Name: ________________________________________

Chronicle of a Death Foretold Reading Guide

Directions: Answer the following questions thoroughly and in complete sentences. Refer to the
text.
Chapter 1
1.

What is a chronicle? How is this work like a chronicle? How is it unlike a chronicle?

2.

What details of the "death" day do various people disagree about? What does
this disagreement indicate?

3.

What did the people in the town expect would be important that day? What
actually turned out to be important? What is the "lesson"?

Chapter 2
4.

Discuss Bayardo San Romn:

a)
physical description
b)
why does he want to marry Angela
c)
actions that reveal his character?

5.

Discuss Angela:
a)
how does she feel about Bayardo (before the wedding)?
b)
the town's and her family's expectations of her

6.

Describe the "sexual" culture of the town. What attitudes prevail about the proper
role of men, the proper role of women?

7.

What is the motive given for killing Santiago Nasar?

Chapter 3
8.

What "time frame" is described in this chapter?

9.

What is the reasoning of the Vicario twins? What justifies their act? How do they really
feel about it? Give evidence.

10.

What does the fact that nearly everyone knows (except Santiago) what is planned tell us
about the fundamental assumptions, values of the town?

11.

How do class differences influence feelings about Santiago?

Chapter 4
12.

What is significant about Mara Alejandrina Cervantes and her "girls"? What
attitudes do the townspeople and the narrator have toward them?

13.

Explain what happens to Angela Vicario and Bayardo San Romn after the murder and in
later years?

14.

Discuss Angela's "love letters." What wry/ironic comment is Marquez making about
such letters when he has Bayardo "return" to Angela but with the letters unopened?

Chapter 5
15.

What does the narrator discover about Santiago's role in "deflowering" Angela?
a)
b)
c)

did Santiago die "understanding" the reason for his death?

why would Angela withhold the name of the real perpetrator? who
might it be? evidence?
what symbolic meaning does this mystery have for ALL humans?

16.

What puzzles most of the townspeople as they look aback on the morning of Santiago's
death?

17.

Why, in some sense, does the "piecing together" of this chronicle make the narrator and
the townspeople "feel better"?

18.

After reading the book, what might readers conclude is the significance of the title for
themselves? Why?

The Characters: Identify and describe (include physical description, occupation, and
relations to other characters)
19.

Major Characters:

a)

the narrator

b)

Santiago Nasar

c)

Bayardo San Romn

d)

ngela Vicario

e)

Pedro Vicario

f)

Pablo Vicario

20.

Minor Characters:

a)

Divina Flor

b)

Flora Miguel

c)

Mara Alejandrina Cervantes

d)

Clothilde Armenta

e)

Plcida Linero

f)

Cristo Bedoya

g)

Colonel Aponte

h)

Father Carmen Amador