.”
12. It was said that the enormous hernias caused by pollution [on the testicles of local men] “whistled like a lugubrious bird and twisted in unbearable pain, but no one complained because a large, well-carried rupture was a display of X.”
ANSWERS
1. c.
2. d. (That sentiment is lifted from Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Grey)
3. Juvenal Urbino
4. Florentino Ariza
5. Fermina Daza
6. Barbara Lynch
7. a.
8. d.
9. a. (That quote is from Dickens’s A Christmas Carol)
10. the certainty of death
11. the fate of unrequited love
12. masculine honor
Daily Joy with Honey Girl 