The Storyteller

Over the break, I read Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter by Mario Vargas Llosa.  This is the seventh novel by Llosa I have read—and I already own an eighth novel by him which I assume I will read sometime.  I have also read a collection of his non-fiction work.  I am thus reasonably certain that I enjoy reading Llosa.  (Well, it’s either a) I enjoy reading his work or b) I am supremely masochistic when it comes to reading.  I am reasonably confident that it is the former, but would entertain arguments that the latter is more accurate.)  So, having now finished eight books by Llosa, it seems reasonable that I would be able to answer a rather simple question:  What makes Llosa (a Nobel Laureate, no less) someone whose work is a pleasure to read?

And now the problem for the day.  I have no idea why I like Llosa.  None.  I have read eight books he wrote, but to the best of my recollection, I have never once recommended his work to anyone.  Part of the reason that I have never recommended him is that I would have a very hard time picking which book of his to recommend.  I’ve liked every one of them enough to think I should read another book.  Yet, they all have this quality about them, this undefined quality, which makes me think, “Well, I liked that book, but I am not really sure who else would like that book.” 

Consider the novel I just finished.  Young Peruvian author—who currently writes news blurbs, but wants to write novels—hooks up with his older, divorced, Bolivian Aunt.  (Don’t worry too much: there is no blood relation between the Young Peruvian and the Aunt.)  Meanwhile, the young Peruvian novelist regularly interacts with a scriptwriter for radio serials.  The Aunt and the Scriptwriter meet once, but otherwise the stories do not overlap.  Every other chapter in the novel is a short story which is the storyline from one of the radio serials written by the scriptwriter.  The main story meanders along in the odd numbered chapters.  Eventually young Peruvian and Aunt get married much to the distaste of the larger family.  The scriptwriter goes insane.  In the epilogue, we find out the marriage does not last.  End of story.

Now, I have a hard time imagining that anyone read the preceding paragraph and thought, “That is a book I simply must read.”  So, is it the prose style which makes the book sing?  It can’t be—the book was written in Spanish, so this is a translation, and his novels, all of which I have enjoyed, have different translators.

So, it must be something about the way the stories are told which makes him so compelling.  And that is what puzzles me—after seven novels, it seems like I should have some ability to describe what it is that makes Llosa novel so good, and yet I cannot.  It also seems like after seven novels, I should be able to tell someone, “you really ought to read book X.  It’s really good—I think you’ll like it.”  Not that I should be able to tell everyone that—but I should be able to tell someone that, right?

At this point, my inclination is to conclude with a recommendation that you, The Reader, should read Book X.  But then I think about the novels I have read, and I cannot figure out which title to substitute for X. 

After a lengthy pause, staring out my window, I arrived at the following, thoroughly unsatisfying conclusion the present post:

Dear Reader, Mario Vargas Llosa is a Nobel-prize Winning Peruvian novelist.  I have enjoyed every novel of his I have read.  You should try reading him.  A good place to start is (select one) [Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter, Death in the Andes, The Notebooks of Don Rigoberto, In Praise of the Stepmother, The Storyteller, The War of the End of the World, Who Killed Palomino Molero?]

And right after finishing that conclusion I realized, that all books are not equal.  So, really, start with The Storyteller if you like the idea of reading Peruvian short stories; The War of the End of the World if you like long Victorian British novels; In Praise of the Stepmother followed by The Notebooks of Don Rigoberto (the latter is the sequel to the former, though I stumbled upon the latter before I realized it was the second in the series) if you like erotica; Death in the Andes if you like vaguely disturbing endings; or Aunt Julia if you like clever short stories which feel like they just continue after the story is done.

Next up on my Llosa reading list, by the way:  The Feast of the Goat.