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Mario Vargas Llosa on writing, love, and dictatorships

Rome Jorge

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Mario Vargas Llosa on writing, love, and dictatorships

Romano Cortes Jorge

What does the 2010 Nobel Prize Winner in Literature have to say about Bob Dylan's victory?

Peruvian novelist Mario Vargas Llosa, 2010 Nobel laureate in Literature, spoke to local and foreign journalists, as well as fellow writers, at a press conference organized by Instituto Cervantes Manila at the Ayala Tower on Thursday, November 3.

The former journalist and one-time presidential candidate is in the country for several engagements, including a lecture at the University of Santo Tomas (UST) where he will receive an honorary professorship on November 7, and an event at the De La Salle University (DLSU) where he will be conferred an honorary doctorate on November 8. Llosa had his primary education at a La Salle school in Bolivia. 

Llosa is no stranger to Manila. His first Philippine visit was in 1978, to meet with Philippine members of the Poets, Essayists and Novelists (PEN) International, which he headed at the time. This was during Martial Law under the regime of Ferdinand Marcos. “It was a dictatorship,” he said of his first Philippine trip.
 
Photo by Rome Jorge/Rappler
A staunch liberal and critic of both communist and fascist dictatorships in Latin America, Llosa declined to comment on the controversial rule of President Rodrigo Duterte. But give him a few days and he might.
 

 

“Let me stay a few days and I will have an idea what’s going on. I think it would be arrogant to give a statement about is going on in Filipinas. Give me a few days to hear, and listen and read about it, and then I can give you a more documented opinion about Philippines,” he said.

 

 

 

Photo by Rome Jorge/Rappler

Writers vs tyrants

Llosa, who writes an opinion column for El Pais, the most widely-circulated newspaper in Spain, nonetheless noted that writers are the natural enemy of tyrants. 

“Dictators are right in being suspicious of this kind of activity, because I think this activity develops in societies a critical spirit about the world as it is. Why do you think that all dictatorships have tried to control literature? They have established systems of censorship.

“They have given special laws to put limits to the fantasy world that literature creates because they mistrust very much this activity that is producing stories to replace the real world with the fantasy world of literature.”

These insights resonated in the room packed with journalists from a country where national hero Jose Rizal helped spark a revolution for independence with his novels that mirrored real-life oppression. Llosa’s own novels, such as The Green House, expose military abuses, the rape culture, and corruption. 

He also spoke more about his latest work. “I am writing an essay about liberalism and culture – how liberalism has affected culture in a positive sense in the modern world.” His most recent work, “Cinco Esquinas (Five Corners)” published January this year, which explores the state of Peruvian journalism during the rule of President Alberto Fujimori, whom Llosa challenged as a candidate in the 1990 elections.

A victim of several badly-written opinion pieces wrongly attributed to him, he opined that anonymously-written content without attribution, mentorship, or accountability posted online has a negative effect on society.

 

 

 

 

A playwright as well as a novelist, Llosa confided that he did not wish his novels be turned into plays as they were expressly written for that medium. He noted that “novels without description are impossible” whereas plays are all about dialogue.

 
Privacy, Bob Dylan

 

 
Though known to be outspoken, the 80-year-old declined to reveal any details of his current romance with Filipino-Spanish socialite Isabel Preysler.

 

 

“Love is a fantastic experience, probably the richest that we have had, but it is private. When it becomes public, it impoverishes it. It becomes banal. Public expressions of love banalizes love. So I don’t want to banalize this fantastic, marvelous experience. For me, it is, and always will be, private,” he said.

 

 

 

The author has always been very private, never revealing why he got into a fist fight in Mexico City in 1976 with fellow Nobel prize winner for Literature Gabriel García Márquez. The Colombian author of Love in the Time of Cholera and many other international bestsellers, who got a black eye from Llosa, died in 2014.

 

He did respond, though, to questions about Bob Dylan’s recent Nobel Prize in Literature.

 

 

“I am an admirer of Bob Dylan as a singer. I like his songs very much. I don’t think he is a great writer. I think the Nobel in literature is for writers, not for singers,” Llosa said with a smile. – Rappler.com

 

 

 

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