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cronosmu's review against another edition
4.0
Historia de Mayta es un libro donde la ficción se imagina a sí misma. Un escritor, el mismo Vargas Llosa, busca escribir una novela acerca de un personaje que en los años cincuenta protagonizó una insurrección fallida, al borde del ridículo, que buscaba implantar el comunismo en el Perú. Ya en los años ochenta, durante el apogeo del terrorismo de Sendero Luminoso, el escritor se enfrasca en la tarea de narrar esta historia y para eso rastrea a los personajes que conocieron a Alejandro Mayta. Al mismo tiempo se va elaborando, en un plano narrativo paralelo, no la historia definitiva de este hombre y su aventura, sino la posible, y esto es así porque si los testimonios no son fiables, si la memoria es un engaño, entonces la ficción se vuelve el único medio para construir un relato verosímil, que bien puede o no ser del todo fiel a lo sucedido. Lo brillante de la novela es que es en sí misma un juego. Uno como lector puede estar siendo engañado por los dos Varguitas, el escritor y el personaje. ¿Existió Mayta? Y si existió ¿hasta qué punto coincide su vida auténtica con el retrato que el escritor hace de él? Lo mejor, sin duda, es ese último capítulo que, sin exagerar, se puede decir que es magistral.
Aunque no está entre sus novelas más trepidantes, se trata, a mi modo de ver, de una de sus obras más injustamente olvidadas. Sería una pena que todo buen lector de Vargas Llosa (y por añadidura, cualquiera que esté interesado en el tema de cómo se construye una novela) se pierda de este libro.
Aunque no está entre sus novelas más trepidantes, se trata, a mi modo de ver, de una de sus obras más injustamente olvidadas. Sería una pena que todo buen lector de Vargas Llosa (y por añadidura, cualquiera que esté interesado en el tema de cómo se construye una novela) se pierda de este libro.
owl_the_bookworm's review against another edition
dark
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
gef's review against another edition
3.0
As Vargas Llosa tells it in La historia secreta de una novela (1983 ed. Barcelona: Tasquets, 1971), La casa verde resulted from his attempts to weld together two unrelated novels that he was trying to write on alternate days. La tía Julia y el escribidor and Historia de Mayta must have similarly disconnected origins. The first is a joining of the story of Varguitas' romance of his tía Julia, to a story about somebody MVLL knew, possibly in the same period, el escribidor ("the scribbler") of radionovelas. As I recall, neither is essential to the other, & the only connection is that the same young man, Varguitas, is a protagonist in one and an observer in the other.
Mayta is even curiouser in its structure. The author (MVLL's narrators are almost always transparent versions of himself) seems to have conducted a real investigation into the history of a real revolutionary of the late 1950s. He presents his speculative findings (because the research in newpaper archives and interviews of survivors and witnesses leaves many questions still in dispute) through a multilayered veil of fiction. But even the first layer is not completely coherent. He presents himself as a novelist who wants to write a fictitious account of real events, and yet needs to know as exactly as possible what those real events were, as a way, he says - I don't remember the phrases, because he offers this explanation several times to doubting interview prospects - to know how much he is lying. O.k., that may be questionable strategy, but not implausible. But then he presents himself as a former schoolmate of Mayta, and therefore of the same age. This age is never stated more precisely than "cuarentón" at the time of the crucial events, which must be 1958 - Fidel Castro is still in the mountains, shortly before entering Havana. The narrator's quest takes place "now," which seems to be 1983 -- the book came out in 1984 - by which time, to follow the logic of the first premise, both he and Mayta would have to be at least 66. However, the conversations & reflections of the narrator, & his relationship to the people he interviews, seem to be those of a man no older than the real Vargas Llosa, born 1936. How do I know? Well, he doesn't seem to have any personal memories of Perú prior to the events of 1958 - his description of school days with Mayta are generic, could be from any period - nor any acquaintance with any of his interviewees or their contexts that goes back even to that time. A second & more glaring inconsistency is the age of Mayta's tía, 70 when the narrator interviews her. That is, she is barely, if at all, older than Mayta himself, but is supposed to have reared him.
Then there is the author's strange decision to locate the events of 1983 in a fantastically apocalytic Perú, which has been invaded, most implausibly, by a combined Cuban and Bolivian revolutionary force and is then also invaded by U.S. Marines to combat the first invaders, leaving the Peruvian armed forces on the margin and causing great destruction from terrorist attacks and air-raids. Enough social violence was already occurring in Perú in 1983 to make this whole scene completely unnecessary, as well as ridiculously implausible. Worse, it is not fully imagined. We never meet or even see one of those "Marines" (everybody uses the English word) or terrucos, nor is there any attempt to explain how the Cuban-Bolivian revolutionary army could have been formed or how they can defend their bases in Bolivia from air or other attacks - it would be possible to make such a case, I suppose, but what would be the point?
In the course of the novel, MVL slides from one p.o.v. to another, beginning a sentence in the 3rd person, about Mayta, and ending in the 1st, as Mayta, or sometimes in the 1st as himself. The maneuver is tricky but generally successful, but there are places where it didn't make sense. I don't remember just what it was, but I think there are places where Mayta as "I" is saying things that the character could not possibly know.
Then at the end, MVL undoes his whole fiction, by claiming to have met the real prototype, who is now an ex-con and an employee in an ice cream parlor. He confesses to having invented the Perú apocalíptico for no good reason he can explain, and also to have invented - both to strengthen his fictional Mayta's motivations and to explain how he became alienated from his political party on the eve of the revolutionary action - Mayta's homosexuality. This is a very important theme in the development of the character of the fictional Mayta. However, it turns out to be not the case at all of the "real" Mayta, the one he claims to have found and interviewed after writing his whole novel. This "real" Mayta is perhaps more interesting than the fictional one, & although he claims not to be prejudiced, is surprised and a little disgusted by the attribution of homosexuality. He's married with several kids, and knows homosexuals chiefly from having seen them depraved and exploited in Lurigancho prison.
It's about fragmentation, about pulling many different threads and styles and premises together into one work and achieving coherence. Vargas Llosa, for all his brilliance, does not always pull it off. I was moved and amazed by Historia de Mayta, but also disappointed in it as an aesthetic construct. Come to think of it, La ciudad y los perros is also two stories attached to but not integrated into one another. Pantaleón y las visitadoras is the only one of his novels I can think of right now that is fully integrated and coherent, in the same way as GGM's Crónica de una muerte anunciada.
In MVLL, I admire the technical virtuosity, in swift shifts of p.o.v., pacing of actions, and the pitiless descriptions, like lingering close-ups of garbage, or broken lives, or ruined apartments, etc. In Gabriel García Márquez I admire enormously the aesthetic integration he usually manages to achieve, starting from ideas and perceptions just as diverse as MVLL's.
Mayta is even curiouser in its structure. The author (MVLL's narrators are almost always transparent versions of himself) seems to have conducted a real investigation into the history of a real revolutionary of the late 1950s. He presents his speculative findings (because the research in newpaper archives and interviews of survivors and witnesses leaves many questions still in dispute) through a multilayered veil of fiction. But even the first layer is not completely coherent. He presents himself as a novelist who wants to write a fictitious account of real events, and yet needs to know as exactly as possible what those real events were, as a way, he says - I don't remember the phrases, because he offers this explanation several times to doubting interview prospects - to know how much he is lying. O.k., that may be questionable strategy, but not implausible. But then he presents himself as a former schoolmate of Mayta, and therefore of the same age. This age is never stated more precisely than "cuarentón" at the time of the crucial events, which must be 1958 - Fidel Castro is still in the mountains, shortly before entering Havana. The narrator's quest takes place "now," which seems to be 1983 -- the book came out in 1984 - by which time, to follow the logic of the first premise, both he and Mayta would have to be at least 66. However, the conversations & reflections of the narrator, & his relationship to the people he interviews, seem to be those of a man no older than the real Vargas Llosa, born 1936. How do I know? Well, he doesn't seem to have any personal memories of Perú prior to the events of 1958 - his description of school days with Mayta are generic, could be from any period - nor any acquaintance with any of his interviewees or their contexts that goes back even to that time. A second & more glaring inconsistency is the age of Mayta's tía, 70 when the narrator interviews her. That is, she is barely, if at all, older than Mayta himself, but is supposed to have reared him.
Then there is the author's strange decision to locate the events of 1983 in a fantastically apocalytic Perú, which has been invaded, most implausibly, by a combined Cuban and Bolivian revolutionary force and is then also invaded by U.S. Marines to combat the first invaders, leaving the Peruvian armed forces on the margin and causing great destruction from terrorist attacks and air-raids. Enough social violence was already occurring in Perú in 1983 to make this whole scene completely unnecessary, as well as ridiculously implausible. Worse, it is not fully imagined. We never meet or even see one of those "Marines" (everybody uses the English word) or terrucos, nor is there any attempt to explain how the Cuban-Bolivian revolutionary army could have been formed or how they can defend their bases in Bolivia from air or other attacks - it would be possible to make such a case, I suppose, but what would be the point?
In the course of the novel, MVL slides from one p.o.v. to another, beginning a sentence in the 3rd person, about Mayta, and ending in the 1st, as Mayta, or sometimes in the 1st as himself. The maneuver is tricky but generally successful, but there are places where it didn't make sense. I don't remember just what it was, but I think there are places where Mayta as "I" is saying things that the character could not possibly know.
Then at the end, MVL undoes his whole fiction, by claiming to have met the real prototype, who is now an ex-con and an employee in an ice cream parlor. He confesses to having invented the Perú apocalíptico for no good reason he can explain, and also to have invented - both to strengthen his fictional Mayta's motivations and to explain how he became alienated from his political party on the eve of the revolutionary action - Mayta's homosexuality. This is a very important theme in the development of the character of the fictional Mayta. However, it turns out to be not the case at all of the "real" Mayta, the one he claims to have found and interviewed after writing his whole novel. This "real" Mayta is perhaps more interesting than the fictional one, & although he claims not to be prejudiced, is surprised and a little disgusted by the attribution of homosexuality. He's married with several kids, and knows homosexuals chiefly from having seen them depraved and exploited in Lurigancho prison.
It's about fragmentation, about pulling many different threads and styles and premises together into one work and achieving coherence. Vargas Llosa, for all his brilliance, does not always pull it off. I was moved and amazed by Historia de Mayta, but also disappointed in it as an aesthetic construct. Come to think of it, La ciudad y los perros is also two stories attached to but not integrated into one another. Pantaleón y las visitadoras is the only one of his novels I can think of right now that is fully integrated and coherent, in the same way as GGM's Crónica de una muerte anunciada.
In MVLL, I admire the technical virtuosity, in swift shifts of p.o.v., pacing of actions, and the pitiless descriptions, like lingering close-ups of garbage, or broken lives, or ruined apartments, etc. In Gabriel García Márquez I admire enormously the aesthetic integration he usually manages to achieve, starting from ideas and perceptions just as diverse as MVLL's.
epictetsocrate's review against another edition
3.0
ALERGATUL dis-de-dimineaţă pe Malecón de Barranco, atunci când umezeala nopţii îmbibă încă aerul, şi face ca străzile să fie lunecoase şi lucii, este un fel potrivit de a-ţi începe ziua. Cerul e sur, chiar şi în toiul verii, fiindcă soarele nu se iveşte niciodată deasupra cartierului înainte de ora zece, şi ceaţa estompează marginea lucrurilor, silueta pescăruşilor, conturul pelicanului ce taie în zbor linia frântă a falezei. Marea – aşa îi spunem noi Pacificului – îţi apare plumburie, verde-închis, fumegândă, nărăvaşă, cu pete de spumă şi cu valuri ce înaintează ritmic spre mal, păstrând mereu aceeaşi distanţă între ele. Uneori, o bărcuţă de pescari se leagănă săltată de unde; alteori, o răbufnire de vânt goneşte norii şi dezvăluie hăt-departe La Punta şi insulele pământii San Lorenzo şi El Frontón. Este un peisaj frumos, cu condiţia să-ţi aţinteşti privirea la elemente şi la păsări. Fiindcă tot ce a făcut omul, în schimb, e urât.
pollo's review
4.0
No entiendo como no se habla más de este novelón, una especie de Conversación en La Catedral en versión reducida, pero que incluye una ucronía (de lo que hubiera pasado en el Perú si el conflicto armado interno tomaba rumbos más graves) y además la propia historia de la elaboración de la libro (con Vargas Llosa como personaje en busca de testimonios).
Con la clásica técnica vargasllosiana de combinar diálogos de distintos tiempos (La casa verde) y mezclar primera a tercera persona en una misma frase (Los cachorros), acercándonos y alejándonos del protagonista (aunque de una forma menos efectiva que con Pichulita Cuellar), en diez capítulos vamos descifrando, a través de un largo conjunto de conversaciones (como en la larga plática entre Zavalita y Ambrosio), la evolución política y personal de Alejandro Mayta, y su frustración, como la de todos los personajes, en los que ninguno es feliz y nos acerca a la resignación y a la imposibilidad del cambio o de descubrir la verdad de sus primeras novelas como La ciudad y los perros.
Todo teniendo como marco la triste y violenta situación de nuestro país, que, como Barranco, parece un círculo sin fin entre la belleza del malecón y la sordidez de los basurales.
Con la clásica técnica vargasllosiana de combinar diálogos de distintos tiempos (La casa verde) y mezclar primera a tercera persona en una misma frase (Los cachorros), acercándonos y alejándonos del protagonista (aunque de una forma menos efectiva que con Pichulita Cuellar), en diez capítulos vamos descifrando, a través de un largo conjunto de conversaciones (como en la larga plática entre Zavalita y Ambrosio), la evolución política y personal de Alejandro Mayta, y su frustración, como la de todos los personajes, en los que ninguno es feliz y nos acerca a la resignación y a la imposibilidad del cambio o de descubrir la verdad de sus primeras novelas como La ciudad y los perros.
Todo teniendo como marco la triste y violenta situación de nuestro país, que, como Barranco, parece un círculo sin fin entre la belleza del malecón y la sordidez de los basurales.
caterinaanna's review against another edition
4.0
Several members of the library reading group found [b:The Falls|37781|Things Fall Apart|Chinua Achebe|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1352082529s/37781.jpg|825843] confusing because of the time shifts: goodness knows what they would have made of this one which moves voice, place and time within a single paragraph - sometimes, I suspect, within a single sentence!
Mayta is a failed revolutionary who we, and the sometime narrator, get to know through interviews with people who knew him. Of course all of these people have seen a different side of Alejandro, all have a particular perspective on the events of the past, and all have their own agenda in talking to the author. While the author reflects on this, he presents his view of events as a narrative interwoven with the interviews. Trusting this is one way to read the novel; assuming it is merely a single, and possibly unreliable, synthesis is another. Some people have said there is a twist at the end, in the final interview with Mayta himself, however I thought the revelations of this section were consistent with the man I'd pieced together - someone whose willinggness to trust others, even while doubting them, led to his downfall.
Mayta is a failed revolutionary who we, and the sometime narrator, get to know through interviews with people who knew him. Of course all of these people have seen a different side of Alejandro, all have a particular perspective on the events of the past, and all have their own agenda in talking to the author. While the author reflects on this, he presents his view of events as a narrative interwoven with the interviews. Trusting this is one way to read the novel; assuming it is merely a single, and possibly unreliable, synthesis is another. Some people have said there is a twist at the end, in the final interview with Mayta himself, however I thought the revelations of this section were consistent with the man I'd pieced together - someone whose willinggness to trust others, even while doubting them, led to his downfall.
zober's review against another edition
3.0
The writing and chronological setup of the book was very cool. However, there were about 100 pages that seemed superfluous in the middle of the book - or at the very least, they could have been condensed.