Setting of Peru as Llosa’s Nationalistic Imagination
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along with it represents the time when Odría‘s regime collapsed. But the most
important thing is that in this era Peru underwent economic growth due to capitalism. It did not satisfy all Peruvians though.
In the period of 1960s and 1970s, the story describes a phase when the narrator took his postgraduate program. He even went outside country such as
Madrid and Paris to continue his study there. This period in the novel also seems to represent Llosa‘s life background. He went to European countries around 1960s
-1970s to Madrid and Paris. Along with the representation of 1960s and 1970s as a phase when Llosa
went to Madrid and Paris, it was depicted in the novel that Peru underwent many demonstration related to consumerism.
In the sixties and seventies―the years of student revolt against a consumer society―many middle-class young people left Lima, motivated partly by
adventure-seeking and partly by disgust at life in the capital, and went to the jungle or the mountains, where they lived in conditions that were
frequently precarious Llosa, 1989: 242.
The time the author used does not seem to represent independence war era.
But to some extent, it represents more about the author‘s biography. These periods
explain how he underwent half of his life. The irony in the setting of time goes along with the setting of place.
Though the setting of place represents Peru at most, it precisely also sets some other places outside Peru such as Firenze, Madrid, and Paris. In fact, Madrid and
Paris were two cities that gave big influence to Llosa for he spent some years there to study and to work in the earliest of 1960s. Later, he often spent his time
living outside Peru. His going outside Peru very frequently influences his
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understanding of nationalism. He contemplates nationalism not only in a way of loving his country but also in a way of putting it in a universal context and issue.
Although he was outside, he still seems to put attention to his country especially during the era when capitalists and consumerism took over his country.
Another irony related to nationalism in The Storyteller lies on its conflicts. It is not easy to define The Storyteller as a nationalistic novel by only looking at
the setting inside Peru that is described a lot in the story. Thus the conflicts are also necessary.
A moment in Firenze had brought him to a flashback in 1950s when he met Saúl Zuratas. Apparently this encountering brought a conflict since Saúl
became someone that was very altruistic to natives. Saú l‘s altruism to Indians tend
to make him not be able to accept development or modernity that often cause destruction to the natives as he explained this way in the story.
No, pal. As a matter of fact, I‘m understanding. I swear. What‘s being done in the Am
azon is a crime. There‘s no justification for it, whatever way you look at it. Believe me, man, it‘s no laughing matter. Put yourself
in their place, if only for a second. Where do they have left to go? They‘ve been driven out of their lands for centuries, pushed farther into the interior
each time, farther and farther. The extraordinary thing is that, despite so
many disasters, they haven‘t disappeared. They‘re still there, surviving Llosa, 1989: 20.
Saúl‘s way of thinking was not accepted by the narrator for he thought that development was needed for Peru. He thought that it was impossible to avoid the
development just for the sake of the natives. It is seen in this way. Occasionally, to see how far his obsession might lead him, I would
provoke him. What did he suggest, when all was said and done? That, in order not to change the way of life and the beliefs of a handful of tribes
still living, many of them, in the Stone Age, the rest of Peru abstain from developing the Amazon region? Should sixteen million Peruvians
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renounce the natural resources of three-quarters of their national territory so that seventy or eighty thousand Indians could quietly go on shooting at
each other with bows and arrows, shrinking heads and worshipping boa constrictors? Llosa, 1989: 21.
Apparently, these two opposing ideas were the main conflicts. In the development of the conflicts, Saúl even devoted his own life for the natives,
Machiguengas, by becoming a storyteller among them. It was somehow a decision which the narrator could not understand taken by his best friend as he explained
this way. Where I find it impossible to follow him
—an insuperable difficulty that pains and frustrates me
—is in the next stage: the transformation of the convert into the storyteller Llosa, 1989: 243.
While Saúl had shocked the narrator with his decision of becoming a storyteller, the narrator himself seemed to stay in his argument of having global
mind. While Saúl preferred going deep into the jungle, the narrator precisely kept going outside Peru. Even the setting of place in the last scene was placed in
Firenze, Italy, when he wrote all these stories. Darkness has fallen and there are stars in the Florentine night, though not
as bright as those in the jungle. I have a feeling that at any mo ment I‘ll run
out of ink the shops in this city where I might get a refill for my pen are also locked up tight for their chiusura estivale, naturally Llosa, 1989:
245.
Thus, the ironies lie on three things: the setting of time, the setting place, and main conflicts. The setting of time do not reflect independence era although
this is a nationalistic novel. The setting of place also shows locales outside Peru although this novel seems to bring up nationalism in Peruvian context. Lastly,
although the atmosphere of nationalism in Peruvian context have been reached in the description of settings of place inside Peru and social circumstances, the main
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conflicts apparently shows two opposing ideas about the development for Peru. The main conflicts precisely reveal that there were internal conflicts in Peru
between those who supported development and those who refuse it for the sake of natives‘ lives.