This carefully crafted book intertwines three tales occurring around the 1961 assassination of Rafael Trujillo, the brutal dictator of the Dominican Republic. The author’s language is beautiful and descriptive. He astutely matches the voices of each of his characters to the vernacular. There are enough historical facts to learn something without the narrative becoming pedantic. All these features make it brilliant.
But I believe the author is trying for more. It’s as if he wants to answer the question: How does a brutal dictator maintain such cruel control of a country for three decades? He is laying out how it works. First, he tells us of the agents. He gives us Urania. She returns to her homeland with the sole objective of presenting her father with a tally of her expenses for a decision he made so long ago. Then there are the insurgents, working together in a high-risk pursuit. And there is the dictator who is conflated with the state, as he has all those powers and economic means at his disposal.
The author is clear that there are more units of shared interest. Each of these agents has ties to the family. And each of these has varying fortunes depending on its ranking within the social structure.
To keep his model tight, the author does not pursue the family as agents who take action. He keeps to three stories, three positions of departure around one historical event. The first is the view of the lead character, Urania Cabal. Her story is one of private loss. One might want to point out that her upbringing in the upper echelon of society is what led to her success at Harvard and in the legal profession. Though her return after thirty-five years in the US is only to punish her father. To make it clear that his betrayal was beyond redemption.
The insurgents’ story is interesting as they tell individuals tales while collaborating in the assassination of the all-powerful leader. Their losses under the dictator’s reign are aired. There’s an ongoing tally of the wrongs against them, the losses they’ve incurred, and the potential penalties their actions could bring to them and their families, all while dangling the glory of being the crew that extinguishes the dictatorship. They work as a team. Their action influences the direction of the country.
Truiljo’s firm grip on the small Caribbean country occurred through control of the secret police, the army, and industry. His private gains were considerable. Truiljo’s ability to manipulate the interests of subordinates is significant. But the author gives us more insight. He shows, by running these stories simultaneously, how Truiljo understood the impact of corruption on other close affiliations. He led people to a point of no return, destroying collations one by one. One wonders if his fear of the church is somehow related to a fear of the levers of redemption.
I believe that Mario Vargas Llosa uses this book to break out individual agents, groups as agents, and show how they interact, how they are motivated, and where all the gains and losses occur. It shows up in his language.
On page 267, Trujillo’s girltrader and dealmaker tells Urania’s father, “He (Trujillo) will call you. He’ll return what’s been taken from you. Uranita’s future will be secure. Think of her, Agustín, and shake off your antiquated prejudices. Don’t be an egotist.” He offers a perverse message of fulfilling his family obligation, of helping out his daughter, by offering her up as a sexual morsel to the dictator.
On page 322 the author emphasizes the active reformulation of groups as agents, “As if in a dream, in the hours that followed he saw this assemblage of Trujillo’s family, relatives, and top leaders form cliques, dissolve them, and form them again as events began to connect like pieces filling in the gaps of a puzzle until a solid figure took shape.” Once the new assemblage forms, it becomes one. A solid shape.
On page 355, the brilliant Vargas Llosa reminds his readers to depend on human nature: “Doña María’s response had been predictable: her greed was stronger than any other passion.” The first lady could be depended on to prioritize personal interests over group ideals.
In this book, the audience is presented with a model of group agency, with actions for the self or for the group, with an accounting in a before-and-after setting of people’s fortunes and deficits. Vargas Llosa answers the question of how it works.
Home Economics 