“We are a society that has learned to laugh at its misfortunes, be they in soccer, politics, or the economy, and that deserves to be represented in literature. Laughter is not for the dumb, nor is seriousness for the intelligent”
It’s interesting, when we think about Peruvian literature, that what usually comes to mind are novels in which humor is a missing, minimum, or insignificant element. Let’s consider, for example, Redoble por Rancas (Drums for Rancas, trans. Edith Grossman), a book that alludes to indigenous struggles in the Pasco region. Or Conversación en La Catedral (Conversation in the Cathedral, trans. Gregory Rabassa), in which the history of repression during the Odría dictatorship is narrated. Or En los ríos profundos (Deep Rivers, trans. Frances Horning Barraclough), which tells the story of the injustices faced by a fourteen-year-old Andean boy. Let’s not forget La violencia del tiempo, a work whose monumentality renders it indecipherable for the vast majority of readers, and which has become, as of late, the new “hidden jewel” of Peruvian literature according to some academics, writers, and critics who write with their left hand. The aura of solemnity that has enveloped literature seems strange. It seems that the more stark, harsh, and discomforting (and even political) a work of literature is, the better. It would seem that the poor Peruvian writer is condemned to writing texts as though they were sociological, academic, or journalistic work. The writer is condemned to writing about massacres, coups d’état, struggles, marginalization, or racism. Happiness, according to some, comes off as frivolous in a country like ours.
However, this isn’t so, even though our famished national critics push us to think the contrary. There exists, even though no one speaks about this, a current of humor in our literature. How could this not be so? Our society has had to learn to laugh at its problems (some of them without solution), at itself, at the marvelous blessing and curse of being Peruvian. And it sure is difficult to define what it means to be Peruvian in the time of the Memer’s Republic of Peru. Our jokiness (up to and including our nonsense), which allows us to create memes even about coups d’état, has not been widely explored in our national literature. Therefore, it’s important—rather, it is our duty—to explore and clarify the current of humor in Peruvian literature by pushing aside the fallen branches, the dried-up leaves, and, of course, the cobwebs.
Our luminary Gustavo Rodríguez, winner of the 2023 Alfaguara Prize, merited that award for his novel Cien cuyes, which deals primarily with deterioration and old age. The critic Javier Agreda notes assertively that parts of the novel are written in coded humor. Now then, if we are talking about humor, between Rodríguez and Roncagliolo (winner of the 2006 Alfaguara Prize for Abril rojo, translated as Red April by Edith Grossman), we see an improvement. Although, clearly, this has nothing to do with literary quality. Jaime Bayly, also in 2023, published the novel Los genios, a story about Mario Vargas Llosa punching Gabriel García Márquez: two of the heavyweights of Latin American literature. If we’re talking about humor, Jaimito has had a resounding success (and if we’re talking about sales as well). Because humor, as a literary tool, gives you enough space to allow the characters’ vices and monstrosity to flourish. I doubt that Gabo was as much of a pothead as he is in the novel, and I also doubt that Marito had the vocation for boxing that the author proposes, nor did he drink as many glasses of milk as he does in the novel. Despite this, I do not doubt that there exists a certain truth in the text, and that this allows us to get to know these two iconic personalities. Bayly’s accomplishment is having created an entertaining novel that borders reality and fiction, and that makes the reader laugh out loud. Humor is not a novelty in our fifty-eight-year-old enfant terrible. It is always present in the columns he publishes in different dailies and international platforms, as well as in his short story collection Yo soy una señora.
In 1994, writer Fernando Iwasaki published the novel Inquisiciones peruanas, a book that, in a humorous tone, lays out the peccadilloes and tragicomedy of a society that appears to be sacred, ceremonious, and smelling of sacristy. And, although this book is about the time of the Inquisition and obscurantism, its sins and temptations could well be transplanted to the urban barrios of today’s Lima. Or isn’t it the case that envy, desire, and lust continue to be washed away during Sunday mass? Humor is a lethal weapon that uncloaks any priest, no matter how much of a pater noster he appears to be (please excuse my use of Latin). Julio Ramón Ribeyro, with a cigarette in hand, explored a discreet humor in Dichos de Luder, an aphoristic book in which the main character opines about certain things in a ludic, ironic, and playful manner: “I have never been insulted, or persecuted, or assaulted, or incarcerated, or exiled,” says Luder. “I must therefore be a scoundrel.” Let’s go now to the barracks. Pantaleón Pantoja decides to open a visiting service in order to calm the troops’ lustful impulses in Pantaleón y las visitadoras (Captain Pantoja and the Special Service, trans. Gregory Kolovakos), which is written in a tone different from the one Mario Vargas Llosa has used throughout his successful and brilliant literary career. One must admit, humor is not our most universal novelist’s forte. Indeed, at his conferences, even the laughter seems rehearsed. Our Nobel Prize-winner, who has recently announced his retirement with the publication of his latest novel Le dedico mi silencio, made use of humor in his novel published in 1973 in order to speak nakedly about corruption in the Peruvian army. Between each laugh, between each joke, a monstrous truth begins to form: the army needs to hire prostitutes so as not to rape the local townswomen. It would have been impossible to report on this using a different tone, especially since at that time Peru was living under the military dictatorship of Velasco Alvarado.
“The first modern novel in the history of humanity was a text loaded with humor, irony, and parody. It wasn’t a sociological novel with a ‘serious’ and solemn bent (that’s why nobody has heard of Mateo Alemán)”
Let’s get back to sacred matters… A little nun was in charge of injecting Martín Romaña’s hemorrhoid medicine into his behind, or as the character himself called it, “his rectal via crucis.” It’s clear that Alfredo Bryce Echenique is one of the masters of Peruvian comedy. And none of those academics and critics who condemn humor, no matter how paper-faced they are, can deny the literary quality of our aristocrat who traveled to Paris to learn to be a writer, even though the accusations that he plagiarized his journalistic texts put a damper on his career. It has often been said, especially at his book presentations and in interviews, that Bryce’s style, gin-and-tonic included, is a rara avis (please excuse again), and that before him humor did not exist in Peruvian literature. That’s fine for publicity, but it isn’t true. The author of Un mundo para Julius (A World for Julius, trans. Dick Gerdes) takes his style from two antecedents, which—in my view—are direct.
Please allow me to now descend into literary hell, into the underpinnings of our tradition. Let me sweep away some dead leaves. The first direct antecedent of Bryce Echenique’s style is Duque, the novel by José Diez Canseco published in 1934, considered the second queer novel in Perú after Confesiones de Dorish Dam by writer Delia Colmenares (1929). I won’t go into a discussion of queerness because that’s not the theme of this essay. Duque is written in a humorous tone from the beginning, when the twenty-five-year-old little man, Teddy Crownchield, has the dilemma of choosing a tie among the one hundred fourteen he has in the closet, until the end, when the scandal blows up in the prudish city of Lima. The novel’s characters move among the elegant cafés of the city’s center, including the main brothels and opium dens. This is no coincidence. Bryce must have read this novel because the narrative techniques are, in some cases, the same as his own, especially in the use of the same anglicisms, as is the case with Susan’s famous “darling” in A World for Julius.
The other antecedent, although it might seem strange, comes from Ricardo Palma (yes, Ricardo Palma), who, despite the church-going faces of his children Clemente and Angélica, made a show of his sense of humor in Tradiciones en salsa verde. Our beggar librarian becomes gossipy and even crude, oblivious to his own solemn pose with his combed and immobile mustache. He mocks, with self-confidence, historical and serious characters, in whose image bronze busts have been made (always shat on by some rara avis). Neither Antonio José de Sucre nor Simón Bolívar (with his twenty thousand names) nor Ramón Castilla with his amorous ravings are safe from this acrid pen. Malicious prose and verse, double entendres, and gossipy tone abound: “One day he said to a young man / By the shade of a fig tree / As long as you don’t stick me with a nun / You can stick me with whatever.”
This book was not published until the last third of the twentieth century. It is clear that Palma senior did not publish this book because the bronze medals, the awards, and the title of national hero should be defended; however, it is unclear why the Palma children did not publish the manuscript. Although I can’t imagine Clementito publishing a book like this one, much less Angélica, who was so obsessed with how the ladies of her time should behave themselves. Whatever the case may be, Tradiciones en salsa verde is a book that ends up humanizing our traditionalist, whose canonical work is not lacking in humor either, although it might be more costumbrista and demure. Bryce inherits from Palma the ability to laugh at the patriotic: “Peru advances, Brazil scores a goal!” Besides, both writers also coincide as representatives of Criollismo.
Allow me to descend into the fourth zone of literary hell, to the furthest cave, to demonstrate that laughter is as much a part of our tradition as is crying. During the time of the viceroyalty, when novels were prohibited in the Americas, Juan del Valle y Caviedes wrote Diente del parnaso, his only book. It is full of satirical verses against the doctors of his time, whom he even compares to executioners. Satirical poetry was not the exception at that time. Before Romanticism, satirical poetry was abundant in Spain. However, even if you don’t believe me, it’s enough to see the case of Don Quixote, a novel considered ridiculous during its time and whose main character can be, at the same time, the craziest and the sanest man in the world. The first modern novel in the history of humanity was a text loaded with humor, irony, and parody. It wasn’t a sociological novel, with a “serious” and solemn bent (that’s why nobody has heard of Mateo Alemán). Not to mention the comedies of Lope de Vega, in which graciosos appear as characters; nor the sonnet “To a Nose” by Quevedo, in which he mocks Góngora’s physical appearance: “There was a man stuck to a nose / it was a superlative nose…” No one can challenge, no matter how much of an academic they may be, the fact that these works are the fundamental texts of our tradition. No one could qualify these works as “lacking in seriousness.” The comedy-tragedy, Aristophanes-Sophocles, Lysistrata-Antigone dichotomy, which we have inherited from the Greeks, remains in effect even today.
With all this said, we must begin, at last, to value humor (which does not abound) in our literature. It is striking that not a single Peruvian woman writer can be found who is directly associated with humor. I hope, in the future, there may be more interest in exploring this path, which is a fundamental part of our tradition. This does not mean that we should not appreciate works that are “serious,” sociological, political, and stark. These are fundamental in order to understand a society as bowlegged as our own. However, works that reflect Peruvian humor are also important, especially because it is present in our day-to-day lives, on social media, on television, in the Memer’s Republic of Peru: colorful, outlandish, bizarre. We are a society that has learned to laugh at its misfortunes, be they in soccer, politics, or the economy, and that deserves to be represented in literature. Laughter is not for the dumb, nor is seriousness for the intelligent. Humor is a lethal weapon that disrobes even the most serious academic, no matter how much of an encyclopedic face one may have. Not everything is seriousness, revolution, and massacres. We are also allowed to laugh.
Oklahoma, 2023
Translated by Luis Guzmán Valerio
