The philosophical and ethical meaning of the meeting of an angel with people in the story of Gabriel Garcia Marquez “The Old Man with Wings. "A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings" (Un señor muy viejo con unas alas enormes) (1968) An old man with large wings summary

Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Very old man with huge wings

It rained for the third day in a row, and they could barely keep up with the crabs crawling into the house; together they beat them with sticks, and then Pelayo dragged them through the flooded yard and threw them into the sea. The newborn had a fever last night; apparently, it was caused by dampness and stench. Since Tuesday, the world has plunged into gloom: the sky and the sea have mixed into some kind of ash-gray mass; the beach, glittering in March with sparks of sand, turned into a liquid slurry of mud and rotting shellfish. Even at noon, the light was so fuzzy that Pelayo couldn't see what was moving and moaning plaintively in the far corner of the patio. Only when he got very close did he discover that it was an old, very old man who had fallen face down in the mud and was trying to get up, but could not, because his huge wings were in the way.

Frightened by the ghost, Pelayo ran after his wife Elisenda, who at that time was applying compresses to a sick child. Together they looked in silent stupor at the creature lying in the mud. He was wearing a beggar's robe. A few strands of colorless hair stuck to his bare skull, there were almost no teeth left in his mouth, and there was no grandeur in his whole appearance. Huge hawk wings, half plucked, bogged down in the impenetrable mud of the yard. Pelayo and Elisenda looked at him so long and so carefully that they finally got used to his strange appearance, he seemed almost familiar to them. Then, emboldened, they spoke to him, and he answered in some incomprehensible dialect with the hoarse voice of a navigator. Without much thought, immediately forgetting about his strange wings, they decided that this was a sailor from some foreign ship that had been wrecked during a storm. And yet, just in case, they called a neighbor who knew everything about this and that world, and one glance was enough for her to refute their assumptions.

It's an angel, she told them. Surely he was sent for a child, but the poor fellow is so old that he could not stand such a downpour and fell to the ground.

Soon everyone already knew that Pelayo had caught a real angel. No one raised a hand to kill him, although the omniscient neighbor claimed that modern angels are none other than participants in a long-standing conspiracy against God, who managed to avoid heavenly punishment and take refuge on earth. The rest of the day, Pelayo watched him from the kitchen window, holding a rope in his hand just in case, and in the evening he pulled the angel out of the mud and locked it in the chicken coop along with the chickens. At midnight, when the rain stopped, Pelayo and Elisenda were still fighting the crabs. A little later, the child woke up and asked for food - the fever had completely disappeared. Then they felt a surge of generosity and decided among themselves that they would put together a raft for the angel, give him fresh water and food for three days, and set him free to the waves. But when at dawn they went out into the patio, they saw almost all the inhabitants of the village there: crowded in front of the chicken coop, they stared at the angel without any spiritual awe and put pieces of bread through the holes of the wire mesh, as if it were a zoo animal, and not a heavenly creature.

His call for caution fell on barren ground. The news of the captured angel spread with such speed that in a few hours the patio turned into a market place, and troops had to be called in to disperse the crowd with bayonets, which at any moment could destroy the house. Elisenda's back hurt from the endless garbage collection, and she had a good idea: fence the patio and charge five centavos from anyone who wants to see the angel at the entrance.

The rain did not subside for the third day, from the half-flooded yard crabs crawled to the house. Pelayo did nothing but destroy them. The child had a fever all night, and the parents thought that she had it from the stink of crabs.

Since Tuesday, the world has become gloomy, the sky and the sea were the same ashen color, when Pelayo returned from the sea in the morning, he could hardly see that an old grandfather was stirring and groaning in the back of the yard, who had fallen face down in the mud and could not get up because he was interfered with. huge wings.

Frightened, Pelayo ran after his wife Elisenda, who was just putting compresses on the sick child. Both of them looked at the old man with dumb stupefaction. He was dressed like a beggar, his skull was bald, his mouth was toothless, his large cock's wings, plucked and dirty, were mired in a swamp, his appearance was amusing and unnatural. Having come to their senses a little, Pelayo and Elisenda dared to turn to him. He answered in some sonorous, but incomprehensible language, so they thought that he, perhaps, had suffered during the accident of some foreign steamer. A neighbor called by the spouses, who had seen many miracles in her life, immediately explained that this was an angel who, apparently, had flown in for a child, but the poor fellow was so old and weak that a downpour knocked him to the ground.

The next day, the whole village knew that there was a living angel in Pelayo's house. The neighbor warned that the angels were very dangerous at this time of the year, so Pelayo did not take his eyes off the old one all evening, and locked him in a wire chicken coop for the night. At midnight the rain stopped. In the morning the child asked for food, his fever subsided. The couple decided that they would let the angel go, give him fresh water and food for three days, and let him fly to the open sea. However, in the morning they saw a yurma of neighbors in front of the chicken coop, who looked at the angel without any holiness and threw food to him through the net, like circus animals.

Upon hearing of the angel's arrival, Gonzaga's father appeared. Together they began to discuss what to do with the prisoner. The proposals were different: to appoint an angel as the head of the universe; make him the general who wins all wars; with the help of an angel, bring out a new kind of winged people who would conquer the universe.

Father Gonzaga said a prayer, and then asked to open the door to take a closer look at this helpless grandfather, who sat among the skins from fruit and scraps and looked more like a big old chicken than a human being.

Father Gonzaga went into the chicken coop and greeted him in Latin; the old man, indifferent to people, reluctantly muttered something in his own language. The priest did not like the fact that the angel did not understand God's language and did not know how to respect God's servants, besides, he smelled of a swamp, a large feather was excised by earthly winds, and nothing in the pitiful appearance of the old one testified to the greatness and dignity of the angel.

The priest left the chicken coop and in a short sermon warned the parishioners against being too naive: the wings still do not testify to anything, both the plane and the hawk have them. He recalled that the devil has extraordinary abilities to transform and deceive careless people. Father Gonzaga promised to write a letter to the bishop and through him to get the final decision from the pope.

The news of the angel spread so fast that after a while a lot of people crowded into Pelayo's courtyard and troops had to be called in to disperse the Mob, which almost destroyed the house. Elisendi came up with the idea of taking five centavos from everyone who wants to look at the angel.

And people walked and walked. Even the traveling circus arrived. Fanciful patients came with the hope of recovering: a woman who, from childhood, counted heartbeats and she no longer had enough numbers for this; a man who was disturbed by the noise of the stars; a sleepwalker who woke up at night and broke everything he did during the day, and many others. In the midst of all the confusion, Pelayo and Elisenda unexpectedly discovered that in less than a week they filled all the vessels that were in the house with coppers, and there was no end in sight for those who wanted to look at the angel.

Crazy from the unbearable heat and the stench of candles that their believers placed in front of the chicken coop, the angel tried to hide further into the corner. Of all the dishes that were put in front of him, he chose eggplant porridge. It seemed that supernatural patience was the most important virtue of the angel: he was pecked by chickens, the sick pulled feathers from their wings to touch their sores, the atheists threw stones at him. One even burned his side with a red-hot piece of iron, which is used to brand bull-calves. The old man jumped up in fright, muttering something in his own language, his eyes filled with tears. Seeing that the angel was reacting to pain, the crowd decided to give him peace.

Father Gonzaga urged the flock to wait for instructions from the pope. And he kept finding out whether this supernatural creature had a navel, whether his speech was similar to Aramaic, whether he was able to stay on the tip of a needle. Correspondence with the pope could have continued as long as there was light and sun, if one event had not put an end to this whole story.

The traveling circus, among other miracles, showed a girl who turned into a spider. The fee for the circus was less than for Pelayo's yard. The girl could be asked any number of questions, considered from all sides, so this terrible truth did not cause anyone the slightest doubt. A tarantula spider the size of a sheep had the head of a girl. She told with sincere sadness how, while still very young, she ran away to dances without the permission of her parents, and when she returned home through the forest, lightning that flew out of the sky split by thunder turned her into a spider. She ate exclusively minced meat balls that merciful souls threw into her mouth.

This truthful and instructive spectacle diverted the attention of people from the angel for some time, which he hardly honored mortals with his gaze. In addition, the miracles attributed to the angel were somehow dubious: the blind man did not regain his sight, but three new teeth grew; the paraplegic never began to walk, but suddenly won a lot of money in the lottery; a leper grew sunflowers in the diseased places. These miracles, more like a joke, shook the reputation of the angel, and the spider woman completely destroyed it. Father Gonzaga was able to sleep peacefully again, and Pelayo's court was deserted again.

However, the owners had nothing to complain about. For the money they received, they rebuilt their two-story house, put iron bars on the windows so that angels would not fly in. Pelayo started raising rabbits and resigned as a police officer. Elisenda bought clothes for herself and dressed up like a rich lady. Only the chicken coop remained unchanged; however, sometimes it was washed with bleach and fumigated inside to get rid of the pungent smell of chicken manure.

When the boy began to walk, his parents made sure that he did not approach the chicken coop, and when he grew up, he began to play in the chicken coop. The boy's angel treated him with the same indifference as in other mortals, but meekly endured all his whims and antics.

One day, the boy and the angel got chicken pox at the same time. The called doctor examined the patient and found so many diseases in the angel that it was simply amazing how this poor fellow still lives in the world. But most of all, the doctor was surprised by the wings of the old, which were so natural in this organism that the logical question arose why other people did not have them.

Several years passed, and the boy went to school. The new house has grown old, the chicken coop has completely collapsed. The helpless angel wandered around the yard, trampling vegetables, and entered the houses. When he was driven out of the bedroom with a broom, he instantly found himself in the kitchen; spouses came to the conclusion that he has the ability to divide into many of his individuals. Elisenda complained in despair that she could no longer live in this hell full of angels.

Over the last winter, the angel has aged very much. He barely moved and saw almost nothing, and all the feathers fell out of his wings. Pelayo took pity on the old man, wrapped him in a blanket and took him to the barn, where the angel was shaking with a fever every night. The owners were worried that the old one would not accidentally die, because no one knows what to do with the dead angel.

And the angel, on the contrary, began to recover. At first he sat motionless in the most remote corner of the yard, then a hard and long feather began to grow on him. Sometimes, when no one was listening, the old man hummed the songs of the ancient travelers.

One day Elisenda, who was choosing onions in the garden, thought that the sea wind was tearing off the tin canopy over the balcony; she went to the house and, looking out of the window, saw that it was an angel trying to fly up. His movements were clumsy. Finally, he managed to climb up. When it flew over the last houses, flapping its wings like an old hawk, Elisenda breathed a sigh of relief. She looked after the angel for a long time, who finally got away from them and flew towards the sea, turning into a small black dot.

Translation by M. Zherdinivska

Colombian writer Rafael García Márquez's short story "The Old Man with Wings" depicts a small town - a bleak gray area. Around dirt, rain, sea molluscs that rot on a birch. It is to the poor, destitute lives of the inhabitants of an abandoned town that an angel comes. This angel is very difficult to recognize; it is not a beautiful celestial being with white wings. This angel looks like an impoverished old man with shabby hawk wings. The family in which the angel appeared is very poor - Pelae and his wife Elisenda. They just had a little boy. Nobody understands why they need an angel. No one even knows that this angel is this dirty, sick old man with wings, who sits in a corner with chickens.

Such a nameless town that lives its own life can be anywhere. Everywhere there is a crowd that will consider what is incomprehensible. People from the town feed the angel like an animal in a zoo, throw stones at him, tear out a feather, even burn him with a red-hot piece of iron. Greedy for everything, people soon left the angel, this miracle they had given, for the sake of another spectacle - the circus spider woman. The crowd does not care what to look at, if only to entertain their monotonous worthless life.

The couple, in whose courtyard the angel settled, used their chance: to watch the angel, they began to sell tickets, they built a two-story house with the funds raised. Later, the family was so fed up with the angel that Elisenda called it torture to live in a place full of angels! A lonely old man, a sick angel, with dirty wings without a feather, did not evoke sympathy and love from anyone, only curiosity. He couldn't fly anywhere. With the restoration of nature, the angel was also restored. He recovered and flew away. No one in this city understood why the angel came. A person busy with everyday worries may not notice the miracle that lives next to him. He does not think about the high, the spiritual. An angel is a messenger of God. He flew to this dirty city to remind all people that there is something in the world more important than daily troubles, more important than entertainment, money. There is God, love for neighbor, sympathy and mercy.

Is there a place for angels among people? Composition based on the story of G. Marquez "The Old Man with Wings"

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Gabriel Garcia Márquez's short story A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings was written in 1968. This rather small work is filled with deep meaning and saturated with light mystical notes, just in the style inherent in Marquez.

Something unusual happens in a small settlement: a creature suddenly appears in the yard of ordinary people, it looks like a very unkempt and miserable tramp, but behind it are two huge pretty shabby wings.

The inhabitants of the village do not understand the speech of the creature, but looking at his haggard, exhausted appearance, the peasant Pelayo, in whose yard an angel appeared, decide to settle him in a poultry house. Soon the rumor about an extraordinary stranger spreads throughout the village, more and more people want to look at an unusual creature and Pelayo and his wife decide to make some money on it.

At first glance, it may seem that the story is about human greed, greed, and, in fact, indifference to the fate of a living being, albeit not like them. This is partly true, but to a much greater extent, the author focuses on the fact that miracles do not have to be beautiful at all. If they are not accompanied by flamboyance, pomp and luxury, can they be considered miracles?

Deprived of beauty and, consequently, respect for himself even on the part of deeply believing residents of the village, the angel is also deprived of understanding their speech. In turn, no one understands what the angel is saying in his own language; Gradually, interest in him fades away, and he slowly grows old with loneliness.

Written as a fairy tale, the story denounces not fairy-tale and not children's problems at all. Pragmatism, along with cynicism, coexists with miracle and mystery, not quite an ordinary angel in the broad and familiar sense, not quite ordinary villagers. In this story, everything is so real and irrational at the same time that you involuntarily wonder if the old angel has flown away or maybe it was a fantasy, it seemed?

A magnificent story that teaches you to see the beautiful, to be able to distinguish it even in the most ordinary, everyday, everyday and even repulsive. The author closely intertwined mystical facets with reality.

“A Very Old Man with Huge Wings” is a bit sad, but nevertheless a light story that will appeal to many. You can find both a fairy tale and a piece of truth in it, and the nuances skillfully arranged by Marquez and at first glance inconspicuous little things, like cute traps, slamming shut, make one wonder and think about how appropriate a miracle is in everyday life.

It's an angel, she told them. Surely he was sent for a child, but the poor fellow is so old that he could not stand such a downpour and fell to the ground.

People came all the way from Martinique itself. Once a traveling circus arrived with a flying acrobat, which flew several times, buzzing, over the crowd, but no one paid attention to him, because he had the wings of a star bat, not an angel. Desperate patients arrived from all over the Caribbean in search of healing: an unfortunate woman who from childhood counted the beats of her heart and already lost count; a Jamaican martyr who couldn't sleep because the noise of the stars tormented him; a sleepwalker who got up every night to destroy what he did during the day, and others with less dangerous diseases. In the midst of this pandemonium, from which the earth trembled, Pelayo and Elisenda, although infinitely tired, were happy - in less than a week they stuffed their mattresses with money, and the line of pilgrims, waiting for their turn to look at the angel, continued to disappear over the horizon.