Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the Colombian novelist who died this week, did not pen a letter that’s being going around that starts off with “if God, for a second, forgot what I have become and granted me a little bit more of life ...”
The letter was actually written by Mexican ventriloquist Johnny Welch in 1996. The original letter can be read here.
However, it has been mis-attributed to Marquez since 2000 when he fell ill. Marquez has previously said that he didn’t write it and dismissed it as cheesy.
It can be accessed on the PRRB.ca website.
It reads: “If God, for a second, forgot what I have become and granted me a little bit more of life, I would use it to the best of my ability.
I wouldn’t, possibly, say everything that is in my mind, but I would be more thoughtful l of all I say.
I would give merit to things not for what they are worth, but for what they mean to express.
I would sleep little, I would dream more, because I know that for every minute that we close our eyes, we waste 60 seconds of light.”
