SOURCE: Penuel, Arnold M. “A Contemporary Fairy Tale: García Márquez' ‘El rastro de tu sangre en la nieve.’” Studies in Twentieth Century Literature 19, no. 2 (summer 1995): 239-55.

In the following essay, Penuel discusses how “El rastro de tu sangre en la nieve” utilizes various elements of the fairy tale genre.

Like most of García Márquez' stories and novels, the short story “El rastro de tu sangre en la nieve” integrates elements from a variety of sources, but the story's principal intertextual element is the fairy tale. Although the titular image of blood on the snow comes from “Little Snow-White,” the story is a subtle recreation of “Little Briar-Rose,” better known as “Sleeping Beauty.” Well aware of the symbolic import of fairy tales, García Márquez exploits that tradition to create a contemporary fairy tale replete with symbolic meaning. His fairy tale explores the cultural...