Customer Reviews

The Feast of the Goat: a Novel

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Rafael Trujillo ruled the Dominican Republic with an iron hand from 1930 to 1961. His cruelty and brutality could sentence people to disgrace, torture or death on a whim. His lust for power and women was insatiable, and a climate of fear was everywhere. Mario Vargas Llosa, the prize winning Peruvian author knows his subject well. And in this novel, he uses his best storytelling talents to recreate that harsh time in history when ruthlessness ruled. The known facts are all there, re-interpreted by the author to facilitate our understanding of what it must have been like to live through those awful times. And the few fictional characters are there to help tell the story.

The story is told through three different viewpoints. The first is set in the present day, when a middle-aged female attorney who has lived in the United States since the age of 14, returns to the Dominican Republic. She's full of anger at her invalid father who was once an official in Trujillo's government, and it is only at the very end of the book that we understand why. But as she meets her relatives and finally lets them hear her personal story, two other compelling narratives are taking place in alternating chapters which are set in 1961.

The reader gets a chance to see into the mind's eye of Rafael Trujillo himself. He's 70 years old now. Always immaculately well groomed, he's embarrassed by bouts of incontinence. And he's also finding it difficult to consummate his erotic encounters with young women. He's upset about these matters, but his mind is razor sharp, deeply involved in the political intrigues that are his forte, and able to force his underlings to shiver in terror at the whims of his disfavor.

And then there is a group of assassins, who we first meet as they wait in the darkness to ambush his car on a lonely road. Each of these men has a good reason to hate the dictator. Each has a sorrowful story and as each story unfolds, I was able to better understand the vast mosaic of the evil regime and its effects on their lives and those of their relatives. I was horrified at the many acts of cruelty they had to endure. And I found myself worrying about the safety of their families.

Then it happens. We all knew it would. After all, it's in all the history books. Rafael Trujillo was assassinated.

But this is not a joyful conclusion. The regime didn't fall. And the punishments meted out to the perpetrators by Trujillo's son were the epitome of mercilessness. I wish the story wasn't true. It would be nice if I could think of it as a figment of the author's imagination. But alas, that is not the case.

I literally couldn't put the book down and I devoured the author's words, letting them take me to the place he intended. He brought me right into the Dominican Republic during those awful times and into the hearts and minds of the very real human beings who lived through it. It was a voyage into the evil mind of Trujillo. And it also gave me an understanding of the forces that shaped the Dominican Republic. And, weaving it all together is the story of a woman who seemed to escape. Or did she?

I give this book my highest recommendation.

Mario Varlgas Llosa is easily on my personal list of all-time Great Latin American Authors. I have been an avid fan for quite some time and have read several of his masterpieces: La ciudad y los perros (1960), the novel that launched his literary career and caused a sensation in the literary world when it was published ... and initiated the second phase of the "boom" in Latin American literature; la casa verde (1964); Conversacion en la Catedral (1964); and La verdad de las mentiras (1990). The current THE FEAST OF THE GOAT (La Fiesta del Chivo) is written with an insurmountable rhythm and precision that is classic Vargas Llosa. Those of us who lived during the unbelievably nightmarish Tujillo Era and in the ghoulish shadow of the Dictador under Balaguer (especially the infamous "12 Years") recall all too well the ruthlessness of this beast. The author handles ingeniously the characterizations and events of the period. And therein lies the mastery of this political-socially astute and innovative writer: his expanded concept of reality and his precepts about literature being born of a reality that is actually lived. This story is powerful. In honestly, however, I take serious issue with Vargas Llosa in that he does not give appropriate credit to a few present-day Dominican literary giants like Frank Moya Pons, Bernardo Vega, Roberto Cassa, and Jose Michel Cordero ... for their already published, widely respected historical research [upon which most every writer draws for accurate historical perspective] on the subject. Only a Vargas Llosa, I suppose, has the literary supremacy to pull it off so cleverly. Nevertheless, this is a novel that will enlighten the reader about the last days of the Trujillo Era and the psyche of "el Chivo"...goat. Pay very close attention to the quite, unassuming poet-president. Vargas Llosa is a priceless literary treasure.

Alan Cambeira
Author of AZUCAR! The Story of Sugar (a novel)

If you think a novel about the Trujillo Era (1930-61) in the Dominican Republic would be boring, think again. Mario Vargas Llosa's THE FEAST OF THE GOAT is a work of literary brilliance.

"Literature is fire," writes Vargas Llosa, a writer touted by critics to become the next Spanish-American writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature, and his latest novel radiates with the incendiary heat of Machiavellian politics, sexual obsession, and bestial brutality.

To the inhabitants of the Dominican Republic, Rafael Leonidas Trujillo Molina was known as Chief, Generalissimo, the Benefactor, the Father of the New Nation, and His Excellency. To his enemies, Trujillo was the Beast and the Goat.

For more than three decades, Trujillo ruled the Dominican Republic with an iron fist. He had cut the Gordian knot of the "Haitian problem" by having between 10,000 and 15,000 Haitians slaughtered.

In 1961, writes Vargas Llosa, "the country had touched bottom, placed under quarantine because of the excesses of a regime which, although in the past it had performed services that could never be repaid, had degenerated into a tyranny that provoked universal revulsion."

On the mild, starry night of Tuesday, May 30, 1961, the 70-year-old Trujillo, suffering from bouts of incontinence and impotence, was being driven from his palace in Ciudad Trujillo (Santo Domingo de Guzman) to his Mahogany House in San Cristobal, for another of his orgies--"to prove again he was a man." On the highway to San Cristobal, seven men stationed in three cars lay in ambush to assassinate him.

THE FEAST OF THE GOAT has three storylines:
(1) The story of Urania Cabral, now 49, who returns to the Dominican Republic in 1996, after 35 years absence from her homeland. At age 14 she had been cynically betrayed by her own father, Sen. Augustin Cabral, one of the highest-ranking officials in the Trujillo regime.
(2) The story of those who plotted a military-civilian junta and were successful in tyrannicide but were captured by Trujillo's son.
(3) The story of Trujillo himself, who (like Joseph Stalin, but on a lesser scale) accomplished much good but was also "the person in whom all the strands of the dread spider web [of tyranny, corruption, and terror] converged."

THE FEAST OF THE GOAT is not for the squeamish. Its explicit language and shocking scenes of sex, violence, and torture depict the decadent life of "a small country, a huge hell."

In a novel of this type, however, such excesses are non-gratuitous; one cannot imagine an adequate or realistic description of the Trujillo Era apart from such graphic scenes.

The entire atmosphere of the Trujillo Era has a Kafkaesque quality. Like something in The Trial, a person could be arrested, tried, tortured, and executed and never discover his offense. Perhaps the greatest tragedy of Trujillo's dictatorship is that it caused men such as Sen. Augustin Cabral, who otherwise would have remained decent, to betray their own flesh and blood.

Although the word masterpiece often is overworked, I shall risk it here. THE FEAST OF THE GOAT may well be the best novel of the year.

This is the third of Llosa's novels that I have read, and his work just seems to get better every time. History, politics, violence, and sex are three themes that seem to figure prominently in Llosa's books (at least the ones that I have read), and this one is no exception. Feast of the Goat is concerned with the last days of Rafael Trujillo, long-time Dominican dictator and one-time ally of the United States. The book is told in three threads: one looks at Trujillo himself, one is concerned with a woman, Urania, returning to the Dominican Republic for the first time since she left decades ago, right before Trujillo's assassination, and the third storyline deals with Trujillo's assassins. Different readers will probably find one of these stories to be more interesting and convincing than the others, but I found merits in all three, and besides, they converge towards the end of the book. Llosa's portrait of Trujillo is wonderful. He captures the leader's immense arrogance, his rigorous military discipline, his blatant misogyny, and his ability to induce the most self-abasing acts of sycophancy among his followers. Urania's story is compelling melodrama, as she is unable to forgive her father, a former Trujillo aide, who went to hideous lengths to regain Trujillo's favor. The reason for her departure is gradually made clear, although many will guess the reason early on. Finally, in telling the story of the assassins, Llosa is able to document the personal effects of Trujillo's abuses by explaining how these former loyalists became disaffected with the regime. Trujillo's inevitable death occurs about two-thirds of the way through the book, and some of the most intriguing episodes of political maneuvering occur afterwards. Particularly interesting is Llosa's account of Joaquin Balaguer, the quiet, unassuming puppet president under Trujillo, who manages to gain control of the civilian government through compromises and outright conflicts with Trujillo's remaining family members. He contrasts the way in which Balaguer seized the moment with the case of Pupo Roman, commander of the air forces under Trujillo. He was the man who was supposed to seize control under the original plan. Instead, he makes miscalculations at every point, and his complicity in the assassination is eventually uncovered by Trujillo's sadistic son, whom Balaguer lets run the police and security apparatus in exchange for his remaining in charge of civilian affairs. Another theme that Llosa covers very well is the role of the Catholic Church. Originally a patriarchical institution that provided support for some of Latin America's most disreputable dictators, the church courageously changed directions and criticized these regimes. They are depicted as a major thorn in Trujillo's side. Overall, this is a must read for any fan of political novels or Latin American history, and is a worthy contribution to that genre exploring life under totalitarianism. One word of caution- Llosa does not shy away from graphic descriptions of the brutalities committed by Trujillo's sons in their "search" for the assassins.

The fact that Mario Vargas Llosa spent so much effort creating this book, and its triple-visioned perspective of an interesting and ultimately vicious era in the history of the Dominican Republic, speaks to Llosa's artistic genius. Although as a general reader, I can't know exactly what is factual and what is fiction in this account, I can be drawn into the tenor of the times, the terror that ruled the nation, and the feeling of complete domination of a society by a single, overpowering individual with an iron will and an unpitying regard for his loyal opposition. We see Trujillo at his worst, not as the man who "saved the nation" from Haitian and communist rule, but as a murderer, rapist, manipulator, and sadist. The damage he inflicted has resonated for decades, and Llosa implicitly understands this as he details the lives of those who suffered and courageously sought to change their society.
Considering the recent news of Saddam's atrocities and extremes, this book is very timely in detailing the madness of dictators and the struggles of their victims. I am grateful that Mario Vargas Llosa, an artist of world-class stature, wrote this book. It is now a living record of a dark episode in history, not to be forgotten, and of the evil extremes in human nature.

After reading the reviews of this book, I was eager to read it, and I was not disappointed. I could not put it down and read most of it in one night (although I should point out that some of the more graphic scenes of torture are not good bedtime reading). It was a fascinating, totally absorbing story of a time in history which I knew little about. The author weaves the story of Urania, a 49-year-old woman who left the Dominican Republic as a teenager and is now returning, with the true story of the Dominican dictator Generalissimo Trujillo. The author blends the stories together seamlessly, flowing back and forth between times and voices with art and ease. This book is probably not for everyone, but I loved it, both for the mesmerizing story and the powerful writing.

This is a highly personal book for me: I am half Dominican and a relative of one of the minor characters portrayed in the book, and I grew up hearing first-hand stories about the Trujillo regime. Additionally, I have been an avid reader of Vargas Llosa's books for several years starting during a span of several years when I lived in Peru, the author's home country. Because of that, I put off reading the book for several months, fearing that it might not live up to the possibly unreasonable expectations I had built up.

But those fears melted away within a few pages of starting the book, with the compelling story of Urania, the protagonist in one of the three major story lines that fill the pages of the novel. In retrospect, the story of Urania seems to be the weakest of the three lines (it is also the only one that is mostly fiction, though it can be seen as a amalgam of several real events with some artistic license thrown in), but that is more a statement about the strength of the story about the dictator's eventual murderers and (most notably) the one about Trujillo than it is a weakness about Urania's tale.

The story is gritty and intense, riveting and important -- an examination into a 31-year dictatorship that much of the world is unaware of, as well as a fascinating probe into the minds of people who lived under extraordinary circumstances. Without a doubt, The Feast of the Goat will solidify Vargas Llosa's place among Latin America's literary giants like Garcia Marquez, Neruda, Borges, Paz and Allende.

Although The Feast of the Goat is not my favorite Mario Vargas Llosa novel, I think it is his most masterful.

In The Feast of the Goat, Vargas Llosa explores life in the Dominican Republic under the reign of the dictator, Rafael Leonidas Trujillo Molina and the aftermath of his assassination on 30 May 1961.

Trujillo, who was referred to as "the Goat," was trained by the United States Marines and it was United States financial backing that kept him in power from the 1930s through the 1950s. Although Trujillo's regime was marked by corruption and brutality, the United States saw it as far less threatening than communism under Fidel Castro.

To construct the intricate plot of The Feast of the Goat, Vargas Llosa has used a device known as a braid. This particular braid consists of three strands and many, many viewpoints, making this quite a "big book."

The strand I found most intriguing is the only one that is, I think, fictional. It is the story of Urania Cabral, a woman who is returning to the Dominican Republic after 35 years in self-imposed exile. Her story consists mainly of past events, told through flashbacks. We are not exactly sure why Urania returns and neither is she. She tells her father, Augustin Cabral, who had been a high-ranking official in Trujillo's government, that she never intended to return, not even to bury him.

As Augustin lies silent due to a stroke, Urania recounts the events that lead to her departure at the age of fourteen, just two weeks before Trujillo's assassination. It is obvious that Urania hates her father, and readers learn the reason why before the characters in the book do.

Another fascinating strand in Vargas Llosa's braid traces the last day of Trujillo's life. We know that he was obsessed with cleanliness, appearance, order and discipline. Just how obsessed becomes clear as we read the book. In The Feast of the Goat, Vargas Llosa has blended the historical with the speculative and has
come up with a fascinating and vivid portrait of a man who was one of history's most egotistical, tyrannical and debased leaders.

The third strand of Vargas Llosa's braid centers on those who are plotting the assassination of Trujillo. Vargas Llosa ups the suspense by not beginning this narrative until a few hours prior to the assassination and by giving each of the assassins his own perspective on his involvement in the plot. We know, of course, how this plot strand ends. Vargas Llosa, however, keeps momentum high by graphically recounting the barbarous fate of the assassins. Be warned: this is definitely not a book for the faint-of-heart. Simply because we already know how this novel comes out, from a historical perspective, does not mean we can simply resign ourselves to the horror.

Vargas Llosa lets us know that there are those who lament the assassination of Trujillo, as brutal as he was. One of the characters laments that people lived better during Trujillo's regime and that there were more jobs and less crime. In the weeks and months following the assassination, the horror, the corruption and the fear that accompanied Trujillo's regime seem to have been forgotten. Perhaps this is a part of this masterful novel's message. If so, it is a masterful touch, for it only serves to make the horror all that more real and despicable.

I don't think anyone can read this masterpiece of a book and not come away changed. I certainly didn't. The Feast of the Goat is not a pretty book, but it is one that is extremely important and one that I will never forget.

This is one of the finest "political" novels ever written. Centered on the assassination of Trujillo and its aftermath, the book accurately and grippingly describes the twentieth century political history of the Dominican Republic, the devastating effects of a dictatorship and cult of personality on a society and culture, and the role of individual personalities in the making of historical events.

But even more important is the book's function to preserve the memory of atrocities and monstrous acts, so that we may try to prevent and avoid them in the future. Just as novels about the Holocaust serve to remind and teach us about that terrible time, Vargas Llhosa's novel memorializes the horrors that happened in a smaller, more obscure place, and it examines the causes of those horrors in history, society, culture, and personality.

The story shifts among the various plot lines by chapter and sometimes within chapters, and it leaps forwards and backwards in time. Rather than creating confusion in the reader, this technique vivifies the uncertainty and "fog" that arises in any political crisis, and it reminds us that our present always includes our past. It and the objective but often-sympathetic characterizations heighten the involvement of the reader in the story.

In sum, this book succeeds as literature, history, political analysis, psychological study, and social commentary. Comments by other reviewers that the plot line involving the fictional Urania is "weak" miss, in my opinion, the role that the her story plays in representing the lingering effects of an oppressed and unjust polity on individuals. Other comments about the number of characters and the multiplicity of names do not perceive the complexity of any significant historical and political event. Further, they disregard the fact that the author's inclusion of all of the characters and their Spanish names has been used at least since Homer's Illiad formally and repeatedly referred to so many of the Greeks and Trojans by their full names, patronyms, and titles: it preserves the names for history and memory.

This is a story set around the life and death of Rafael Trujillo who was a brutal Latin style dictator of the Dominican Republic for decades until his assassination in the early sixties. There are three views in this novel which alternate from chapter to chapter, the first is Trujillo himself in the last days of his life, 70 years old and aging fast. We see him as he reminisces about his life & his rise to power, used by the U.S. and trained by the marines originally to be a force against Cuba. Another view is through the eyes of Trujillo's assassins, all previously his henchmen, now working in clandestine groups against the dictator, and their individual stories. The character that begins and ends the novel is purely fictional, Urania, a 49 yr. old woman with a great career in the World Trade Organization and the only female side in this extremely macho novel. Urania has returned to the Dominican Republic after 35 years away to see her father, an old man now who was one of Trujillo's top yes men during his reign of terror.

This is book about human motivations and how ordinary people become hypnotized by evil. It is a universal story of the dictator everywhere and a lesson in understanding how it could happen.

Another great one from Llosa that defies genre, it is a thriller, an historical novel, a book about politics, and offers stark, penetrating insights into human nature.