“I was a fagot that my mother had left him as punishment, he said. That’s why he hit me hard.”
Chile, September 1986. A country in fibrillation for the anniversary of General Pinochet’s coup d’état. On the one hand we have dissidents who, with demonstrations and attacks, try not to bow their heads to one of the harshest Latin American dictatorships; on the other, the military who bloodily represses any expression of dissent, without making any distinction between women, the elderly and children.
In this state of perpetual tension, there are the personal stories of Carlos and Fata, Pinochet and his wife Lucía Hiriart. An ideal contrast between two antithetical realities, which go beyond the localities within Chile, but extend to the complexities of the human race and interpersonal relationships.
Fata is an elderly homosexual madly in love with the young Carlos, whose real name he doesn’t know and doesn’t want to know because he lives in hiding, engaged in the political struggle with the Frente Patriótico Manuel Rodríguez-FPMR (who actually actually existed). A love so pure and intense that she decides to personally join the FPMR by lending his house as a base / warehouse. Of course, the doubt that Carlos at the beginning uses Fata (and her feelings) for his own personal gain is almost a certainty, but as the reading progresses he will have time to partially make amends.
The dictator Pinochet is told in the intimacy of a family life that has now come to an end, with a frivolous, classist and vain wife who he can’t stand and the wear and tear of power that will make him live in a bubble increasingly distant from reality.
The stylistic choice of telling the stories of the two couples in parallel, interspersing the chapters, as well as inserting the dialogues within the text without breaking the story, was much appreciated. Without words, in a positive sense, the author’s ability to describe some situations and emotional states of the characters like small Renaissance frescoes, which can only be admired.
The book has the explosive power of dealing with an important topic such as that of rights and tolerance in a historical/political/social context that to define as difficult could be an understatement. There are some passages which, although fictional, have a unique relevance, and will also have it in another twenty years, but without telling you anything else, we invite you to read the book.
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Pedro Lemebel, Ho paura torero, Marcos y Marcos, Milano, 2021
Original edition: Tengo miedo torero, Santiago, Grupo Editorial Planeta, 2001