Nobel laureate Marquez laments writer's block

The author of 100 Years of Solitude, Gabriel Garcia, says that 2005 was a year when he didn't write even a line.

The author of

100 Years of Solitude

, Nobel prize for literature Gabriel Garcia Marquez, is lamenting one year of something even worse for someone of his profession -- writer's block.

In a rare interview to be published this Sunday by Barcelona-based daily La Vanguardia, of which the paper published extracts Wednesday, the Colombian said he "didn't write a line" in 2005.

"2005 was a year when, for the first time in my life, I didn't write a line. "With the practice I have had I could write a new novel without too many problems but if you don't put your back into it the reader always knows," said Garcia Marquez, who moved briefly to Barcelona in 1967, adding he hoped that inspiration to produce a new oeuvre would soon reappear.

He did the interview in his house in Mexico, casting aside his general reluctance to speak to the press or reveal any snippets of his private life.

His latest novel, Memories Of My Melancholy Whores, was published in Spanish in October 2004.