Hello world!
The big news of the week is the announcement of the Nobel Prize in Literature. And the award goes to… Mario Vargas Llosa, the acclaimed Peruvian author and political figure, for mapping the “structures of power and (for) his trenchant images of the individual’s resistance, revolt and defeat.” That’s a mouthful! In more simple terms, his books are poignant and masterful, and what better way to ensure that people read them than give him one of the most prestigious award possible.
Vargas Llosa is the first South American writer to win the award since Gabriel Garcia Marquez in 1982. The two are apparently forever linked. They are former friends with closely related careers (Vargas Llosa even wrote a book about his friend titled García Márquez: Story of a Deicide), but reportedly had a feud that resulted in Vargas Llosa punching Garcia Marquez in the face and giving him a black eye. Even prolific authors as genius as these men can act like children sometimes! A comforting thought. But Garcia Marquez recently tweeted “cuentas iguales,” which is a poetic way of saying “now we’re even.” Perhaps the award has put them back on even terms…
Enough of the gossip and back to the real purpose of this post- Vargas Llosa has written over 30 novels, plays and essays. If you want to read one of Vargas Llosa’s masterpieces but only have time for one, I would recommend The Green House. The novel is about a brothel called “The Green House” and how it affects all the lives it touches in multiple times and places. It is a complex read, with multiple story lines going on at once, many characters, and a narrative without paragraph breaks. It is not told chronologically, so complete focus is necessary, but it serves to emphasize how brutality and corruption is continuous.
If that’s a little too dark, Vargas Llosa also tried his hand at humor and satire with novels like Captain Pantoja and the Special Service and Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter. I would recommend Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter, which is partly based on Vargas Llosa’s relationship with his first wife. It is about Mario, an aspiring writer, who works at a radio station that broadcasts multiple radio soap operas every day, and his affair with “Aunt Julia,” a 32-year-old divorcee.
Some additional notable works of his include, The War of the End of the World, The Real Life of Alejandro Mayta, and A Fish in the Water. These are just a few out of many.
So now Vargas Llosa has joined the ranks of other Nobel Laureates like Harold Pinter, Samuel Beckett, John Steinbeck, Albert Camus, Ernest Hemingway, and many others. So much to read, so little time. In fact, Beaufort Books has teamed with Moyer Bell to publish new editions of our very own Nobel Laureate, Pearl S. Buck. So get reading!
That’s all for now!