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He was delicate, thin, with a curiosity that unnerved the adults, but unlike the inquisitive and sometimes clairvoyant look that the colonel had at his age, his look was blinking and somewhat distracted.
This description of young Aureliano (II) comes from Chapter 17. Although barely acknowledged by the household, even at this young age Aureliano (II) exhibits the traits of Buendía men. He has a dreamy curiosity that seems detached from reality. His strange look is reminiscent of Aureliano (II) and his clairvoyance, but it has a distracted quality. Even though he will eventually unravel Melquíades’s manuscript, on the way he’ll become distracted by sex and hedonism, much like his predecessors.
Nothing he saw along the way interested him, perhaps because he lacked any memories for comparison and the deserted streets and desolate houses were the same as he had imagined them at a time when he would have given his soul to know them.
This quotation comes from Chapter 18, as Aureliano (II) begins leaving the house to visit the Catalonian’s bookstore. Although he has spent his childhood isolated from the world outside the Buendía household, Aureliano (II) has no real desire to take advantage of his newfound freedom, and instead operates with a detached solitude. He is the first Buendía with no real feeling toward Macondo, signifying that the Buendía line has decayed so much that it has become isolated from the very town it founded.
Suddenly, without interrupting the chat, moved by an impulse that had been sleeping in him since his origins, Aureliano put his hand on hers, thinking that that final decision would put an end to his doubts.
This quotation comes from Chapter 19, as Aureliano (II), while explaining his translations of Melquíades’s manuscripts, begins to have incestuous feelings for Amaranta Úrsula. Throughout his short life, Aureliano (II) repeats many of the same Buendía patterns. He becomes lost in solitary, esoteric pursuits, translating Melquíades’s manuscript. He briefly connects with a group of friends but loses them to the wider world while his shrinks. He enjoys the company of sex workers. And, finally, he realizes that he has feelings for Amaranta Úrsula.
Aureliano had never been more lucid in any act of his life as when he forgot about his dead ones and the pain of his dead ones and nailed up the doors and windows again with Fernanda’s crossed boards so as not to be disturbed by any temptations of the world, for he knew then that his fate was written in Melquíades’ parchments.
This quotation comes from Chapter 20, as Aureliano (II) finally finishes translating Melquíades’s manuscript, bringing about his own end and the end of Macondo. At this point, Aureliano (II) has lost everything. Amaranta Úrsula has died, his son is devoured, and his friends in Macondo have all left. With everyone leaving Macondo, it has become a ghost town. Aureliano (II) accepts the fate of the Buendías, the fate of solitude. He shuts out the world to fully isolate himself and narrows his world to the manuscript, bringing about the end of the Buendías and Macondo, just as Melquíades knew he would.
