One Hundred Years of Solitude | Chapter 16 | Summary

Summary

The rain continues for several years. To busy himself, Aureliano Segundo fixes the Buendía house. After discovering "little Aureliano" (Aureliano [II]), he cares for him and his sister, Amaranta Úrsula, and entertains them with stories. Anxious about her inability to physically reconcile with her husband, Fernanda corresponds with invisible doctors for her uterine pain, which Úrsula mistakes for intestinal trouble. When Colonel Gerineldo Márquez passes, Úrsula, at the door, yells "my son" to him and alludes to her death.

Worried about his animals, Aureliano Segundo returns to Petra's. When he arrives, one mule has left. He stays for three months.

When Fernanda nags Aureliano Segundo about the waning food supply, he avoids her. In an outburst, he smashes everything he can break, then returns with food. When Úrsula begins losing a sense of reality, Aureliano Segundo hires diggers and seeks guidance with Pilar's cards, searching for the buried gold. After an earthquake, the rain clears, and the inhabitants are left to repair the damage from "banana fever." When Aureliano Segundo returns to Petra's, she's making lottery tickets for the last mule.

Analysis

The master of magic realism balances magical elements with realism. In the previous chapter, to avoid giving the banana workers what they deserve and what the company has promised, Mr. Brown "unleash[es]" a storm. To accentuate the unlikeliness of rain, it's mentioned the area had been suffering a drought. The opening sentence of the chapter begins, "It rained for four years, eleven months, and two days." The preciseness of this statement encourages doubtful readers to believe.

The rain even softens some of Fernanda's edges. When she realizes that her husband reacts to Aureliano's hidden identity with the "fine pleasure of a grandfather," she regrets hiding him. For unexplained reasons, the two don't speak of his identity or tell others.

After Aureliano Segundo notices his physical looks are changing—aging and losing weight from his entertaining days—his character begins changing, too. He takes a more active role in the children's lives. His romantic relationships evolve. When he's "thinking about Petra Cotes without quivering," he realizes his primarily sexual relationship has changed. When he initiates lovemaking, she refuses pleasantly, insisting they're too old. When he returns to Petra for good, she mistakes him for his brother José Arcadio Segundo because he's lost so much weight.