El coronel no tiene quien le escriba

No One Writes to the Colonel was written by Gabriel García Márquez during his stay in Paris, where he had arrived in the mid-1950s as a press correspondent with the secret intention of studying cinema. The closure of the newspaper he worked for plunged him into poverty while he wrote three different versions of this exceptional novel, which was later rejected by several publishers before publication. After the Faulknerian baroque of Leaf Storm, this second novel represents a step towards asceticism, towards expressive economy, and the writer's style becomes more pure and transparent. It is also a story of injustice and violence: an old retired colonel goes to the port every Friday to await the arrival of the official letter that responds to the just claim of his rights for services rendered to the country. But the homeland remains mute...