Una paciencia mineral

[Perikles]

Florentino soportó los rigores del viaje con la paciencia mineral que desconsolaba a su madre y exasperaba a sus amigos.

'mineral patience' makes no sense in English (well, not to me). Is there another way of translating this, or is it just Márquez inventing poetic expressions? Thanks

[aleCcowaN]

Translate it as "impassive patience" in you like. I suppose "mineral" conveys the notion of impassive and imperturbable but also resistant to the environment: centuries have to pass in order to show signal of erosion.

The term also have a dehumanizing nuance, like people deprived of resilience and their ability to shape the world that surrounds them, or to show frustration instead for not being able to do it, then being a bit exasperating to their fellows.

[Perikles]

Thanks Alec, I suppose the nearest English to it is iron patience, similar to an iron will. Or stubborn, intractable, irrational, non-human, something along those lines.

[katerina]

Originally Posted by Perikles

Florentino soportó los rigores del viaje con la paciencia mineral que desconsolaba a su madre y exasperaba a sus amigos.

No sé si el texto que sigue podría ayudarte a clarificar lo que preguntas..
..." Nuestro país tiene la paciencia mineral que se requiere para erosionar a las personalidades más fuertes, igualar hacia abajo, fomentar el suicidio moral o intelectual, perseguir las singularidades, doblegar. La guerra que el Perú nunca perderá será la que siempre libre en contra de sus mejores hijos.

Originally Posted by aleCcowaN

Translate it as "impassive patience" in you like. I suppose "mineral" conveys the notion of impassive and imperturbable but also resistant to the environment: centuries have to pass in order to show signal of erosion.

I think that "endurance and duration " are implied equally. Something between "patience of Job" and "iron patience"

[aleCcowaN]

I think it has to do with the endurance of patience itself, not with the endurance of the subject. Iron patience, iron will (paciencia de hierro, voluntad de hierro) are active concepts. "Una paciencia mineral" suggests a 'passive stubbornness', it's not a patience like that of "la gota que horada la piedra" but like something in between "la roca que resiste el embate de las olas" and "la piedra en el zapato" [I'm not sure how to translate all three expressions] It's not a virtue nor a defect; it's something one has to cope with.

[Perikles]

Yes, thank you both. Very useful comments.