From the first to the last sentences of García Márquez’s story, death is an underlying force shaping both consciousness and events. The reader recognizes that the news of impending death, delivered by a nonspecific “they” just months earlier, is a powerful force in Sanchez’s life (Paragraph 2). But it is also powerful for Nelson, who has administered death on his first wife, and for Laura, who marvels at it in looking at the always-present rose.

Death shapes Sanchez’s consciousness by disrupting the happy repetitions of his life. Before the news, he was “happy” with his wife and family (Paragraph 2). But now, on the campaign trail, the effort “not to think about death while he dozed” interrupts his sleep (Paragraph 3). He eats diet cereals and takes pills to preemptively strike against the pain of rich meals; “his soul sustained” by the pills, he can attempt to move on from the distraction that strains his routine (Paragraph 4). But death pulls him out of these cycles and repetitions in his life so that he can see the ways in which life traps him. This position makes him feel lonely.

Death also shapes events in the story. Although he speaks to the crowd of “defeating nature,”

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