A review by binstonbirchill
Conversation in the Cathedral by Mario Vargas Llosa
5.0
I came across this work when searching for books similar to A Brief History of Seven Killings. Conversation in the Cathedral is also a lengthy book dealing with weighty issues set in a historical context and written by a brilliant author.
Coming in with no familiarity with 1950s Peru wasn’t really a problem. There’s a lot of characters, endless government officials of varying importance, friends and family of our two interlocutors from the Cathedral (a bar) but even with all of that I never felt lost as to who characters were and where they stood (except when you’re supposed to unsure within the context of the story). Llosa does a great job of controlling the chaos, and he does create a lot of chaos with his stylistic choices.
Which brings me to why I loved this book and what sets it above a normal historical fiction novel. Throughout the book, most heavily in section one, we have multiple narratives and conversations taking place, often three or four, at the same time and with no delineation better them. Line by line and paragraph by paragraph we are constantly being swung back and forth between multiple scenes from the past taking place at different times while sometimes including the same characters, all the while our eponymous Conversation in the Cathedral is dripped in bit by bit. It’s brilliant and one of the most enjoyable and rewarding reading experiences I’ve had. Trying to hold three separate rapid fire conversations in your head is challenging but worth the effort.
The later 2/3 of the novel cuts back on the chaos of form but that’s when the historical events take over. There are great characters and through their eyes we get a very compelling picture of power and corruption in 1950s Peru. Highly recommend this if you’re up for a challenging informative read.
Coming in with no familiarity with 1950s Peru wasn’t really a problem. There’s a lot of characters, endless government officials of varying importance, friends and family of our two interlocutors from the Cathedral (a bar) but even with all of that I never felt lost as to who characters were and where they stood (except when you’re supposed to unsure within the context of the story). Llosa does a great job of controlling the chaos, and he does create a lot of chaos with his stylistic choices.
Which brings me to why I loved this book and what sets it above a normal historical fiction novel. Throughout the book, most heavily in section one, we have multiple narratives and conversations taking place, often three or four, at the same time and with no delineation better them. Line by line and paragraph by paragraph we are constantly being swung back and forth between multiple scenes from the past taking place at different times while sometimes including the same characters, all the while our eponymous Conversation in the Cathedral is dripped in bit by bit. It’s brilliant and one of the most enjoyable and rewarding reading experiences I’ve had. Trying to hold three separate rapid fire conversations in your head is challenging but worth the effort.
The later 2/3 of the novel cuts back on the chaos of form but that’s when the historical events take over. There are great characters and through their eyes we get a very compelling picture of power and corruption in 1950s Peru. Highly recommend this if you’re up for a challenging informative read.