In Chronicle of a Death Foretold, the narrator tells us that two people were responsible for the death of Santiago Nasar

        Divina Flor, another townswoman who knew of the brother’s plot, let her personal issue with Santiago get in the way of her duty as a citizen of the town.  Santiago’s father, Ibrahim, had an affair with Divina’s mother, Victoria Guzman.  However, the affair turned into a love/hate relationship when the affection was over.  Victoria knew Divina was destined for Santiago, but she did not want to let that happen.  “He was just like his father, a shit,” (10).  This hatred for the men of the Nasar family was passed on to Divina.  “She had so much repressed rage the morning of the crime……to embitter Santiago Nasar’s breakfast” (10).  This personal hatred was the direct cause of Santiago’s death.  When Santiago came running to his front door with the Vicario brothers in chase, the door was locked.  Just minutes before, Santiago’s mother was in a frenzy after she heard what was going to happen to Santiago.  However, Divina “calmed her down” by telling her that Santiago had gone up to his room just a minute ago.  “I locked it because Divina Flor had sworn to me that she’d seen my son come in, and it wasn’t true” (98).  Divina Flor was too ignorant to put aside her personal issue with Santiago in order to save the man’s life.

        Divina’s ignorance does not compare to the one man in the town who you would expect to stop the murder from happening.  The most ignorant of all the townsfolk was the Colonel, Lazaro Aponte.  The Colonel, after confiscating the brothers’ first set of knives, said “No one is arrested just on suspicion,” (57).  The twins are announcing their plans with freshly sharpened knives in their hands, and the Colonel is only suspicious?  The Colonel was happy with just taking their knives and warning Santiago Nasar, which he never did.  In fact, he forgot about the plot until he saw Santiago later that day, in which he congratulated himself for simply taking the knives away.  Soon before the murder took place, Cristo Bedoya, a friend of Santiago Nasar, came up to the Colonel and asked him to do something.  The Colonel told Cristo that he had already taken their knives away, and he sent the brothers home to bed.  Cristo told the Colonel that he just saw them again with knives.  “Oh, shit, then they must have come back with two new ones” (109).  It had never occurred to the Colonel that they could have gotten two different knives to do the killing with.  Colonel Aponte then promised to take care of it at once, however he went into a social club to check on a date for a dominoes game that night.  This shows the priorities of the mayor of the town, and how he cares for his citizens.  The first time the Colonel was asked to do something, he simply postponed the killing by taking away their knives.  The second time, a dumb game of dominoes was more important than the safety of Santiago Nasar’s life.  If the brothers were bold enough to go back and get two more knives, they are not joking around when they announce to everyone that they will kill Santiago.  Knowing their seriousness, the Colonel still had more important things to do than try and stop the murder, which is why his ignorance is the worst of all.

        In conclusion, the Chronicle of a Death Foretold’s narrator tells us that two people were responsible for the death of Santiago Nasar, which is untrue.  The Pure ignorance of three townsfolk killed Santiago Nasar.  The three specific townsfolk responsible for the murder, Leandro Pornoy, Divina Flor, and Colonel Lazaro Aponte, failed in their duty as a citizen of the town.  Each of these three people had an equal opportunity to stop the murder; however each person’s ignorance caused their failures in their characters.  This death was foretold, and foretold to an entire town, yet the actions of these three people aided the killers in their mission of murder.    

        

Work Cited

Garcia Marquez, Gabriel.  Chronicle of a Death Foretold.  New York:  Vintage International, 2003.