"With the passing of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the world has lost one of its greatest visionary writers -- and one of my favorites from the time I was young," spokesman Jay Carney said in a statement.

　　Offering his thoughts to Garcia Marquez's family and friends, Carney said he once met the novelist in Mexico and "cherishes to this day" an inscribed copy of the famed novel presented by the 1992 Nobel laureate.

　　"As a proud Colombian, a representative and voice for the people of the Americas, and as a master of the 'magic realism' genre, he has inspired so many others -- sometimes even to pick up the pen themselves," Carney added.

　　Garcia Marquez passed away on Thursday in his home in Mexico City at the age of 87. He was checked into a hospital on April 3 due to "dehydration and bronchial and urinary tract infections."

　　"One Hundred Years of Solitude," his masterpiece published in 1967, has been translated into 35 languages and sold more than 30 million copies.