Deeply moved after reading this book, I scribbled down the outline of the story (deep spoiler, readers should not read it):
Florentino Ariza is the illegitimate son of a rich river transportation company partner. /kloc-When his father died at the age of 0/0, he had to drop out of school and become an apprentice in the post office. He is very clever, and soon learned to send telegrams and play the violin with his colleagues, and he likes reading and writing poems very much. One day in florentino 18 years old, he sent a telegram to Lorenzo Dasa, a local invisible rich man, and saw his 13 year old daughter Fermin. The girl has a pair of almond eyes, dignified and elegant, and inadvertently caught a glimpse of florentino, which made her hopelessly fall in love with her. In order to win the girl's heart, florentino fell into a trance-like lovesickness. He wrote poetic love letters to girls day and night, writing dozens of pages; He runs to the garden in front of the girl's house every day and pretends to read a book of poems on the bench so that he can have a look at her. This behavior also made the girl's mentality change subtly, and she gradually liked him. With the help of florentino's mother and menstruation of Fermin, he finally got a chance to write a half-page letter to the girl one day. After that, the two began to exchange letters, and their feelings became stronger with the exchange of letters, so that they had to decide for life. Finally, their relationship was discovered by the girl's father Lorenzo. Lorenzo is a nouveau riche who started his business by selling mules and other illegal businesses. He doesn't allow his daughter to marry someone in the post office. So he forced his daughter to travel with him, hoping to make her forget this ignorant love like an illusion. The girl was desperate, but she had to obey. So, before she left, she cut off a lock of her hair and gave it to florentino as a symbol of love. The long journey began on the back of the mule and later arrived on the boat. They visited many relatives along the way, including relatives of the girl's dead mother's house. However, Lorenzo made a fatal mistake. He telegraphed his relatives and friends at home about his trip. The first person who received the telegram was florentino, who worked in the post office, so he could easily know every place where the girl and her father arrived and send the telegram to the girl in advance. The girl will reply to him in time after receiving the telegram. In this way, after three years of travel, their feelings became closer and closer with the telegrams in the air. When the girl came home, they decided to break through all obstacles and get together. They were already looking forward to the upcoming wedding. In order to meet their future, florentino's mother is going to build a house for her son as a wedding room. Fermina also got the management right of the family from her father to prepare for the upcoming wedding. While Fermin was shopping excitedly at the flea market, florentino appeared behind her. She turned around and saw that her childish, old and haggard cheeks were silent for an instant, and a great sense of distance came to her, which made her feel that the sweet correspondence between them in the past three years suddenly became meaningless! So, she resolutely left florentino and got back her letter and the strand of hair she gave him. In the following days, Lorenzo created various coincidences, and let his daughter marry urbino, the most prestigious doctor in the area. Dr. urbino is older than Fermin 10 years old and has contributed to the local cholera epidemic. Moreover, his father died of cholera, and his family was respected by the local people. When florentino learned that the girl of her dreams was going to marry another woman, she was in great pain. After the pain, he began to calm down. He thinks that Fermin's husband will die one day. He decided to wait until Fermin's husband died one day before winning the goddess' heart. For this day, he began to keep himself healthy, and he had to fight against the years! So, he also started his own voyage. During the trip, his first thought was to keep himself clean for his goddess, but God didn't give him this opportunity. One night he was dragged into the hut by a woman in the corridor behind the hut and forced to have sex in the dark. From then on, he fell in love with this feeling of love between men and women. Back home, in order to make up for the emptiness inside, he kept looking for women to make love, especially widows. According to my own records, Yi * * found more than 600 lovers, who are definitely super Neptune. Among all these lovers, the oldest is ten years older than him, and the youngest is a young girl who just turned 14, and most of them have feelings for him. The youngest lover loved him so much that he died for him, but he was still single and didn't marry any of them. Unconsciously, it has been 5 1 year, 9 months and 4 days since florentino first met Fermin. On this day, Dr. urbino fell off the ladder and died, because he tried to catch a parrot flying to mango tree at home. He died at the age of 8 1. At that time, Fermin was 7 1 year old and florentino was 76 years old. After seeing off almost all the guests at her husband's funeral, Fermin found that florentino was seriously courting her, hoping that she could accept her faithful love that she had stood for half a century. This undoubtedly brought great shame to the widow who had just lost her loved ones, so she rejected the old man and drove him out. From then on, florentino began to pursue her goddess as she did half a century ago. This pursuit is less childish and more tolerant and rational. He kept writing to the goddess and talking to her in a weather-beaten adult tone. At first, Fermin was disgusted and refused, but he also gave him a letter full of curses. Slowly, with florentino's follow-up letters, she began to slowly change and accept him. But it is hard for secular society to accept that an old man of this age has a yellow relationship. In order to stay away from the criticism of the world, two elderly lovers boarded a ship of florentino's own shipping company and started a water cruise. At this time, florentino has become the chairman and general manager of this inland shipping company. During the journey, the two finally got together and made love like young people. When they returned, florentino asked the captain to hang a flag on the ship, indicating that the ship had been infected with cholera, and kept sailing back and forth in the strait until they spent the rest of their lives!