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A
Letter From A Dying
Nobel Laureate
- "You
will be called upon to account for all the permitted pleasures in life
you did not enjoy while on earth."
- ~
the Koran
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- Nobel-prize winning
Colombian author Gabriel Garcia Marquez retired from public life last
November due to worsening cancer of the lymph nodes. He has sent this
farewell letter to his friends, which has been translated, posted on the
Internet, and sent by Jeff Hutner:
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"If for an
instant God were to forget that I am rag doll and gifted me with a piece
of life, possibly I wouldn't say all that I think, but rather I would
think of all that I say. I would value things, not for their worth but
for what they mean. I would sleep little, dream more, understanding that
for each minute we close our eyes we lose sixty seconds of light.
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- I would walk when
others hold back, I would wake when others sleep. I would listen when
others talk, and how I would enjoy a good chocolate ice cream! If God
were to give me a piece of life, I would dress simply, throw myself face
first into the sun, baring not only my body but also my soul.
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- My God, if
I had a heart, I would write my hate on ice, and wait for the sun to
show. Over the stars I would paint with a Van Gogh dream a Benedetti
poem, and a Serrat song would be the serenade I'd offer to the moon.
With my tears I would water roses, to feel the pain of their thorns, and
the red kiss of their petals...
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- My god, if I had a
piece of life... I wouldn't let a single day pass without telling the
people I love that I love them. I would convince each woman and each man
that they are my favorites, and I would live in love with love.
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- I would
show men how very wrong they are to think that they cease to be in love
when they grow old, not knowing that they grow old when they cease to be
in love! To a child I shall give wings, but I shall let him learn to fly
on his own. I would teach the old that death does not come with old age,
but with forgetting. So much have I learned from you, oh men...
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- I have learned that
everyone wants to live on the peak of the mountain, without knowing that
real happiness is in how it is scaled. I have learned that when a
newborn child squeezes for the first time with his tiny fist his
father's finger, he has him trapped forever.
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- I have learned that a man
has the right to look down on another only when he has to help the other
get to his feet. From you I have learned so many things, but in truth
they won't be of much use, for when I keep them within this suitcase,
unhappily shall I be dying."
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