Taylor Pagel

Mrs. Balka

HL English / Period 1

6 November 2019

Chronicle of a Death Foretold ​on the Significance of Honor

In the novel ​Chronicle of a Death Foretold​, revolving around the death of a man who’s

life could have been spared if not for the extreme bystander affect that took ahold of the town in

which the murder occurred, author Gabriel Marquez reveals how honor is inexcusably assigned

more importance by individuals and families within society and placed above other significant

values such as love and compassion through the imagery of different people’s reactions to the

forecoming murder, symbolism of the superficial relationships within the society, and the

juxtaposition of events in the past compared to those in the present,.

Near the end of the piece of literature, as Santiago Nasar is coming home to his death bed

with everyone in town aware of his impending doom, Marquez utilizes the imagery of Flora

Miguel’s reaction to the news of Santiago’s planned murder to illustrate how in this culture,

one’s honor overrrides any love they hold for those in their life. Once Flora is warned of her

fiance’s planned murder, it “seemed inconceivable to [her] that [the Vicario brothers] were going

to kill Santiago Nasar”; however, she did stumble upon the ludicrous realisation that “they would

force [Nasar] to marry Angela Vicario in order to give her back her honor” (Marquez 112).

Instead of thoughts of grief or plans to help Nasar escape the crisis, she refuses to accept the

situation and plots a new one in her mind that revolves around Angela’s honor. Evidently, the

ideal of honor is incredibly emphasized by the townspeople with every action centered upon
maintaining a person’s honor. In this instance, Angela’s honor, which is used metonymously

with her virginity, cannot be given back to her; therefore, Flora’s idea would not be remotely

conceivable; yet, it continues to be relevant in that society due to her idea revolving around

Angela’s honor. Moreover, with this thought of Santiago being forced to marry Angela residing

on her mind, Flora “went through a crisis of humiliation” and “was in her bedroom weeping with

rage” while “the town was waiting for the bishop” (Marquez 112). The imagery of Flora

mourning not for her soon to be husband but instead for her possible “future humiliation” is a

direct depiction of how selfish the people of the town are. Rather than using her time to warn

Santiago Nasar and possibly save his life, Flora spends her time feeling sorry for herself and

places her own honor over the love she has for him. Evidently, the thought of humiliation and the

public’s view on a person is viewed with more importance than someone about to have their life

stolen from them and reveals how selfish people who succumb to the bystander effect truly are.

Furthermore, the significance of honor is not solely held in virginity and marriage in this

society, it is also seen in the superficial relationship between Santiago Nasar and Flora Miguel

through the symbol of the chest of letters. While Flora waited for Santiago to return home, she

put the “chestful of letters that [he] had sent her from school” in order, preparing to give them to

him (Marquez 112). Once inside she “placed the chest in his hands” shouting her wishes for the

Vicario brothers to succeed in murdering him (Marquez 113). Due to Santiago being completely

unaware of his plotted murder, he was so perplexed “that he dropped the chest and his loveless

letter poured out onto the floor” (Marquez 113). These love letters, or rather loveless letters,

serve to represent the facade of a relationship Santiago and Flora maintained with each other;

they held no true love for eachother and were only marrying one another out of convenience and
the public’s expectation that they should marry. Evidently, honor is critical to the situation here,

as well, because without the thought of having to uphold their individual honor, the pair would

have never been engaged to begin with. Additonally, the murder would never have occured if

Angela was not forced to marry Bayardo merely because she needed to maintain her family’s

honor. Furthermore, the ideals of honor are seen in the relationship between lovers and family

members alike with both types of relationships being negatively affected by the importance of

upholding appearances and honor.

Finally, Marquez illustrates how quickly love and tenderness for a person can be tossed

to the side once a person’s honor is on the line through the juxtapositon of Santiago and Flora’s

relationship prior to the murder plot compared to it after the plan of murder has been revealed.

Prior to the day of the killing, when Santiago would pass by Flora’s house he would “scratch his

keys across the window screens” in order to get Flora’s attention; however, on the day he was to

be murdered Flora “saw him approaching through the screen before he scratched it with his

keys” and told him to come inside so that she could return his love letters back to him (Marquez

112). The allusion of scratching keys on window screens compared to young suitors throwing

rocks at the window of their secret lovers juxtaposes Santiago and Flora’s superficial relationship

with one revolving around pure love. This juxtaposition of their relationship at first revolving

around tender rituals and young love to then revolving around honor and Santiago’s doom is also

representative of quickly the value of love can be tossed aside in order to make room for the

overpowering implications of honor. In other words, Flora was able to give up her passion and

love for Santiago without hesitation in order to keep her appearance intact which is significant

because it shows that love holds no real value in society if a person’s honor is at stake.
 All in all, the extreme value of honor compared to the disregard for love and compassion

for other human beings is evident throughout the entire novel. To begin with, the imagery of

Flora Miguel’s reaction to her fiance’s, Santiago Nasar, impending death reveals how self

centered people are even in a crisis while the symbolism of the chestful of loveless letters

represents the numerous relationships that are solely built off of upholding one’s own honor

along with their family’s honor. Finally, the juxtaposition of Flora and Santiago’s relationship

before and after the day of murder reveals how quickly love can be replace with the significance

of one’s public appearance.

In my essay the main things I needed to revise included the topic sentences of each paragraph

and the implications that each technique had on my global issue revolving around honor. For the

majority of my paragraphs the topic sentences either attempted to introduce the literary technique

poorly or did not introduce them at all. Additionally, I failed to connect my techniques back to

my global issue at the end of each paragraph prior to my revision and discuss the significance it

had on the issue. Following the revision, my topic sentences allow my paper to be much stronger

due to them focusing my essay on the different techniques and my improved analysis on the

different techniques allowed my paper to reach a new depth.