The War of the End of the World

Rating:
Summary: The best of Vargas Llosa
Review: And that is saying a lot. The most gripping epic that I have ever read (in the Spanish original).

Rating:
Summary: Fanaticism and Obsessions
Review: During the 1964 presidential campaign, Barry Goldwater was branded a fanatic. In defense of the term Goldwater said something like: "Fanaticism in the defense of freedom is a virtue. The soldier who gives his life to protect our freedom is a fanatic." I remained comfortable with this until I read War at The End of The World.

Vargas Llosa's historical novel is a study on fanaticism and obsessions: religious and patriotic fanaticism, fanatical idealism and obsessions of power, material possession, and sexual pleasure. Every chapter has samplings of these destructive forces, which succumb to villainous misfortune even when the intent is righteous and honorable. Llosa does a superb job in creating multi-dimensional characters who are driven and eventually destroyed by that inner force which decries moderation. It's frightening that we can see all these forms of fanaticism and obsessive behavior all around us in today's world.

This novel of epic proportion utilizes events as a backdrop for the players. There's excessive violence which is described in profanely graphic detail. But, I can't recall any novel where all the characters are exposed in such intimate detail. Every quirk, vice, virture; every musing, distraction, and feeling are revealed. Vargas Llosa leaves no thought unexplored or unchallanged. The one exception is the central character, the Counselor, who remains an enigma throughout the book.

I strongly doubt if anything was lost in translation. The translator, Helen Lane, kept the writing fluid and very much alive.

Rating:
Summary: Fanaticism and Obsessions
Review: During the 1964 presidential campaign, Barry Goldwater was branded a fanatic. In defense of the term Goldwater said something like: "Fanaticism in the defense of freedom is a virtue. The soldier who gives his life to protect our freedom is a fanatic." I remained comfortable with this until I read War at The End of The World.

Vargas Llosa's historical novel is a study on fanaticism and obsessions: religious and patriotic fanaticism, fanatical idealism and obsessions of power, material possession, and sexual pleasure. Every chapter has samplings of these destructive forces, which succumb to villainous misfortune even when the intent is righteous and honorable. Llosa does a superb job in creating multi-dimensional characters who are driven and eventually destroyed by that inner force which decries moderation. It's frightening that we can see all these forms of fanaticism and obsessive behavior all around us in today's world.

This novel of epic proportion utilizes events as a backdrop for the players. There's excessive violence which is described in profanely graphic detail. But, I can't recall any novel where all the characters are exposed in such intimate detail. Every quirk, vice, virture; every musing, distraction, and feeling are revealed. Vargas Llosa leaves no thought unexplored or unchallanged. The one exception is the central character, the Counselor, who remains an enigma throughout the book.

I strongly doubt if anything was lost in translation. The translator, Helen Lane, kept the writing fluid and very much alive.

Rating:
Summary: 3 Stars
Review: Esta es una historia de amor en que el personaje principal, al no verse correspondido se la pasa por más de cincuenta años esperando a que Fermina por fin le preste atención. Es una lástima que su durante todos esos años Florentino no vive ni disfruta su vida, sino que se convierte en una sombra a la espera de que su amor por fin se digne en notar su existencia. Por otro lado, el autor nos describe una sociedad llena de perjuicios en los cuales las mujeres tenían que casarse jóvenes y obviamente vírgenes para que su reputación no se viera mancillada. No es para nada la mejor novela de GGM. No está de más leerla, pero no despertó en mi ninguna emoción...

Rating:
Summary: A great book about tragic events.
Review: First I must say I disagree with the synopsis of this book in the Amazon site. Canudos is never described as a libertarian's paradise, except in the mind of one of the characters. On the contrary, in a land where the government did precious little for the people, once pressed by droughts and famine the people got together around a spiritual leader, the Counselor, thus finding a way to be governed. Vargas Llosa describes in episodes the almost epic travels of that holy man through the backlands of Brazil, and how he and his followers eventually settled in Canudos, and rejected the ways of the Republic. As with every complex human (movement, revolt?), each main player has a distorted view of what Canudos is about. The Colonel thinks it is a political movement to overthrow the Republic (which, in his martial way, he firmly believes will redeem the poor people). The landowners and local politicians never even consider the insurrection in detail; for them Canudos is just another episode in the local fight for power, bringing into the scene as a new player the federal forces. For the Englishman Gall, it is a libertarian's paradise, a place touched by the revolution, a place of equals. For the journalist, Canudos is an impersonal story, to be recorded for posterity in detail. Even for the people of Canudos the experience is diverse. For some it means redemption from a past life of sin; for others it is where they find their place in society; others see it as a holy place where to wait for Judgement Day. All these feelings are galvanized in the spiritual leadership of the Counselor, and no one really knows what Canudos means for him. As events unfold and the federal troops near their destination, the feeling of ultimate doom permeating the whole book comes to a climax; in that sense the story is a tragedy. There is only one, sorrowful possible conclusion. This is a superbly written book, where Mr. Vargas Llosa's characteristic prose style shines through. A must read.

Rating:
Summary: Immense, spectacular
Review: I read several of Mario Vargas Llosa smaller (but also superb) works before deciding to attempt to read this one, his masterpiece. It is truly one of the more memorable and profound books that I have read. The structure of the book doesn't divert too much from that of the typical epic novel- dozens of characters, numerous subplots, and events of historical significance. Most of the action takes place in the remote, arid backlands of northwestern Brazil. In this land devastated by drought and poverty, a religious leader known as the Counselor manages to recruit a sizable number of miserable and scorned creatures to be his disciples. We are introduced to such characters as the Little Blessed One, the Lion of Natuba, the Mother of Men, Satan Jao, and a host of others who are social outcasts for one reason or another. It is around this time that the monarchy in overthrown and a republic established; taxes are now to be collected, a national census is to adminstered, and church and state are to be separated. The Counselor and his followers regard these new developments as a direct threat and signs of the impending apocalypse, and they set up their own town, Canudos. The newly formed state can obviously not tolerate these renegades, and the book basically relates the war between Canudos and the waves of military forces that are sent to annihilate them. Vargas Llosa spares no details when relating battle scenes; the reviewer on the inside cover of the book was right in calling this one of the bloodiest books of the century. We are presented with images of corpses hanging from trees, ants devouring the open wounds of soldiers, and decapitated heads on stakes. It is perhaps this gritty realism that makes this book so memorable, though. Another aspect of the author's writing that makes this book so convincing is his ability to sympathetically portray all of the competing interests. Although it is probably fair to say that the Counselor's followers are depticted mainly as victims, Llosa also argues from the point of view of the military, the aristocracy, the republican government, a nearsighted journalist travelling with the army, and even a Scottish anarchist. At the end of this book, one is quite uncertain who, if anyone, is on the right side and who is on the wrong side. But I think it is this moral ambiguity that Vargas Llosa is attempting to create in our minds. In presenting this true historical event in the form of an epic novel, Vargas Llosa has given us a masterful tale of devotion, despair, misery, and personal redemption.

Rating:
Summary: I think you had to be there.
Review: Mr. Llosa has what I would call a good book which, for me, could have been better. Perhaps my perspective is from too far north. An incredible story based on historical events that seem implausible. I had difficulty with the very long names of many of the characters and geographical references repeated over and over. And, I'd guess, the author just couldn't come up with an ending.

Rating:
Summary: Stunning.
Review: The previous stellar reviews are quite accurate - the book is beautifully written, ambitious, intellectually challenging, etc. The author does a stellar job of recreating Bahia at the turn of the century, and one comes away with a richer understanding of Brazilian history, messianic movements, class warfare, fanaticism, etc.

And yet . . . it's a challenge to finish. For all the action, there's a curious lack of forward momentum. New characters - and their backstories - are introduced almost every chapter. Roughly a third of the way through the book we know the themes and it's just a matter of finishing the book to reach the ending that's hinted at on the back cover.

Those who compare this work to Tolstoi's had it right in more ways than one. It is a truly brilliant work. And such a chore to read.

Rating:
Summary: Greatest of all Latin American novels.
Review: The reviewer who described this book as the best 19th Century novel written in the 20th Century comes pretty close to hitting the nail squarely on the head. This is a very great work, by the far the best novel written in the last 50 years. It contains a plenitude of drama, scores of fascinating characters, and it is thankfully free from the defects afflicting most Latin American fiction. No left-wing fustian, no "magic realism" here! (Thank God for that!) I'm also pleased that Llosa dispensed with his penchant for literary modernism in this work. Unlike the (admittedly) brilliant "Conversations in a Cathedral," "The War of the End of the World" is not a difficult read. Llosa must have realized that here was a story that had to be communicated, and he does a brilliant job of bringing the tragic tale of Canudos to vivid life. Highly recommended.

Rating:
Summary: THE WORLD IS COMING TO AN END!!!
Review: This is perhaps Vargas Llosa's best novel and a must for all those well-meaning readers in the developed world who eagerly idealize Latin American revolutions without knowing anything about these countries.

The book is based on the true story of Antonio Vicente Mendes Maciel ("O Conselheiro"), a mad prophet of sorts -kind of a weird Christian ayatollah of the late XIX Century- who ignited, in the most remote corner of Brazil, a bloody uprising among the lowly against Money, Property, Progress, Law, Army, Republic and State, and everything else he found oppressive, sinful and evil. In return, the Brazilian government reacted with indifference, disbelief, concern, anger, outrage and total annihilation.

Little by little, Vargas Llosa transforms this obscure anecdote into a monumental epic of Tolstoiesque proportions that not only hooks you on the plot but reveals the richly interwoven tapestry of Brazilian -and therefore Latin American- society; its illusions and delusions, its races and classes, its loves and hates, its fear of the modern and its contempt for the past, and the fanaticism that pervades both attitudes (to date).

I read this mammoth masterpiece during Christmass '94 at the midst of the Zapatista revolt in Chiapas, and it was sad to realize how little have we changed our societies. Our development always seems to engender inequality and our social struggles to defend backwardness and ignorance. Vargas Llosa is acutely aware of this, and he conveys it in his story splendidly, without preaching, without agendas, without aloofness and without letting you put down the book. Should you decide to read it, ask for a few days off!