Closely associated with the Latin American Boom, Mario Vargas
Llosa passed away at 89. The then young Latin American associated with the Boom
generation in the early 1960s and 70s had his entire literary career scripted
in controversy. A native of Peru stands no less in repute when compared to his
contemporaries of the Boom generation: Julio Cortazar of Argentina, Carlos Fuentes
of Mexico and Gabriel Garcia Marquez of Colombia. The judges of the Nobel Prize
committee called him a ‘divinely gifted storyteller.’ The versatile writer won
the Nobel Prize in the year 2010. Earlier, the movement and later the global recognition
with the Nobel raised him into a towering figure and turned Latin America into a
rich continent.
Born in Arequipa, Southern Peru, in 1936, Llosa witnessed his
parents’ separation in infancy. Moved to Bolivia to his great grandparents,
Llosa returned to Peru at 10 and wrote his first play, ‘The Escape of the Inca’.
Graduating from the University of San Marcos, he later studied in Spain, finally
settling in Paris. ‘The Time of the Hero’, written in 1962, is a tale of
corruption and abuse at a military school in Peru. His second novel, ‘The Green
House’ (1966) set in Peru is yet another indictment on military working in
collusion with the missionary and pimps around some brothel. The next two
novels characteristic of the political turmoil founded the Latin American Boom Movement
in the 1960s and 1970s. Llosa was friends with the leading Colombian author Gabriel
Garcia Marquez, known for his magic realism. The two later underwent a spat
that nearly lasted a decade owing to the difference of opinion shared on Cuban
communist leader, Fidel Castro. A few years following the reconciliation, Vargas
Llosa was nominated for the Nobel Prize in the year 2010.
Llosa’s work is inseparable from the insatiability in the various parts of the region. ‘Conversations in the Cathedral’ (1969) exposes dictatorship under Manuel Odria. He supported Fidel Castro but later felt discouraged from pursuing his ideals. ‘Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter’ have been adapted into a film, ‘Tune in Tomorrow’. Continuing to attract criticism for his remarks on feminism, the killing of journalists and other pertinent issues, he failed to empathise with the victims. He died in Lima, and with him, a star was gone.