Ethnic clashes in Peru: The dilemma underlying the novels of Mario Vargas Llosa

My study proposes to analyze (using an anthropological viewpoint) a fundamental predicament underlying the mass of material and narrative techniques in Mario Vargas Llosa's novels, as he endeavors to come to terms with the ambiguities of the fragmented Peruvian society, and that is: Peru's vast disparities between an almost unimaginable number of ethnic groups, which create such tremendous problems of interaction and identity, both on the individual level and the communal one. Through the examination of four of his novels, La ciudad y los perros, La casa verde, Historia de Mayta, and El hablador, I show that he consistently reveals major areas of the issue of ethnic clashes which include: (1) the level of violence existing in such a pluralistic society, (2) the ineffectiveness of the three major institutions charged with maintaining order and fomenting a true equality, the church, the educational system and the military, (3) the failure of individuals from a wide variety of ethnic groups and class levels to find a satisfactory identity within the system, (4) the lack of mutual understanding and respect existing between the diverse groups, and (5) the inadequacy of certain proposed solutions to the difficulties, such as revolution.In these works Vargas Liosa struggles with the dilemma posed by his attempts to sympathize with the problems of the native groups in Peru while he tries to overcome Western, Eurocentric values, which he accomplishes by demonstrating the inadequacy of the world view inherited from Europe and adapted in Peru. Caught between conflicting environments, the majority of his protagonists fail in their quests for survival and identity and only Mascaritas in El hablador is successful, as he immerses himself in a totally different cultural system, that of a jungle tribe. While this is not a practical solution, Vargas Llosa intimates in his novels that the Peruvian society must come to terms with its ethnic diversity and search for new answers.