One Hundred Years of Solitude: Linear and Circular TimeCien Anos de Soledad The style in One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Márquez is closely linked to myth. Márquez chooses magical realism over literal realism, thus placing the novel's emphasis on the surreal. To complement this style, time in One Hundred Years of Solitude is also mythical, simultaneously incorporating a circular and linear structure (McMurray 76). Most novels are structured linearly. Events occur in chronological order, and you can map the novel's exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and denouement. One Hundred Years of Solitude is also linear in its broad outlines (Bell-Villida 98). The plot of the novel is simple: José Arcadio Buendia marries his cousin Ursula, they find Macondo, the family grows, declines, and is eventually swept off the face of the earth by a hurricane. There is a beginning, and time moves the story toward a total, apocalyptic conclusion (117). Within this linear backdrop, the structure of One Hundred Years of Solitude is circular (McMurray 77). Events throughout the novel repeat cyclically. The names Aureliano and Jose Arcadio are repeated in each generation, for a total of five Jose Arcadios and 22 Aurelianos. Men's personalities also seem to repeat themselves; the José Arcadios are "impulsive and enterprising" and the Aurelianos are "lucid and reserved" (77). The cyclical rhythm is reinforced by six cases of incest that occur over the course of five of the family's six generations. One of the most striking examples of cyclical structure is found in the novel's opening line: "Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendia will remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice." (Garcia Márquez 1). Two generations later, chapter eleven opens the same way: "Years later, on his deathbed, Aureliano Segundo will remember the rainy afternoon in June when he went into the bedroom to meet his first son" (186). These two sentences are grammatically parallel. They open with an adverbial phrase ("Years later"), followed by the subject and then the predicate in exactly the same verb tense. The sentences begin with a distant event and end with an allusion to a future event which, in both cases, occurs within the same chapter. As critic Barroa observes, "the words 'many years later' appear so often that they become the heartbeat of the novel." (104).