Interview with writer Eduardo Huarag (Image: Eduardo Huarag front of the Faculty of Romance Philology of the LMU, Munich, January 2010 .)
experienced terrorist violence in Peru to the 80's and early 90's and its political fallout, moral, social, economic and psychological among people the country has been central in many of the manifestations national arts in recent years, from crafts and lyrics of the national folklore, to films, theater, photo galleries and literary production. At least in the narrative genre that topic seems to have inspired the richest fruits in quantity and quality. Just about the most important characteristics of the last Peruvian literature conferences have addressed a university professor and writer Eduardo Alvarez Huarag given at universities and cultural institutions in Europe, on tour in January 2010 by Germany, France and Spain. During his tenure at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU) Munich, Germany kindly agreed to an interview.
In his latest novella The boat (Ed. San Marcos, 2007) you enroll in the line of Peruvian authors taking the issue of violence the 80's and early 90's as a crucial backdrop for a love story. What has also led to dabble in this subject?
Well, there are several things that should be mentioned. First, the experience to live through. I spent three years, 80 to 82, Huamanga University in Ayacucho, and met a reality very different from Lima. I traveled to some places and found that it meant extreme poverty. No one could think the country the same way since those ancestral places marginalized. From that experience came a subject, he went around for a while, writing a first draft and making several other attempts failed, indeed. And so I put together a first novel on the subject: The promise (2005). This novel, however, the plot leads to another question, I suddenly felt that the issue of violence had left me, and I ended up writing about the harrowing subject of incest. In contrast, The boat (2007) despite the different perspectives from different places and times, I was able to focus on violence and police plot. And while the central argument revolves around the relationship of a couple, James and Alexandra, to be treated all that atmosphere of uncertainty brought by the state security services. In this novel through the metaphorical figure of a boat, which never reaches its destination and the many anonymous characters who die, I wanted to show all the implications that somehow assumed those years of violence and upheaval for the country. I think that was an experience not to be ignored or overlooked. My novel The boat was thus the result of a vital need to communicate and build a story about why I had made very marked by its social, political, and even personal and sentimental or emotional.
As perhaps also with novels like The girl who went to heaven ([1988] 2009), Rosa Cuchillo (1997), Abril rojo (2006) , The Blue Hour (2007) and even Beanfield Dog Ear (2008), in which the issue of terrorist violence is directly or indirectly present, do you think they all have something in common, so you can talk about the last novella in Peruvian literature?
Well, they have in common that I mentioned a moment ago, that twenty years of violence that shook the conscience of the country, both in Lima and in the provinces. Not coincidentally, these novels touch that topic. There are the authors of particular interest. In my case, I had reasons of personal experience, but I am aware that there is a different attitude of all the writers to play not only that topic. A few are more interested in the relationship of the insurgency with the thought messianic, mythical, others prefer to explore the existential conflict and psychological problem. I think the writers are more conscious now of how you have to tell the stories, that is, the conscientious use of techniques and narrative strategies. Now that is common to all these authors, if not, I dare to argue that their works would not be relevant.
And those writers Cusco - for example, Enrique Rosas-Paravichino, Luis Nieto Degregori, Mario Guevara - have something special in their works that might speak of a separate subject with title of 'literature Cuzco' today?
I think there are several motivations in current literary production of Cusco. The issue of violence is only one, there is also the trend towards historical rescue, metaphorization, the absurdities of everyday events, but also the extraordinary events very close to magic realism. If we start to see the entire productions of recent years will find that there is no consistent theme or concern, as in the era of Narrative group, for example. Today I think that does not exist.
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full interview:
TASK - Journal of the Center for Studies and Development Promotion (DESCO) Nr 178 (April-June 2010), 102-107.
See more about TASK 178:
http://www.desco.org.pe/quehacer-todas.shtml?x=6427
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