The opening sentence of Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s celebrated novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude, is considered to be one of the greatest lines in literature.
It reads: "Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel Aureliano Buendia was to remember that distant afternoon when his father took him to discover ice."
Numerous literary publications, including the American Book Review, have repeatedly listed it among the most famous sentences ever written.
As news of Marquez’s death at age 87 spread on social media Thursday, many fans quoted other lines from the Nobel laureate’s books:
"I discovered to my joy, that it is life, not death, that has no limits." from Love in the Time of Cholera. RIP Gabriel Garcia Márquez
— Regina Garcia Cano (@reginagarciakNO) April 18, 2014
“A true friend is the one who holds your hand and touches your heart” ― Gabriel García Márquez
— Miguel Angel Escotet (@DrEscotet) April 18, 2014
And here is a partial list of Marquez’s works, compiled by The Associated Press:
FICTION:
"No One Writes to the Colonel and Other Stories," 1961
"One Hundred Years of Solitude," 1967
"The Autumn of the Patriarch," 1975
"Chronicle of a Death Foretold," 1981
"Love in the Time of Cholera," 1985
"The General in his Labyrinth," 1989
"Strange Pilgrims," 1992
"Of Love and Other Demons," 1994
"Memories of My Melancholy Whores," 2004
NONFICTION:
"The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor," 1970
"News of a Kidnapping," 1996
MEMOIR:
"Living to Tell the Tale," 2002