When an old man with filthy, tattered wings tumbles from the sky in Gabriel García Márquez's story, "A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings" (reprinted in Thomas R. Arp and Greg Johnson, Perrine's Literature: Structure, Sound, and Sense, 8th ed. [Fort Worth: Harcourt, 2002] 329), he affects the people who come into contact with him. Márquez decides never to reveal where the old man with wings comes from because the author uses magical realism, a blend of reality and fantasy, to take care of the uncertainty. The theme of this story is that many religious people believe that their faith is only full of beauty and grace, and that it does not include everyday evils, which leads them to have a superficial understanding of religion.

Once the old man with wings falls down onto the courtyard of Pelayo and Elisenda, his magical...