what is Peruvian literature?
Peru is a country with a great pre-colonial history, that of the Incan Empire. As it is generally admitted, the poetry of the central-Andean region, predominantly oral but partially transmitted through quipu, consists of two main genres: harawis (lyrical) and hayllis (epic), recited by bards known as harawec. The elements of the Andean pre-colonial culture were transmitted by early colonial chronicles of indigenous origin, such as Inca Garcilaso who explored and transmitted Inca poetry, while the Quechua nobleman Guamán Poma de Ayala transcribed the indigenous mythology.
The history of the Spanish conquest, culminating in 1532 with the capture of Atahualpa, is well-known due to early chronics. One of them, Verdadera relación de la conquista del Perú y provincia del Cuzco llamada la Nueva Castilla (The True Narrative of the Conquest of Peru and of Cuzco Province, Otherwise Known as New Castile), in 1534, was written Pizarro's secretary, Francisco Xerez. What is significant, there was also a number of indigenous and mestizo chroniclers of Peru, such as such as Titu Cusi Yupanqui, related to Incan royal family. In 1570, he wrote wrote Relación de cómo los españoles entraron en Pirú y el subceso que tuvo Mango Inca en el tiempo en que entre ellos vivió (The Narrative of How the Spaniards Entered Piru and Mango Inca's Experiences while Living Among Them). Another example, in 1613, is Juan de Santa Cruz Pachacuti Yamqui Salcamaygua's Relación de antiguedades deste reyno del Piru (Narrative of the Antiquity of this Kingdom of Piru).
European literary models were exploited by the Academia Antártica, a Neoclassicist literary group active in Lima at the brink of the 16th and 17th century. The 19th century brought the influence of Romanticism and Costumbrismo.
The history of the Spanish conquest, culminating in 1532 with the capture of Atahualpa, is well-known due to early chronics. One of them, Verdadera relación de la conquista del Perú y provincia del Cuzco llamada la Nueva Castilla (The True Narrative of the Conquest of Peru and of Cuzco Province, Otherwise Known as New Castile), in 1534, was written Pizarro's secretary, Francisco Xerez. What is significant, there was also a number of indigenous and mestizo chroniclers of Peru, such as such as Titu Cusi Yupanqui, related to Incan royal family. In 1570, he wrote wrote Relación de cómo los españoles entraron en Pirú y el subceso que tuvo Mango Inca en el tiempo en que entre ellos vivió (The Narrative of How the Spaniards Entered Piru and Mango Inca's Experiences while Living Among Them). Another example, in 1613, is Juan de Santa Cruz Pachacuti Yamqui Salcamaygua's Relación de antiguedades deste reyno del Piru (Narrative of the Antiquity of this Kingdom of Piru).
European literary models were exploited by the Academia Antártica, a Neoclassicist literary group active in Lima at the brink of the 16th and 17th century. The 19th century brought the influence of Romanticism and Costumbrismo.
I have readMario Vargas Llosa, Historia de Mayta (1984)
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I have written... nothing ...
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in search of man
(garbage & landscape)
Historia de Mayta is one of those books I had at home for a very long time. Latin-American literature was fashionable in Poland early after the fall of the Wall of Berlin; it was one of our earliest discoveries. That such people as Mayta were Trotskyists did not mean much for us; I ignored the precise meaning of the term. When I read this novel for the first time, I imagined the text was old, even if the Polish translation was, by our standards, almost immediate. Maybe because the book spoke of distant events, a failed revolution attempt that dated back to 1958. I just felt the time lapse, built up by the writer in such a compelling way.
Yeah, everything was odd and abstract: Latin America, Trotskyism, even being a homosexual. All those things laid below our horizon; I might eventually understand how and why they went to school to the Salesians'. I also went to the Salesians' as a child, even if it was only for the catechesis before my First Communion.
So I might search for Mayta just as the hero of this novel did, trying to speak to people, trying to break into secrets, trying to make connections. A revolution. Somewhere, in the mountains of an unknown continent, among Indians. What on earth could it mean to be an Indian? And why this novel, today, still brings to my mind such a pervading sensation of strangeness, of something I cannot fathom, something I cannot comprehend? Parts without a whole, a puzzle without the guiding image. Poverty, but strangely not alike our own. Poverty of an exotic kind.
The novel's protagonist finds his man. Mayta is at the end of everything: failed revolutions, expropriations, prison in which his own companions put him to get rid of him. Dreaming only about going abroad, vaguely. Because he understood that Peru cannot be changed. It just stands there, like that village built by Mayta's and other prisoners' wives, in the proximity of the prison of Lurigancho; even when they get out of it, they remain nearby. Just like Mayta, I dream vaguely about going abroad, starting from scratch; a second life. If I ever get out, will I remain nearby? Just like Peru, Poland sinks in garbage.
***
The years passed by. I check on the Global Democracy chart published by The Economist. Peru: flawed democracy. Rank: 57. Score: 6,53. Poland: flawed democracy. Rank: 50. Score: 6,85. In February, when the results for 2021 get out, Mayta's country may be above us.
Mario Vargas Llosa, Historia de Mayta (1984). Read in a Polish translation: Historia Alejandra Mayty, without the name of the translator, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Tenten, 1991.
Kraków, 8.11.2021.
Yeah, everything was odd and abstract: Latin America, Trotskyism, even being a homosexual. All those things laid below our horizon; I might eventually understand how and why they went to school to the Salesians'. I also went to the Salesians' as a child, even if it was only for the catechesis before my First Communion.
So I might search for Mayta just as the hero of this novel did, trying to speak to people, trying to break into secrets, trying to make connections. A revolution. Somewhere, in the mountains of an unknown continent, among Indians. What on earth could it mean to be an Indian? And why this novel, today, still brings to my mind such a pervading sensation of strangeness, of something I cannot fathom, something I cannot comprehend? Parts without a whole, a puzzle without the guiding image. Poverty, but strangely not alike our own. Poverty of an exotic kind.
The novel's protagonist finds his man. Mayta is at the end of everything: failed revolutions, expropriations, prison in which his own companions put him to get rid of him. Dreaming only about going abroad, vaguely. Because he understood that Peru cannot be changed. It just stands there, like that village built by Mayta's and other prisoners' wives, in the proximity of the prison of Lurigancho; even when they get out of it, they remain nearby. Just like Mayta, I dream vaguely about going abroad, starting from scratch; a second life. If I ever get out, will I remain nearby? Just like Peru, Poland sinks in garbage.
***
The years passed by. I check on the Global Democracy chart published by The Economist. Peru: flawed democracy. Rank: 57. Score: 6,53. Poland: flawed democracy. Rank: 50. Score: 6,85. In February, when the results for 2021 get out, Mayta's country may be above us.
Mario Vargas Llosa, Historia de Mayta (1984). Read in a Polish translation: Historia Alejandra Mayty, without the name of the translator, Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Tenten, 1991.
Kraków, 8.11.2021.
