Colombian writer and Nobel Prize in Literature Gabriel Garcia Marquez had a daughter hidden outside marriage, a secret jealously guarded by those close to him but revealed on Monday January 17, eight years after his death, by a Colombian press article.
Read alsoDeath of Mercedes Barcha, widow and inspiration of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, at 87
Married for nearly fifty years to Mercedes Bacha, Garcia Marquez had an out-of-wedlock relationship with a Mexican journalist, 33 years his junior, Susana Cato, according to an article in the daily El Universal, based in Cartagena (north). From this affair was born a daughter, Indira, now 31 years old and a film producer, who does not bear the name of her famous father, details the article. The author of “
One Hundred Years of Solitude
” met Susana Cato in Cuba. She interviewed him once for a Colombian publication, and they wrote screenplays together.
"
Shortly before the death of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the rumor reached my ears, and throughout these eight years, it disturbed me, I wanted to check if the information was true
," said on a local radio the author of the article, Gustavo Tatis. In his long paper entitled "
A girl: the best kept secret of Gabriel Garcia Marquez
", Gustavo Tatis explains that he confirmed "
the information
" with the biographer, family members and one of the writer's best friends. . But he says he kept it confidential out of respect for his wife Mercedes. "
We waited until she died to disclose the information
." L'existence of this hidden girl was "
the most sacred and intimate secret
by Garcia Marquez.
“
A family cataclysm
”
Leader of “
magical realism
”, Gabriel Garcia Marquez died on April 17, 2014 at the age of 87 in Mexico City where he lived part of his life.
His wife died at the same age on August 15, 2020. The El Universal article does not specify whether Mercedes knew of Indira's existence.
“
It is very likely that Mercedes had an intuition of what happened between Susana and Garcia Marquez, but until the end of her life she maintained discretion and silence.
However, the revelation of Indira's existence was a family cataclysm,
” says the author.
"
Until the end, Garcia Marquez kept an eye on
" his daughter, assures Gustavo Tatis.
In the 1990s, the 1982 Nobel laureate said that “
every writer has three lives: one public, one private and one secret
”.
In his case, "
in each of his three lives, women played a key role
," commented the journalist, author of these revelations.
Read alsoAbdulrazak Gurnah receives his prestigious Nobel Prize for Literature in London due to the pandemic
Garcia Marquez and his wife had two sons, Gonzalo and Rodrigo, who last year published the book “
Farewell to Gabo and Mercedes
”, dedicated to the last days of the monument of contemporary literature.