10. 17 Aurelianos

My honest to goodness reaction to Aureliano's 17 sons by 17 different women was that he must have some potent seeds. However, these young men are short-lived indeed and, like their father, lack attachment to the world around them and are rather flat characters. They aren't interesting so much in themselves, but gain interest as characters when looked at as reflections of their father.

p. 103 - We are introduced into the short-lived history of the Aurelianos. "Colonel Aureliano Buendia (...) had seventeen male children by seventeen different women and they were exterminated one after the other on a single night before the oldest one had reached the age of 35."

p. 150 - A young woman brings one of Aureliano's sons to be bapatised. "No one doubted the origin of the nameless child: he looked exactly like the colonel at the time he was taken to see ice for the first time. The woman said that he had been born with his eyes open, looking at people with the judgement of an adult, and that she was frightened by his way of starting at things without blinking." As there is no name, I as a reader assume that all of the Aurelianos had similar entrances into the world...

p. 215 - The Aurelianos come to visit for the jubilee celebration that Colonel Aureliano shuns. They are all interconneted. "Then Colonel Aureliano Buendia took down the bar and saw at the door seventeen men of the most varied appearance, of all types and colors, but all with a solitary air that would have been enought to idenfify them (...) They were his sons. Without any previous agreement, without knowing each other, they ahd arrived from the most distant corners of the cost (...) They all bore with pride the name Aureliano."

p. 216 - The Aurelianos are wild house guests. "They smashed half of the dishes, they destroyed the rosebushes (...) they killed the hens by shooting at them (ect.)"
- The other Aurelianos are connected to one another as skilled craftsmen, peace-loving men. They all attend Ash Wednesday service. "More amused than devout, they let themselves be led to the alter rail where Father Antonio Isabel mad the sign of the cross in ahes on them (...) they could not remove the crosses"

Aureliano Triste:
- p. 216 "He was a big mullato with the drive and explorer's spirit of his grandfather. He had already tested hisi fortune in half the world and it did not matter where he stayed."
- p. 221 Wants to build a railroad, which had been tried earlier. "Aureliano Triste did not lose any sleep or appetite nor did he torment anyone with crises of ill humor, but he considered the most harebrained of projects as immediate possiblities."
- P. 222 Completes the railroad project
- p. 238 "..was leaving the house with his mother at seven in the evening when a rifle shot came out of the darkness and perforated his forehead.

Aureliano Centeno:
- p. 220 "Tim had moderated his early impulse for growth and he was a man of average height with smallpox scars, but his amazing power for manual destruction remained intact (...) he had a cordiality that won the immediate confidence of others and a stupendous capacity for work."
- p. 221 Reacts when his brother doesn't return for awhile after starting the rail road. "In that way he planned to diversify the production of an enterprise he considered his own, because his brother showed no signs of returning after the rains."
- p. 238 "...found in the hammock that he was accustomed to hang up in the factory with an ice pick between his eyebrows."

Aureliano Serrador and Aureliano Arcaya:
- p. 236 Decide to stay in Maconda and work with the brothers
- p. 238 "Aureliano Serrador had left his girlfriend at her parent's house (...) when someone in the crowd who was never identified fired a revolver shot which knocked him over into a cauldron of boiling lard."
- p. 238 "Aureliano Arcaya was shut up with a woman and [someone] shouted 'Hurry up, they're killing your brothers!' (...) he was greeted with the discharge of a Mauser that split his head open."

Aureliano Amador:
- p. 239 "She drew lines through the names until only that of the eldest remained. His name was Aureliano Amador and he was a carpenter, living in a village hidden in the foothills. (...) Aureliano Amador was safe. The night of the extermination two men shot at him but missed the cross of ashes. Aureliano Amador had been able to leap over the wall of the courtyard and was lost in the mountains, which he knew like the back of his hand. Nothing more was heard from him."
- p. 373 Resurfaces after years of being on the run as a fugitive. "His clothing in tatters, his shoes cracked, the old kapsack on his shoulder his only luggage, he looked like a beggar but his bearing had a dignity that was in frank contradiction to his appearance." He is turned away by Jose Arcadio and is shot in the cross of ashes by police who have been chasing him for years.

Reflection to come...