The Storyteller (novel)

The Storyteller  

1st edition
Author(s) Mario Vargas Llosa
Original title El hablador
Translator Helen Lane
Country Peru
Language Spanish
Publisher Seix Barral
Publication date 1987
Published in
English		 1989
Media type Print

The Storyteller (El Hablador) is a novel by Peruvian author Mario Vargas Llosa. The story tells of a man who leaves civilization and becomes a "storyteller" for the Machiguenga Indians. The novel thematizes the Westernization of indigenous peoples through missions and through anthropological studies, and questions the perceived notion that indigenous cultures are set in stone.

Contents

Plot

Major themes

Development history

Publication history

Explanation of the novel's title

The "storyteller" (hablador) of the title refers primarily to a position within Machiguenga culture—to a person who preserves and recites the culture's history and beliefs to the rest of the tribe. The narrator, himself a writer, is fascinated by this type of person in various cultures around the world, such as the Celtic seanchaí, which he refers to for comparison; he is even more intrigued to find that in the twenty years since his first encounter with habladores, they seem to have disappeared--none of the Machiguenga will even acknowledge the storyteller exists.

The "storyteller" has a secondary reference to the narrator himself, a writer who briefly runs a television show that tries to copy the work of the hablador by presenting assorted stories of cultural significance.

Literary significance and reception

Awards and nominations

Adaptations

References

External links

Critical studies

Because of its focus on the role of storytelling within culture, the novel has received numerous critical studies, including:

Novels
Short story collection
  • The Cubs and Other Stories (1959)
Essays
Essay collections
  • A Writer's Reality (1991)
  • A Fish in the Water (1993)
  • Making Waves (1997)
  • Letters to a Young Novelist (1997)
  • The Language of Passion (2001)