The Bad Girl: A Novel | Mario Vargas Llosa | a very good book from a real talent

The Bad Girl: A Novel | Mario Vargas Llosa | A post-modern Bovary...

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The Bad Girl: A Novel

	The Bad Girl: A Novel Mario Vargas Llosa Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2007 - 288 pages average customer review:based on 19 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Ricardo Somocurcio is in love with a bad girl. He loves her as a teenager known as ?Lily? in Lima in 1950, when she arrives one summer out of the blue, claiming to be from Chile but vanishing the moment her claim is exposed as fiction. He loves her next in Paris, where she appears as the enchanting ?Comrade Arlette,? an activist en route to Cuba, and becomes his lover, albeit n icy, remote one who denies knowing anything about the ily of years gone by. Whoever the bad girl turns up as?whether t?s Madame Robert Arnoux, the wife of a high-ranking UNESCO fficial, or Kuriko, the mistress of a sinister Japanese businessman?and however poorly she treats him, Ricardo is doomed to worship her.

The protean Lily, gifted liar and irresistible, maddening muse?does Ricardo ever know who she really is? The answer is as unclear s what has become of Ricardo himself, a lifelong expatriate hadowed by the sense that he is only ever drifting. In MarioVargas Llosa?s beguiling new novel, the strange bedfellows of good and bad turn out not to be what they appear.

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a very good book from a real talent

Llosa once again showcases his amazing talent. The guy can switch between genres as effortlessly as you & I change shirts. Very good novel. Get it, won't be disappointed.

A post-modern Bovary...

My book club read "The Bad Girl" and its inspiration, "Madame Bovary" by Flaubert. Mario Vargas Llosa has updated the French classic in a way that at first glance might seem unclear. How is the protean protagonist (who goes by many names and guises) similar to Emma Bovary? Emma was provincial and doomed by the tightly controlled times in which she lived, the girl in this novel (set in '60s and '70s) travels the world, has many lovers and husbands, and seems to have far more control over her life. For a while, it seems the narrator, who is doomed to love the bad girl for his whole life, is the tragic figure.

It is a worthwhile exercise to read this book and "Bovary" together. I recommend reading Flaubert first. His novel is surprisingly readable, and a revealing look at the pre-feminist world. Vargas Llosa seems to be deconstructing feminism a bit... do women really have more choices today or are they just doomed to gain power through sexuality? The bad girl, despite more freedom, has moments of sexual humiliation that might make you wonder about her control over her own life.

What the novels have in common is an strong anti-passion theme. Characters driven my their passions, held hostage by them, do not fare well in the narrative. By contrast, the more reasoned and dispassionate characters fare better. Whether deliberately or not, both novels seem influenced by orthodox Christian attitudes about temperence and prudence. I also think Vargas Llosa is doing a postmodern deconstruction of feminism and sexuality and coming up with less than a full endorsement of either.

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An enjoyable romp through the world

This novel paints a panoramic history of four decades of South American and European life as the story traces Ricardo's love for "the bad girl." The characters are not particularly complex, and I never really believed the love story, but I really enjoyed the romp through the world.

reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4

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