Balthazar's Marvelous Afternoon

Gabriel García Márquez (1927-2014) was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for Literature in 1982. He was born in Aracataca, Colombia and received a Jesuit education and studied law before becoming a journalist. After being sent to Rome on assignment, García Márquez spent much of his life travelling. Though Cuban novelist Alejo Carpentier coined the term magical realism, to describe a storytelling style that blends mundane and magical elements, this term and style are now widely associated with García Márquez. In Mexico, he wrote the novel A Thousand Years of Solitude, now considered an important example of a work that blends history and fantasy. Over his lifetime, García Márquez wrote several acclaimed novels, short stories, and screenplays, and his body of work is known for its critically celebrated prose and profound character portraits. This guide to his short story “Balthazar’s Marvelous Afternoon” refers to the 1991 edition of García Márquez’s Collected Stories. 

Originally published in 1962, “Balthazar’s Marvelous Afternoon” begins by introducing Balthazar, a humble carpenter. He has just completed a custom-made birdcage for Pepe, the son of José Montiel, a curt and powerful man in the neighborhood. While Balthazar shaves, preparing to take the finished order to Montiel, his girlfriend, Ursula, asks Balthazar how much he intends to charge for it. When Balthazar says that he pictures asking for “thirty pesos to see if they give me twenty” (149), Ursula reminds him of the time and effort he has put into the cage. She encourages him to ask for more: “You’ve lost a lot of sleep in these two weeks. Furthermore, [...] I think it’s the biggest cage I’ve ever seen in my life” (149). Balthazar agrees to request more money. 

Balthazar’s cage has attracted the admiration of the townspeople, who fill his dining room that afternoon to look at the cage and later follow him to the Montiels’s home. Dr. Octavio Giraldo arrives after hearing of Balthazar’s cage, intending to purchase it for his wife, who likes birds “so much that she hated cats” (150). When Balthazar explains that he has already sold the cage, Dr. Giraldo presses the matter, offering to buy it from him for sixty pesos. Balthazar refuses, stating, “I can’t sell you something that’s sold already” (152).

However, the cage is not truly sold. When Balthazar brings the finished cage to the Montiel house, Montiel’s wife greets him. She seems confused to see Balthazar but delighted by the cage’s aesthetic design, calling to Montiel, “Come and see what a marvelous thing” (153). Balthazar asks for Pepe, revealing to the Montiels that their twelve-year-old son placed the order for the cage. José Montiel summons his son, Pepe (a diminutive version of José), and insults Balthazar, criticizing him for taking an order from a child. José suggests Balthazar sell the cage elsewhere. Pepe, in protest or self-flagellation, screams and slams his head against the ground. To stop him, Balthazar insists that the cage is a gift, and that he means to take no money for it. He gives Pepe the cage and leaves the Montiel home as José flies into a rage because Balthazar and Pepe have flouted his will. 

In the short story’s final sequence, Balthazar is in a pool hall celebrating his completed commission with the crowd of townspeople who have come to celebrate Balthazar’s victory over Montiel. They assume that Balthazar has already been paid for the cage, and Balthazar does not correct their misunderstanding. In fact, he lies, claiming that he received sixty pesos, because he realizes that the townspeople are invested in the idea that Balthazar has extracted money from the widely disliked José. Allowing them to believe he was paid for the commission, Balthazar buys round after round of drinks for the crowd, eventually leaving his watch as payment. Drunk and giddy, Balthazar declares he is about to begin a large enterprise to create “a million cages” (156), and says they must all work quickly before the rich all die off, because they are very “sick, and they’re going to die. [...] they can’t even get angry anymore” (156).

By mealtime, Balthazar’s afternoon has ended. His disciples leave him in the pool hall alone while Ursula waits at home with his steak and onions, disbelieving the reports of his drunkenness. Balthazar wakes later, lying in the street, to feel someone removing his shoes. In the morning, as the church crowds pass, they are unsure whether he is alive or dead.