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One Hundred Years of Solitude chronicles the history of the Buendía family and the town of Macondo as they repeat the same mistakes over and over on account of their solitary natures. Instead of following a traditional linear plot structure, the novel goes in spirals, each generation following different variations of the same pattern. The family attempts to escape its solitude through love, loses itself in learning or ideals, and faces an apocalyptic climax, losing its patriarch in the aftermath. Simultaneously, the entire novel is a loop, with the Buendías going from being exiled founders of an isolated town, to a prominent family in a bustling trade hub, back again to isolation as stragglers in a dying town.
In the first generation, José Arcadio Buendía and Ursula establish a few tropes that haunt the family for the entire novel. First, José Arcadio Buendía and Úrsula are cousins, foreshadowing the incestuous tendencies of the Buendías. Second is the destruction that follows romance. José Arcadio Buendía founds Macondo after wandering in self-imposed exile because he is haunted by the effect of his own machismo, the pride that leads him to kill Prudencio Aguilar. Additionally, José Arcadio Buendía demonstrates the Buendía tendency toward solitude. Solitude in the novel means a profound isolation from both those around them and from the time they live in. For José Arcadio Buendía, his scientific curiosity causes him to withdraw from others. Úrsula meanwhile acts as a force against solitude. She wants the house to be open and hospitable. She attempts to open or diversify the family line, warning the children against the dangers of incest. Finally, we see how the state of the town mirrors the state of the Buendía family. At this point, both are isolated from the outside world and naïve.
The climax of the first generation is the insomnia plague, which plunges the whole town into solitude. Melquíades comes to save the day, forcing the cycle onward as the second generation takes the helm of the story. Not too long after this point, José Arcadio Buendía’s selfhood appears to erode, and he ends up chained to a tree. Just as the marriage of José Arcadio Buendía and Úrsula coincides with exile and death, the coming of age of the second generation is full of tragedy. José Arcadio runs away. Amaranta and Rebeca’s sisterhood is ruined by jealousy. Colonel Aureliano Buendía loses Remedios, and is surprised to find he hardly grieves. José Arcadio’s return lures Rebeca away from Pietro Crespi, reflecting his father’s destructive machismo.
As Macondo opens up to the world, it becomes embroiled in politics, and so do the Buendías. Colonel Aureliano Buendía dominates this period of the story, and his reputation cements Macondo’s status as a hotbed of liberal rebel activity. The climax of the second generation is the failed execution of Colonel Aureliano Buendía. Although the war continues for years after, it is here Colonel Aureliano Buendía truly becomes lost to both Macondo and his family. Eventually, he loses his ideals and the respect of the town. Even Úrsula acknowledges his incapacity for love. The war practically smothers the third generation. Colonel Aureliano Buendía’s absence leaves Arcadio to interpret his wishes himself, and his violence and machismo makes him a hated dictator. Aureliano José attempts to outrun his incestuous feelings for Amaranta, fails, and ends up assassinated.
The fourth generation follows José Arcadio Segundo and Aureliano Segundo as the Buendías and Macondo face an era of imperial capitalism with the banana company. Just as the banana company brings overinflated prosperity, Aureliano Segundo’s libertine lifestyle results in a seemingly endless glut of wealth from his impossibly fertile animals. But at the root of both the banana company and Aureliano Segundo’s prosperity is a deep unhappiness. Aureliano Segundo only feels joy with his mistress and is practically exiled from the house. The banana company is a corrupt and exploitative institution. The apocalyptic banana company massacre, resulting in years of rain, serves as the climax of this period. José Arcadio Segundo loses himself to solitude after this point. He falls out of step with those around him, who believe the government's version of events, and loses himself in solitude.
Starting with the fourth generation, Úrsula’s influence over the family declines with her strength. When Fernanda succeeds her as matriarch, the Buendía family’s fate is sealed because there is no one to slow down the patterns of decay. With her sheltered upbringing and closed-minded attitude, Fernanda wants solitude. Instead of having a full and open house, Fernanda boards up the windows and sends the fifth generation of children away for education, severing their ties to Macondo. Fernanda’s obsession with purity causes Meme’s exile. José Arcadio (II) inherits the carnality and indolence of the Buendía line with no outlet for it and perishes from his libertine lifestyle. Amaranta Úrsula leaving Macondo young grants her a romanticized vision of it, but when she returns, she has no real understanding of it.
Aureliano (II) sees the end of the Buendías and Macondo. He operates as if facing another manifestation of the amnesia that comes with the insomnia plague because of how Fernanda shuts him out from his family history. He has no connection with Macondo, and the failing town itself barely remembers the Buendía family. Aureliano (II) repeats all of the family vices. He falls into the solitude of José Arcadio Buendía, desperately studying Melquíades’s papers. He indulges in carnality in the brothels of Macondo. He pursues an incestuous relationship with Amaranta Úrsula. Their relationship results in the usual spate of tragedies, Amaranta Úrsula’s death and the forewarned pig-tailed son, whose death marks the end of the Buendía line. In the solitude of grief, Aureliano (II) finally deciphers Melquíades’s papers, and the town disintegrates in the final apocalyptic wind of climax. Out of time, out of people, out of Buendías, Macondo too fades into obscurity, a solitary end to a solitary place of solitary people.
