Nobody writes to the colonel

“Nobody Writes to the Colonel” is a novel by the outstanding Colombian novelist Gabriel García Márquez (1927−2014), published in 1961. The work is one of the first by the author and is marked by the influence of Ernest Hemingway.

The events unfold in a small Colombian town. A seventy-five-year-old retired colonel waits for a boat at the port every Friday. He is due to receive a letter about his pension as a war veteran. But no one writes to the colonel. After the death of his son, he and his wife live in poverty and are starving. The only thing they have is a rooster, which the colonel trains for battles, hoping to get money for his stay.

The novel is a hymn to the resilience of the human spirit. Márquez tells the story of a man who fights for a decent life and believes in justice, and a country suffering from poverty, hunger and corruption.