Nunca hubo una muerte más anunciada.
Gabriel García Márquez, Crónica de una muerte anunciada
“Será un nuevo éxito”, comenta excitado mientras lee sobre la pantalla del ordenador las palabras que los electrodos captan directamente de su cerebro.
Tardó mucho en descubrir su verdadera vocación. Por fin, a sus veinticinco años, estuvo seguro: se convertiría en escritor. Su ataúd no lograría disuadirle; se considera un hombre firme, de gran determinación. Ciertamente ninguna experiencia tiene del mundo: ha ido creciendo en su caja, ajeno a la realidad exterior. No será impedimento. ¿Acaso no describió Julio Verne lugares nunca vistos? Además los tiempos se alían con él: ahora la literatura aboga por una introspección que a menudo roza el onanismo. Y a él, en su estrecha “muerte viva”, le sobra tiempo para pensar.
El editor parece satisfecho; sus libros se venden como churros. Encontrada la fórmula, escribe uno tras otro como quien, en efecto, saca uniforme masa de una sobada manga pastelera.
Está orgulloso: ha logrado su sueño. Pero las pesadillas se repiten cada noche. El huracán arranca las paredes de su frágil casa, le arrebata sin esfuerzo el ataúd cual liviano pijama. Las páginas de sus novelas vuelan dejando un inconfundible rastro de tufo a podrido, a carne manida. Y él, desnudo e indefenso, es arrastrado por una multitud de voraces hormigas. Aunque ya no es exactamente él sino un malogrado feto con rizada cola de cerdo; un engendro fruto de demasiada consanguineidad y endogamia. Quienes antes le aclamaban huyen cubriéndose la nariz con sus pañuelos.
Debería estar satisfecho: ha alcanzado su sueño… Pero sospecha que, a diferencia de los grandes autores, a quienes sus obras sobrevivieron, él, presuntamente inmortal, habrá de asistir a la desaparición de sus propios hijos. Quizá fue una ilusión. Quizá esté definitiva y realmente muerto. Muerto del todo. Muerto como un cadáver ordinario, uno cualquiera. Quizá la fiebre tifoidea se lo llevó de verdad a los siete años. Quizá haya comenzado a corromperse ya, lenta pero inexorablemente, por dentro.
There had never been a death more foretold
Gabriel García Márquez, Chronicle of a Death Foretold
"It will be a new success," says excited while reading on the computer screen the words picked up by electrodes directly from his brain.
It took a long time to discover his true calling. Finally, at twenty five, he was certain: he would become a writer. His coffin could not dissuade him, he considers himself a strong man of great determination. Naturally, he has no experience of the world: he has grown inside his box, oblivious to external reality. This will not be an impediment. Did not Jules Verne describe places never seen? Moreover, the times become his ally: now literature advocates an introspection that often borders on masturbation. And he, in his cramped "living death", has plenty of time to think.
The editor seems satisfied; his books are selling like hot cakes. Having found the formula, he writes one after another as someone who, indeed, extracts uniform dough out of a too handled pastry bag.
He is proud: he has achieved his dream. But nightmares return every night. The hurricane removes the fragile walls of his house; effortlessly it snatches his coffin, like lightweight pyjamas, away from him. The pages of his novels fly away leaving an unmistakable trace of rotten stench, of high meat. And he, naked and defenceless, is dragged by a multitude of ravenous ants. Although he is not exactly as he himself but a malformed foetus with curly pig tail, a freak result of too much consanguinity and inbreeding. Those who encouraged him before, flee now covering his nose with their handkerchiefs.
He should be satisfied: He has achieved his dream... But he suspects that, unlike the great authors, who were survived by their works, he, supposedly immortal, will see the disappearance of their own children. Maybe it has been an illusion. Maybe he is definitely and truly dead; entirely dead; dead as an ordinary corpse, as an unremarkable one. Perhaps typhoid fever really took him away when he was seven years old. Maybe he has begun to rot, slowly but surely, inside.
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