October 22, 1982

The Postal Service agreed today to pay a total of $400 million in back pay due employees because of violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act from 1974 to 1978. The 800,000 current and past employees affected will get a maximum of $736 each. The pay is due for such things as overtime, night differential, and holiday work. The award, the largest of its kind, was approved today by Chief Judge Aubrey E. Robinson of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia to settle several lawsuits, including a complaint filed against the Postal Service in 1978 by the United States Labor Department.

Gabriel Garcia Marquez, the author of ''One Hundred Years of Solitude,'' was awarded the 1982 Nobel Prize for Literature today. Comparing him to Balzac and Faulkner, the selection committee of the Swedish Academy described Mr. Garcia Marquez, a 54-year-old Colombian who lives in Mexico, as a great novelist of overwhelming narrative talent, breadth and epic richness. More unusual was the academy's defense of its choice with an elliptical reference to laureates of past years whom some people have found inaccessible, esoteric or even unread. 'International Successes' Noted Pointing to the sales in the millions of copies of Mr. Garcia Marquez's best-known novel, the academy asserted it could not be said this time to have given the award to ''an unknown writer.'' ''His international successes have continued,'' since the publication of ''One Hundred Years of Solitude,'' the academy's statement went on. ''Each new work of his is received by expectant critics and readers as an event of world importance, is translated into many languages and published as quickly as possible in large editions. Nor can it be said that an unknown literary continent or province is being brought to light with the prize.''

NEVER let it be said that New Yorkers do not love their city, despite the exuberant grumbling that identifies the species. Every weekend they pour into the streets of the five boroughs, ready to lay their skepticism aside and admire - and learn about - New York. Some explore haphazardly, opening themselves to the random sights and sounds and smells of the city. Others are more orderly about it, winding methodically through a neighborhood, guidebook and camera in hand. But most rely on the walking tours that have grown into a major weekend industry over the last 10 years or so, tours that explore historic or natural areas, that trace the footsteps of some noted New Yorker or simply offer a look in depth at a familiar landmark. Tours this weekend will take gregarious walkers from the promenade in Brooklyn Heights to the quiet paths of Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx, in the clear, bright air of autumn. Looks at the legends of Wall Street will be offered, as well as of the people who are celebrated as legends in the statues and monuments of Riverside Park. For those who savor the outdoors in undiluted glory, there will be a windy stroll across the George Washington Bridge and a walk through a salt marsh in Brooklyn.

''We believe the time has come to stop talking about talking about peace and start sitting down at the table, negotiating directly between Israelis, and Arabs, and the United States, and start achieving Palestinian rights, and start achieving the broader peace which is the key to the stability and security for Israel.'' - Excerpt from a State Department policy statement. (A1:6.)

WHAT is the perfect way to watch the New York Marathon? To run in it, surely - a privilege that will be denied all but 16,000 of the more than two million people who will turn out on Sunday to be part of it. The lucky entrants will see some authentic New York curiosities: Fort Wadsworth at dawn, for one, the Staten Island gathering point for runners on their day of days. Think of it: a tiny middle-American town just like John Glenn's, all tended lawns and flagpoles, surrounded by scrub forest aglow with October russets and golds. Incongruous, to be launched from that peaceable kingdom into the chaos of a race where a runner bashes around the corners of the city like a pinball, deafened and buoyed by the din of humanity. Oh, sure, you can watch the Marathon on television. Last year, according to the ratings, 11.5 million people did. This time, ABC has rounded up a few of the usual suspects (Jim McKay, Marty Liquori and Diana Nyad) at honcho central to broadcast three hours of coverage starting at 10:30 A.M. They've got 25 cameras and two helicopters, and runners all over the country are proud that their sport will be getting such major-league attention. There is just one problem, though. The cameras are going to miss the most extraordinary aspect of the Marathon - the part that is truly worth seeing.