Setting
The story occurs mainly in an unnamed port city somewhere near the Caribbean Sea and the Magdalena River. While the city remains unnamed throughout the novel, descriptions of it imply that Cartagena in Colombia is intended, where García Márquez lived during his early years. The city is divided into such sections as "The District of the Viceroys" and "The Arcade of the Scribes." The novel encompasses approximately the half century between 1880 and 1930. The city’s "steamy and sleepy streets, rat-infested sewers, old slave quarter, decaying colonial architecture, and multifarious inhabitants" are mentioned variously in the text and mingle amid the lives of the characters. Locations within the story include:
- The house Fermina shares with her husband, Dr. Juvenal Urbino.
- The "transient hotel" where Florentino Ariza stays for a brief time.
- Ariza’s office at the river company.
- The Arcade of the Scribes.
- The Magdalena River.
Read more about this topic: Love In The Time Of Cholera
Famous quotes containing the word setting:
“it is finally as though that thing of monstrous interest
were happening in the sky
but the sun is setting and prevents you from seeing it”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)
“The setting sun is reflected from the windows of the alms-house as brightly as from the rich man’s abode; the snow melts before its door as early in the spring. I do not see but a quiet mind may live as contentedly there, and have as cheering thoughts, as in a palace.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Like plowing, housework makes the ground ready for the germination of family life. The kids will not invite a teacher home if beer cans litter the living room. The family isn’t likely to have breakfast together if somebody didn’t remember to buy eggs, milk, or muffins. Housework maintains an orderly setting in which family life can flourish.”
—Letty Cottin Pogrebin (20th century)