Member Dispatch: Traveling Lit

by Brett Randell

[caption id="attachment_6260" align="alignleft" width="169"]Reading (and talking) Marquez in Guatemala (Brett Randell) Reading (and talking) Marquez in Guatemala (Brett Randell)[/caption]

Three weeks ago, I returned from an incredible month-long adventure in Guatemala. I’ve always heard from other travelers that Guatemala is full of friendly, beautiful people, mind-blowing landscapes, and a rich, historical culture. All of this is now confirmed. What a wonderful country.

I originally set off with my normal “travel dream” of sitting at a cafe, working on short stories and poems, sipping local coffee/wine, and listening to the Spanish language float around me. But as usual, I just ended up caught in the typhoon of people, adventure, and impulse.

After returning to the States, I was thinking of writing a blog about the struggles of writing while on vacation, or a general recap of my Central America adventures, or reflections on how Guatemala may have influenced my music and stories. After more thought, something else really stuck out to me - the effect a book can have on framing an entire adventure.

A week or so before I set off south, I finished a novel that had been haunting my To Read list for years: One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (yes, it’s as amazing as everyone says it is). After a couple weeks of obsessive reading, soaking in its vast dimensions, unforgettable characters, intertwining storylines, social/political/cultural commentary, and beautiful, yet confusingly repetitive names, One Hundred Years rocketed up into My Top 3 Books of All Time. I couldn’t get it off my mind. With the book on my brain, I bought a collection of Marquez’s short stories, stuffed it in my bag, and set off to Guatemala.

As the travels unraveled, I would often read my Marquez book around coffee tables, bar counters, hostel beds and hammocks, during breakfast, lunch, and dinner, over beers and tequila, in busses, boats, shuttles and Tuk-Tuks. With the author’s name dancing about daily, I ended up having tons of conversations about A Hundred Years Of Solitude and Marquez over the course of the month.

[caption id="attachment_6261" align="alignright" width="300"]While the rest of us sat in traffic... While the rest of us sat in traffic...[/caption]

The great part about this wasn’t the fact that I was nerdily talking to people about a modern classic. The great part was the representation of so many different cultures, languages, and people, who all loved this book and came together over an amazing work of literature.

There were many nights where it would be me, some Brits, some Germans, Colombians, Guatemalans, Argentinians, Chinese, Russians, Kiwis, and/or various other people of the world, discussing our love for Marquez and the power of his work. We would talk about the major themes and our favorite parts of Hundred Years, other stories of his that everyone needed to read, and the usual travel thing - giving and getting recommendations of books and authors from different countries that we wouldn’t have known before.

It was really cool to see the universal reasons of why each person loved the book, be it characters, theme, storyline, or literary skill, and also the relative reasons, which may reflect their upbringing, culture or language. With each person growing up in a different country, reading books in different languages, learning English or Spanish at different rates and levels of fluency, we were having these wonderful, unique conversations, all thanks to one powerful book.

IMAG1543As to Guatemala itself, I walked its streets always with the rhythm and feel of Marquez on my mind. Although he’s Colombian and most of his novels take place in that (or similarly imagined) landscapes, you can’t help but feel connected to him when immersed in the culture and surroundings of Guatemala and other Central/South American countries (especially in beautiful, colonial Antigua). The powerful themes he wrote about developing towns, capitalism, the rise and fall of families, companies, politics, war and human nature, seemed to present themselves everywhere I looked, in both the modernity and the ruins of the colorful city. It was like this thin film of Marquez was pressed over all of my experiences and interactions.

Over my past years of travel, each trip and the conversations that came with it would focus on different things –local culture, spirituality, religion, art, architecture, hidden places to see, politics and government, best places to jump off a cliff, best places to drink, best place to see a ruined castle, etc, etc. This trip had the heaviest literary vibe (see: probably because I’ve been taking nonstop classes at Lighthouse), which really created a wonderful lens for the adventure.

My last night in Guatemala was spent at a friend’s colonial style house in Antigua, drinking cheap wine until 6am with a NYC-to-Guatemala transplanted bassist and an awesome German girl I met at a mescal bar. We discussed novels, life, and Ape/Dolphin communication (…that’s for another blog) until the sunrise met our oncoming hangover. I loved how the entire trip was bookmarked by wine-induced Marquez conversations, and I wouldn’t have wanted to experience Guatemala in any other way.

Disclaimer: This blog is an attempt to get you to 1) read Marquez and 2) travel to Guatemala.

[caption id="attachment_6263" align="aligncenter" width="300"]Brett, a la Rocky Balboa, scales the steps of One Hundred Years of Solitude... Brett, a la Rocky Balboa, scales the steps of One Hundred Years of Solitude...[/caption]

Brett Randell is a writer and musician who lives in Denver, but with his wanderlust, you never know where he might turn up. His music and writings can be found on his Web site: www.brettrandell.com.