Netflix orders Spanish series based on Gabriel García Márquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude

Streaming giant Netflix has acquired the rights to Gabriel García Márquez’s classic novel One Hundred Years of Solitude for a screen adaptation, reports The Guardian. The book will be made into a Spanish series, shot mainly in the Nobel prize-winning authors home country Colombia. Márquez’s sons Rodrigo García and Gonzalo García Barcha will serve as executive producers.

The author’s son told the publication that García Márquez had been quite apprehensive of selling the book’s rights for the longest time since he thought that One Hundred Years of Solitude could not be reproduced within the stringent structures of feature films. He was also certain about the fact that the work would lose its essence if made in a language other than Spanish.

“But in the current golden age of series, with the level of talented writing and directing, the cinematic quality of content, and the acceptance by worldwide audiences of programs in foreign languages, the time could not be better,” the publication quoted Márquez’s son as saying.

One Hundred Years of Solitude focuses on the Buendía dynasty, who were the founders of the town of Macondo. Being one of the most acclaimed works of the 20th century, the novel, much like his other works, mixes elements of fantasy, allegory, alchemy and religious apparitions with history and literature. One Hundred Years of Solitude sold approximately 47 million copies worldwide and was translated into 46 languages.

Netflix has, in the recent past, shown major interest in regional literature with Spanish-language originals like Oscar-winning film Roma and popular series Narcos .