Conversation in the Cathedral

Mario Vargas Llosa is one of the most important living writers, and undoubtedly deserves his reputation as one of Latin America's two great novelists. Conversation in the Cathedral is the first book of his I've read in several years. Like most great works of literature, this book is not a quick read. First of all, it is 600 pages, and second, Vargas Llosa writes in a style that is difficult to get accustomed to at first (more on that below). Conversation in the Cathedral is a book that requires a major time commitment, but the ultimate payoff is worth it. As far as the story, it takes place during Peru in the 1950's during the Odria dictatorship. Ostensibly the story revolves around two old acquaintances who accidentally meet and over beers discuss their lives over the preceding years. These two characters are Santiago and Ambrosia. The former is a young journalist whose father was a senator and member of Peru's upper crust elite. He has turned his back on his family's wealth and connections, flirted briefly with Marxism at the university, and now works as a newspaper journalist. Ambrosia formerly worked as one of Santiago's father's servants, but was forced to leave Lima for reasons that become clear only very late in the book. The novel's structure is somewhat complicated. First, it does not follow a linear narrative path. It frequently jumps around chronologically, and even after finishing the book I am not completely certain about the chronological order of events. Second, the story is told from multiple perspectives. Part of the story consists of the actual conversation between Santiago and Ambrosia, as the two interrogate each other about what they've been doing over the previous decade or so. Most of action is live, however, and it is told in both the first and third persons. The thing that makes this book (indeed, most of Vargas Llosa's books) so slow going at times is his use of alternating dialogue. This often makes it difficult to ascertain who exactly is talking to whom, or what is happening. Especially for those readers who are reading Vargas Llosa for the first time, the first part of the book will go pretty slow, but the pace picks up considerable over the second half of the book. This book is powerful on many levels. First, Vargas Llosa is one of the most politically astute novelists around. Not only is he a passionate observer of politics, he has soiled his own hands in it, having unsuccessfully ran for Peru's president a while back. Much of this book's action revolves around political intrigues among the ruling establishment. One of the most intense and quickly paced sections of the book details a plot to overthrow the country's hated security chief. Santiago's own father, being an influential Senator, plays a central role in these conflicts. Overall, Vargas Llosa makes penetrating insights into the nature and functioning of authoritarian regimes. He realistically portrays the cynicism and moral corruption of authoritarian lea

When one of the best contemporary Latin-American authors says "If I could only save from the fire one of the novels I have written, I would save this one", you know that the experience of reading this work has to be invaluable. In this novel, the author explores, through the use of some fictional characters, the effects of the dictatorship of Manuel A. Odria in Peru. One of the aspects that shocked me and that I still find surprising is how well the impact of these terrible events translates to other dictatorships that occurred later in the Latin American history. Vargas Llosa uses a very difficult style throughout this novel, since he jumps back and forth through time and space, and also changes continuously among the viewpoint of different characters, without warning the reader about what is going on in each case. It does take some getting used to in order to fully enjoy the novel, but once you achieve this, the rewards are abundant and leave us satisfied. In this regard, it may help to read "The Time of the Hero" first, since in this book the author uses a similar technique, but keeping it a little simpler. I have heard some of my friends and family complain about Vargas Llosa's style in this work, saying that the author is just trying to be fancy with his writing when there is no need for it. I do not agree with this; I think that the point the author is trying to make through his convoluted technique has to do with the frustration that people feel during a dictatorship and he wants you to feel some of it too when you are going through the experience of reading about it. But also, the author knows that you are going to have to give the book your full attention if you want to understand it, so his style helps assure that you will grasp his point. In my opinion, there is only one other book that can compete with this one for the best Latin-American novel of all times, and most people can probably figure out pretty quickly that I am referring to "One Hundred Years of Solitude". I am not sure which one comes on top, but I know for sure that I would not want to have to make a choice in terms of which of the two to save from the fire!

This is what the main character, Zavalita, and the author, try to find out in the book: how, when, where, why, Latin America went wrong. It is a political, social and personal novel. Without a clear answer, of course, Vargas Llosa boldly exposes before our eyes the crap, the misery, the injustice and the depravation that rule life in most parts of our continent. He is unsparing, cruel and realistic. The lives of Santiago Zavala and Ambrosio Pardo meet time and again through a conversation in "The Cathedral", a bar in Lima, Peru. As they tell to each other their stories, they tell the story of Peru in those years. Zavalita is an upper-middle class journalist, the son of a politician, who resigns his social position for idealistic reasons. He is a loser because he refuses to fit in a world like that, where in order to succeed you have to be a part of corruption, pervertion, and immorality. He prefers to be marginalized and isolated. To tell a chaotic story, Vargas Llosa uses a complex style: jumps in time, different voices from separated times speaking simultaneously. But it is not a hard reading, once you get used to it. The author is superb at eliciting suspense, progressive revelations that give an additional clue into the whole picture. It is fascinating how he reproduces the way people talk in an informal conversation at a bar. Think about it and try to remember your conversations with friends, when sharing a complex story. If the style is great, the substance is chilling: it is a glimpse into the reality most of us refuse to acknowledge. Wherever you live, you will recognize people in almost every character. While MVLL is an excellent writer, this is definitely one of his best. It is certainly one of my favorite novels of all times, and I strongly recommend it.

This is a great novel. At the beginning I found it a little hard to follow the story but once I got used to the author's narrative style, I was spellbound.It is just amazing how much knowledge the author (in his early 30s when he wrote this novel) displays about Peruvian, and by extent Latin American, society and people's psychology, especially those in positions of power (since this is also a political novel).The narrative revolves around the story of Zabalita, a journalist from an upper middle class background. Zabalita is essentially a rebel and idealist who renounces fortune and fame out of both political/ideological convictions and parental resentments. His own personal family deceptions and disappointments are somehow projected onto the whole Peruvian society (it is hard to tell the author from his personage).As it turns out, Zabalita's misfortune is that the vices he resents in his family (his father is an important politician) are inextricably linked to those the author very ably depicts as taking place in Peruvian society as a whole. The author skillfully depicts this reality throughout the novel by showing us his other characters with all their vices; here we have the opportunistic, corrupt, deceitful and immoral politicians.Vargas Llosa greatly succeeds in narrating Zabalita's misfortune and gaining adepts in his readers (at least in my case) to Zabalita's cause. The climax of the novel comes towards the end of the book when Zabalita and the reader are revealed the darkest secrets of Zabalita's father. This is the climax towards which the novel inexorably unfolded starting with the initial conversations, between Zabalita and one of the main protagonists, in the bar "The Cathedral".What really makes this novel great is not only the substance of its subject matter but also, and perhaps most important, the way it is expounded. The author reveals his characters (their darkest secrets, their noblest actions and so on) in a very gradual way, eliciting in the reader suspense, and all kinds of emotions at every turn of a page. The way the author weaves his personages, treating one at a time and then relating them, with the way the story unravels makes it so hard to take a break from reading. This is as much a psychological novel as a social and a political critique, and a great one.

This is a bleak book - some readers may find it too negative and depressing. It is very intense, brilliantly designed, with a wonderfully complicated structure that slowly unravels into a quite awesome piece of fiction that deserves favourable comparisons with the greatest 19th century classics. If Flaubert had tried to combine Moby Dick and Crime and Punishment it might have been a bit like this - but not as good!