Chronicle of a Death Foretold

The narrator is an unnamed man and a friend of Santiago Nasar. Many years after his friend’s murder, the narrator embarks on a quest to discover the truth about what happened.

The anonymity of the narrator is important, as his unease and dissatisfaction with the aftermath of the murder can be extended to the town as a whole. The town’s anxieties are embodied by the narrator, who takes it upon himself to try to piece together an authentic version of events. The distance between the events and the narration is also a key part of the narrator’s character. Like so many people in the town, he has been haunted by the possibility that something went wrong. Many mistakes were made on the day of the murder and many people still feel guilty for what they said or did, or even what they did not say or do. The narrator spends so much time describing missed opportunities, mistakes, and misunderstandings as a way to navigate the guilt and shame of failure. In a metatextual way, the existence of Chronicle of a Death Foretold is an illustration of the narrator’s guilt and his desire to fix his mistakes. The vagueness of the ending, however, demonstrates that this desire cannot necessarily be satisfied.

The narrator operates in a vague space between institutional and personal commitments. As a journalist, the narrator is ostensibly a member of a literary institution which seeks to clarify and inform. His work on Chronicle of a Death Foretold is to unravel the complicated threads of the murder of his friend so as to provide an objective, reliable account of what happened. To aid him in this quest for institutional truth, the narrator turns to other institutional operatives. The priest who conducted the autopsy and the magistrate who made a review of the case are given large parts of the narrative but both are exposed as being in some way flawed. The narrator tries to blend these institutional truths together with the personal truths of his fellow townspeople. That he comes no closer to an official, objective version of reality is illustrative. In the narrator’s version, not even the weather can be relied upon. Truth, as the narrator describes it, is an imprecise and imperfect idea.

The narrator feels a sense of responsibility toward his friend, Santiago, which motivates his writing of the story. Through his research, however, he discovers that reality cannot be pieced together by well-meaning people. No one is excused or exculpated by the story. Instead, the blame is spread far and wide. The narrator shares this blame, so much so that Chronicle of a Death Foretold functions as a penitent act: The narrator could not warn Santiago, but he may be able to warn someone else.

Angela Vicario plays an essential role in the events of Chronicle of a Death Foretold. Just as she is marginalized by the patriarchal society, however, she is pushed to the fringes of the narrative in favor of male characters. Uniquely, however, she is the character who provides the most quotes and the most insights into the events many years after they transpired.

The narrator tracks down Angela and finds her, now old and working as a tailor, and asks her questions about the events. Though the narrator is searching for the truth, he receives many of the same answers which were given at the time of the murder. Angela retains her mystery, preferring the enigma to the truth. In her old age, the truth does not benefit her. After a lifetime of being exploited and used because she is a woman in a patriarchal society, the truth is her one source of power. She refuses to surrender her agency just because the narrator is not satisfied with the conclusion of his story. Angela’s version of events gives her power: the decision not to share, not to engage with the narrator, is a demonstration that Angela has learned how to wield power in a misogynistic society.

Angela’s evolving attitude toward Bayardo is an important part of her character. When he first arrives in the town, their social statuses are very different. Bayardo is the wealthy, elite outsider who sets his sights on the poor, beautiful young woman. He simply offers too much money to refuse; Angela’s family pressure her into marrying the wealthy man because doing so will elevate their status. Angela feels obliged to marry, as marriage is one of the only options for women in her society, but she does not truly love Bayardo. Angela also knows how her society treats women who act outside the traditional strictures of sexual behavior, understanding that her marriage may be undermined by her “secret”: that she’s had sex before being married.

When her secret is uncovered, Angela’s disposition toward Bayardo completely changes. She sees him in a new light. Now, she does not feel obliged to love him, and he is a “pathetic wreck.” When she sees that Bayardo has been reduced—at least on an emotional level—to the status of shame imposed on her, she learns how to love him because he is now her equal.

Of all the characters in the novel, Angela has the happiest ending. Realizing that she loves Bayardo, she embarks on a ritualistic atonement. For 17 years, she writes him letters. He never responds until, one day, he arrives on her doorstep and returns to her, bearing a case of unopened letters. The content of the letters is irrelevant. Instead, the devotion and the quest for atonement represented by the letters are demonstrations of love. Angela finds a resolution to her plight by devoting herself to her estranged husband. When he returns to her, she achieves this absolution. Their future is not explored in the novel, but the mere fact that Angela has the potential for happiness and catharsis makes her luckier than most other characters.