Vargas Llosa, Mario. The Feast of the Goat.

The novel was written by Nobel Prize winner Mario Vargas Llosa and published in Spanish as La fiesta del chivo in the year 2000. It is a historical novel situated in the Dominican Republic and follows three storylines that differ in timeframe but are connected through the topic of the military dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo, who was in power from 1930 until his assassination in 1961. Two of those storylines are close in time, since one follows Trujillo up until his assassination, while another follows those who kidnapped and murdered him shortly before and after doing so. The third thread follows Urania Cabral, who after many years of living abroad returns to the country and visits her dying father, who once was a close collaborator of Trujillo and president of the Dominican Senate. Through the constant intermingling of these narrative threads the reader will find out that the kidnappers were once firm supporters of the Generalissimo, but eventually decided to eliminate him thinking it best for their country. The climax of the novel arrives with the assassination and the discovery of the fact that Urania left the country because she was given by her father to Trujillo to sexually abuse.

The novel inserts itself in the “dictator novel” genre characteristic of Latin American Literature in the 20th century, and Vargas Llosa himself was one of the most representative writers of the literary phenomenon called the Latin American Boom, the very creative and productive period of the 60’s and 70’s. It is written in the author’s most characteristic style, which is that of the “communicating vessels”. This technique allows different narrative threads to mix, overlap and even modify each other to generate more and deeper meaning. As for content, it is a clear example of the power behind authoritarian personalities, in this case enhanced by the pervasive macho culture typical of the Latin American military scene. It also allows a discussion on the morality behind different levels of collaboration in political violence; the spectrum between perpetrators, victims, bystanders and resistance; sexual assault and gender politics; and the complex relation between memory, pain and forgiveness.

Author of this entry: Claudia Vasquez-Caicedo Rainero

Vargas Llosa, Mario. 2000. La Fiesta Del Chivo. Madrid: Alfaguara.

Vargas Llosa, Mario. 2002. The Feast of the Goat. London: Faber and Faber.