Review Of "The Storyteller" By M. Vargas Llosa, Translated By H. Lane

Document Type

Book Review

Publication Date

4-1-1990

Published In

Choice

Abstract

Those who have read The Green House (CH, Jul'69) will immediately recognize the principal setting portrayed in The Storyteller. This latest novel is told on two levels. The first is narrated by a Peruvian, presumably Vargas Llosa, who, while in a small Florentine gallery, discovers an exhibition of photographs of the Amazon region. In one of these a storyteller is seen seated in the midst of a group of Machiguenga Indians, a tribe who until very recently had been completely isolated from the outside world. The narrator is struck by the storyteller's appearance, and he realizes that the light-skinned man in the photo, whose face seems clouded by a large shadow, resembles an old university companion, Saul Zaratas. On a second level we hear the Machiguenga storyteller weave his magic as he mesmerizes his audience with tales of the Creation, the history of the tribe, and the intimate and delicate relationship between humankind and Nature. Given the ongoing controversy over the development of the Amazon region, this is a timely novel whose fictional world will fascinate its reader. But it is, at the same time, a work on the nature of storytelling and the reception of the text, which current literary theorists will no doubt find intriguing. An excellent translation from the original Spanish by Helen Lane. For college, university, and public libraries.

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