Of Love and Other Demons (Vintage International)

Sierva Maria is twelve years old and beautiful, with the longest hair everyone has ever seen. But something is wrong with her. Her behavior isn't normal. She doesn't do what girls her age do. Her customs are too foreign, too unseemly. What's worse is that her behavior is at times unpredictable, even dangerous. What could it be? Could it be that she has rabies? After all, a rabid dog bit her not long ago. Or is it worse? Could she be possessed by a demon? Her father, the Marquis, thinks that the latter is a possibility, which is why he takes her to a convent. She is to be exorcized. But Cayetano Delaura, her exorcist, has his doubts. A devoted scholar, he studies Maria's behavior, and sees her wild ways as well as her gentler behavior. He also sees her shameless ability to tell lies. It appears that the answer is far simpler than anyone thinks -- a matter of nature versus nurture. As Cayetano learns about Maria's ways and how her parents had neglected her over the years, and how African slaves have raised her since her birth, he begins to have some forbidden feelings for the young girl...

Set in the Colonial Americas, Of Love and Other Demons is one of Gabriel Garcia Marquez's most brilliant novels. Essentially a novella, for it only contains about 170-something pages, it is nevertheless a complex and thought provoking read, not the sort of book you'd pick for a day on the beach. It seems, among various things, a story of manners -- centered on the hypocrisies with noble families and the Catholic religion -- and how people refuse to look beyond what is acceptable. The language is dark and bold; nothing is sugarcoated. Numerous subjects could be discussed from this book alone, and you'd have to read it in order to fully understand it. Do you love South American literature with magical realism? Garcia Marquez is one of, if not the best in the genre. Very much recommended.

Very sad story of a poor rich girl with messed up parents and disturbed religious figures. This is a very well written story with great descriptions. At times I felt that I might be reading a true horrific family secret. It was also like reading something like a myth created to explain misunderstood tragedies in a time when religion and spirituality was the waking moment of everyone's life. It was almost very real to me. This is the first book I have read from this author and cant wait to read more. I have to say, that I did read it in English and though I can read some what decent Spanish I believe that the story was very well translated. I normally buy books that are written in Spanish and English so that my mother who reads only Spanish and I can share our comments of books and authors. I have no doubt that Gabriel Garcia Marquez will very fast become one of our favorite authors . His talent is so great to have been able to cross languages and has and not lost a bit of its meaning and strenght.

This small piece of gem by Gabo is one of the most fascinating books as far as I'm concerned. To me, the most fascinating character in this book is that of Abrenuncio, a Portuguese Jewish physician, hated by the church and loved by his patients. A man who knows where he stands ("Sex is a talent, and I do not have it."), a man with his feet firmly planted on the ground ("Books are worthless; life has helped me to cure diseases that other doctors cause with their medicines"), and one who understands the fundamentals of healing ("No medicine cures what happiness cannot.". Without a second thought, I would sell my soul to Devil twice over to achieve his qualiities.

Over the years I have met many pompous, wise people, whose unlimited arrogance (because they read some books) and feeling of intellectual superiority have often made me wonder if they know that the world is more than just books. Gabo tells us in this book that the only real source of wisdom that lies in front of us is our life, not books.

This book also highlights the issue of the animosity suffered by a learned man, when his views and actions are in contrast to the interests of the section of the society that controls it. This is a very real situation anyday anywhere in the world.

However, the major theme of the book is (either presence or absense of) love. Can love conquer everything? Gabo's answer is direct, honest and simple: Yes, it can; but it will do you more good if you don't believe in it.

Can one deny love? Or can one evade it? Perhaps not. To drive this point home, the ever irreverent persona in Gabo makes his presence felt, when he makes the exorcist, one of the most knowledgeable and favorable priests, finally fall in love with the victim, whom he comes to exorcise!

A tropicalized Abelarde-et-Heloise-like story, in which a rabies epidemic is confused with diabolic possession. A beauty of Spanish + African ancestry, already incubating rabies, is pursued by a monk who was in his way to become a saint. Both the young woman and the monk fall for each other with a passion that challenges State and Church, the latter intent in destroying them through its instrument of terror, the Inquisition. They cannot win, of course, but they shake both structures. Her hair does not stop growing even after death. The description of the estate of the decrepit Marquis and his love/hate relationship with his un-titled spouse of mixed origin are only surpassed by GABO himself in his Autumn of the Patriarch.

Book Review Of Love and Other Demons by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, edited by Edith Grossman As usual, Marquez weaves a fantastic tale, one filled with magic and miracles. And, as usual, I am captivated, putting aside my scientific beliefs, my rational analysis for a tale that sweeps me up in the history of the times by bathing the tragic illness and death of the child Sierva Maria De Todos Los Angeles in love, mysticism and seduction. This tale hinges on very usual circumstances for the times: in 1949 the author worked for a newspaper in Columbia and, on a slow news day, the editor asked him to take a trip to the Convent of Santa Clara to watch the emptying of tombs in an effort to scare up some news. Upon his arrival, Marquez was dumbfounded to find a small crypt above the altar filed to overflowing with red hair which, when stretched out on the floor, measured 22 meters, eleven centimeters. This hair, the remnants of Sierva Maria De Todos, was the mark of her beauty when the twelve year old child was alive and the mark of her sainthood after she died from rabies soon after her twelfth birthday. Many came to pray to the niche, hoping for blessings from the young saint and from this tale Marquez constructed his story of her life. We meet Marquez's Sierva Maria on her twelfth birthday when she is roaming the market with her servant and, upon roaming too far, gets bitten by a dog above her ankle. Later, when that dog is found dead, Sierva Maria's downfall begins as every unusual trait of hers is attributed at first to the illness and later to demonic possession when she does not actually fall ill from the bite. Added to this central drama is the negligence of her parents, Bernarda Cabera and the Marquis de Casalduero, due to her mother's drug addiction and her father's apathy. Sierva Maria, however, is not totally without guidance, for her servant has taken her in, raising her in the slave quarters amongst the African slaves. It is to this family that Sierva feels a kinship, a bond which makes her want to sleep on her surrogate mother's floor rather than in the sumptuous quarters laid out for her in the mansion. It is behavior gleaned form these surroundings--stealth, silence and `invisibility'--that cause those in the town to believe in her possession. Once Sierva Maria is believed to be possessed the rest of the story unfolds in the Convent to which she is taken to determine her spiritual state. She is entrusted to the ministrations of a priest, haunted with his own phantoms, who ceases to reason when he is struck with her beauty. Through his humanity, and her otherworldliness, tragedy strikes. Although this story is about a young girl accused of possession, I really see it as a story of the `other' in society. Since Sierva Maria is raised by the slaves of the mansion she is different, appearing wholly other. With her father's fear of being murdered in his sleep by the slaves, and her mother's deep obsession for a slave man she bought for her sexual pleasure and lost in a brawl, Sierva Maria is a bridge between the worlds of black and white, captive and master, earth and God. She functions as the reader's direct line outside the system of her society which included the possibility of demonic possession, the acceptability of owning slaves, the chastity of priests and the cruelty of nuns. I found this book to be a window into passions and fears that still haunt me as I write about it. Of course, I am an avid Marquez fan, having read almost all of his novels, but this most recent one strikes me as the most mythic, blending fact and fantasy seamlessly into one believable reality. And I, for one, am convinced.

No one can fuse logic and magic like marquez. In "Of love and other demons", a beautifully lush and colourful book, marquez seeks to examine the blured relationship between love and logic.
It is about a young girl who is bitten by a rabid dog on her birthday. Subsequently, after failed attempts to cure her, she is suspected of infact being possessed. As a measure, she is sent to a nearby convent, and Priest Delaura (relatively young but dynamic) is sent to take charge of this matter. However, he falls deeply in love with her, and comes to believe that she is infact not at all possessed. He is a voice of reason, in an otherwise ignorant and paranoid world.
This may sound dry on one level, but that is what makes marquez such a phenomenon. The prose is bursting with life. You read as if mesmerised by all the dreams, motivations and love. It is a passionate love story, but also "tragic" in a sense. MArquez portrays love as a demon of sorts, in that it can take over a seemingly controlled individual (in the case of Delaura) much like demonic possession. Love is undeniably and incomparably fulfilling, yet heart breaking all at once. Read this short parable, and be enchanted by its utter beauty.

Once, while in an airport during a storm, my flight was delayed, so I walked into a bookstore and pulled this slim volume from the shelf. In his inimitable style, the Nobel Laureate spins a tongue-in-cheek shaggy dog tale that captivated me and entirely erased the frustration of being grounded in an airport. Less demanding that One Hundred Years of Solitude or Love in the Time of Cholera, yet the same luscious style.

Marquez could not have picked a better fable to write about. The story is of a 12 year old girl who is accused of being possesed after she is bitten by a mad dog. One problem is that the book is very short. Marquez gets so caught up in the paragraphs of descriptive language that were his bread and butter in previous books, that we don't have time to fully explore the tragic relationship between the two moral fugitives. "Of Love and Other Demons" is definitely not Marquez's best, but it is worth reading.

Meh. Not a bad book. A good book for anyone else. But this is GGM, people, I expect the world from him. This let down, though might still be worth reading. Check it out only after reading everything else he's written

Yes, this book probably lost a star or so being read by me in translation. There's good reason - at times, the English version of the Spanish text feels like a moderately-paced plot synopsis, at others like a stack of stage directions. Surely Marquez's prose is more poetic than that.
On is own merits, the book never seems to establish the right pace. Issues concerning the Marquis, Sirva Maria, and her mother (as well as other characters) are brought up vaguely and left inadequately explored. Perhaps this book would have benefited from a fleshing out of the characters and themes Marquez wanted to explore.
The idea of love as a demon (especially when set against the backdrop of Spanish religious draconiansm and cruel colonialism) is compelling, but these kinds of single-metaphor investments are always a liability for onerous anticlimax. Too short to make itself poignant, too long for what it purports to show.

Garcia has probed deep into the complex minds of human behaviour....thier beliefs...thier stubborn practices and mass psychology. How foolhardy can people get ? How inhuman ? This book stays with you....long after you've read it. It calls for justification of those who want to life a normal life, but, are abased by those in power. And it makes you think ! Don't miss it.

I do not wish to reveal the plot but can say with absolute certainty that this is a most lyrical and delicious book. The characters are spell binding and as always Gabriel Garcia Marquez weaves a tale that creates in the reader a hunger for more. It is well worth the time to read. It will transport you. A very inexpensive vacation if you ask me.

I remember when I read this the summer of 2001 (or perhaps 2000?) for an Advanced Placement English class. I was surprised at how much I enjoyed the book and would recommend it as a great read to practically anyone. Marquez is a fantastic writer (that doesn't need to be said) and the story in "Of Love and Other Demons" is intriguing. Find a way to get your hands on a copy.

I love Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I believe my favorite is Love in the Time of Cholera, then 100 Years of Solitude,and then this one. His novels seem to ramble a lot but I love that and how poetic he is. The ending of this one was tragic but what else could you expect of him?

To all those who will read this novel for the first or even the second time, do not think or assume this is a love story! "Of love" is an extremely interesting tale about myths, customs, and how individuals are singled out by the society that fosters these beliefs. In this story love is an outcome of the situation that the two main characters are forced to be in by society. Dear readers, when reading this story do not forget that every society has its own myths and beliefs. Marquez is exploring those beliefs of a latin american country during colonial era. Myths and customs still plays an important role in the thinking of many latin american countries. In order to understand its central theme, read this novel many times and, if you are able, read it in Spanish. And please do not assume this is plainly a love story!

Marquez is up to his old tricks just writing a darngarn great story chock full of the things a master mixes into his pot, and plasters on the walls. There is a psychological treatise underneath the religious application of possession, in the way of misspent aspirations (the Marquis), depravity, and conviction, both religious and secular, and an excellent read for today's adolescent women. At the very bottom of it, another great tale by a great writer.

I read this novel for a Literature assignment and once I began, I couldn't put it down! Marquez creatively describes the human condition so expressively and beautifully that I have not forgotten the characters' vices, dreams and situational miseries. He vividly expresses character vulnerability that allows the audience to seek understanding and the temptation to intervene. The title was accurate for such a beautifully written novel and would highly recommend.

I have always liked Marquez, and this was a feast.

This story
magically transported me to an era where religion, politics,
and superstition were so intimately mixed with ordinary
lives that a ordinarily clear sense of good and bad needs
reevaluation, and it forces us to rethink all our judgements
in light of the existing human conditions. And in this
topsy turvy excursion into different time and sensibilities,
what comes clearly is that so long as we continue to exist,
our pain and suffering at our own hands will continue side
by side with our triumphs and victories.

Brilliantly descriptive of the period and locale with both realistic and imaginative sights, sounds and other sensory tantalizations. So typical of Garcia Marquez. Which is the real world - that of the colonists or that of the African slaves? Author's preference is sensually revealed.

By far one of Garcia Marquez's best books ever! The fact that the author can transform your imagination to actually believe this story and its magical touch is incredible. Forbidden love, tormented souls, and the fact that true love never dies are just a few of the topics touched on in this book. A must read...even if you have never read a book by Marquez. Trust me, this is the one to start with!

A girl, Sierva Maria, who was left by his parents or given to the slaves.
She was 12 years old.
White costums never felt respect for, only he was respecting those who from girl him had inculcated the blacks especially Dominga, who raised her and it him took charge teaching the things of the life.
So much it was the abandon of his parents neither that nor the day of his birthday remembered her.
It was not until the day in which Sierva Maria gets a graft for a dog that was suffering from anger that his progenitors, especially his father, begins to realize how much it loved his daughter.
From this moment Sierva Maria begins to live through experiences that would change his life forever.

This is one of the best books I have read from the best Latin American authors. If you know spanish, I recomend you read it in spanish since the language is better developed and the meaning of the story is deeper. I read it in spanish and after I began to read it, I could not stop.

Of Love and Other Demos is a master piece like other novels from my beloved Colombian Gabriel Garcia Marquez.

I have been a fan of Marquez since I picked up One Hundred Years of Solitude. His writing is always interesting! Of Love and Other Demons is no exception. Marquez keeps you in his grips untill the last page. A great novel!

If you don't want to know the ending stop reading right now. If you have ever read anything by Gabriel Garcia Marquez you already know the ending. You also know the general plot and can describe most of the characters and their flaws. Here it is: Bored second generation aristocracy having given away all their wealth in a drunken religious stupor now lay around the decrepit old mansion in a drugged stupor and wonder why their lives suck. One of their number (the youngest girl) has a run-in with the law (the Holy Office of the Catholic Church), her uniqueness and charm being mistook for possession by demons. Never fear though, for some how her exorcist sent to kill her falls in love with her while entombed in a feces filled jail cell in a crumbling convent. Love conquers all obstacles. But wait, that's not all, for just when you start to see some light at the end of the tunnel for all our pathetic self indulgent bumbling characters (about ten pages to go) and you think something good might happen to one of them, they all start to die. Yes they all die of the same thing: A broken heart. Nobody gets the girl. Nobody rides away into the sunset. Nobody gets any kind of lesson or fulfillment. Everybody dies. After much suffering. Lonely. Alone. Dirty. Pathetic.
Along the way you have page after page of flowery descriptions of people and places. Something Marquez is famous for and you may enjoy. But there is no plot. No story. Nothing interesting happens. You close the book and wonder why the hell you bothered.
My recommendation: 100 years of solitude in your room doing jigsaw puzzles would be preferable to the excruciating pain of Love and Other Demons.

It's a great book. I read it through a single evening, and I couldn't get asleep till I finished it. Yes, I wasn't able to say too much about it to my friend next morning. But during the day it was amazing how continuously were coming to me all the details, and more I was thinking about, more incredible and great it appeared.

ok, so i read this book and just fell in love with it.. i love marquez's writing style wherein he used few words to convey so much meaning and this just blew me away.. this is the first book that i've read by marquez and since i love it so much, i'm planning to read his other work soon.. obviously, i'm now a fan.. =D

This is a decent book. The narration is a little boring, but being a translation, that is an understandable, minor problem. The events of the plot and what happens to Sierva Maria are both heart wrenching and fascinating. I feel what makes this book most interesting is how believable Garcia makes the events. We do not get to know Sierva Maria personally, but we understand her through other characters. This is an excellent book. I recommend it to most readers.

Just finished reaing it. It only took me a couple of days,but I've only got one thing to say; "READ IT". It's really full of passion and emotions, so strong that they can easily be called breath-taking.