Gabriel García Márquez’s ‘Love in the Time of Cholera’ was first published in 1985.
The novel appeared in Spanish in Colombia through Editorial Oveja Negra. Its original title is ‘El amor en los tiempos del cólera’, and it follows the long, complicated relationship between Florentino Ariza and Fermina Daza. Their story examines love, marriage, ageing and the passage of time rather than presenting romance as a simple youthful ideal.
The English edition came later, in 1988, translated by Edith Grossman. That publication gap is the main reason the year is sometimes misremembered. The book’s setting is an unnamed Caribbean port city in Colombia, often understood as drawing on Cartagena, Barranquilla and the Magdalena River region.
The word ‘cholera’ also carries a suggestive double meaning in Spanish: ‘cólera’ can refer to the disease and to anger or passionate intensity. The novel’s historical atmosphere includes epidemics, civil conflict and changing social conditions, but its central concern is how love persists—or changes—across decades.