Gabriel Garcia Marquez's A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings

Gabriel Garcia Marquez’ A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings tells the story of a husband and wife’s chance encounter with a seemingly supernatural individual. Following a lengthy rainstorm, the husband, Pelayo, discovers a winged old man in his courtyard. After deliberation with a neighbor woman, Pelayo ultimately keeps the winged man in his chicken coop. The winged man is shortly thereafter made to be a spectacle, as a crowd drew to gaze upon the magical wonder, under the presumption they were in the presence of an angel. The crowd is cruel to the man as they demand miracles from him, throw stones at him, and try to brand him. Pelayo and his wife, Elisenda, begin to charge five cents to anyone wanting to see the man, and they soon become rich from the show. Eventually, however, a new spectacle, a spider woman, comes to town. The original crowd readily switches their attention to the newest fad, quickly forgetting the existence of the old, winged man. Several months later, the winged man is still living with Pelayo and Elisandra, but

The miracles demanded of him resulted in a blind man growing new teeth, a paralytic nearly winning the lottery, and sunflowers growing from the sores of a leper. No one, however, seems to recognize the true miracle which occurred after the old man’s arrival. Previously, Pelayo and Elisandra’s son was deathly ill, but became well again shortly after the discovery of the man. The couple was also brought out of poverty through the admission charged to visit the old man. Ultimately, it is extremely possible that the man is, indeed, an angel, although fallen. The angel is willing to help out those who do not torture him or demand favors. In the end, he defies the archetypal opinion of what an angel should