Santiago Roncagliolo on the reissue of “Red April”: “Storytelling is a very dangerous trade in Peru” | INTERVIEW

16 years later the novel Abril rojo (Seix Barral, 2021) by Santiago Roncagliolo is reissued in Peru. Prosecutor Chacaltana - the main character - is as present now as was the case in 2006 when the Peruvian writer published the book and won the Alfaguara Prize.

Roncagliolo lives in Spain, but he always returns to Peru, encountering a highly polarized reality like when he was in a conversation and book signing with former president Francisco Sagasti in a bookstore in Barranco. The event had to be canceled because the far-right group 'La Resistencia' came to the scene to try to boycott this event.

“I have been to performances that have been backfired by the far right. We did a presentation in October and the far-right groups broke it up as they usually go against book presentations or when they attack the press,” the Peruvian writer recalled in this interview with Infobae.

—After 16 years this new edition of Abril rojo is launched, how do you see Peru now from the reissue of this novel?

“I think the novel is more current now than when it was published. When it was published, it talked about the past, about a clash between extremes that we had already overcome. Today, the debates in Peru are about Fujimorism and the Shining Path as if we had returned to 1992; it has become the time that the novel tells. Red April has become a novel of the present.

—When Abimael Guzmán died, there was this crisis in the government that he didn't know what to do with his body, has the horror of Shining Path been left behind?

“This is almost the only debate that exists during the elections: whether we are going to have another Abimael or if we need a Fujimori; and we don't debate anything else. Five years ago we discussed how long the president will last. When there is a political crisis and no one believes in them anymore, that is when extremes jump and present the idea that one of these extremes can save the country.

—Something like Vox in Spain...

“In all parts of the world, the far right is growing stronger. Now in Europe he has a conflict because they have traditionally been Putin's partners and that doesn't look so good today. They are phenomena that are appearing worldwide as if we had returned to the Cold War; we can only define ourselves when there is an enemy that is something we supposedly ended up with. It's the end of a dream; the end of the kind of democracy that began in the 1990s.

—So, the novel is more present now than before, it seems that Red April had been written in the 90s.

“I don't know if this novel could be written now in Peru. There are already people who break posters in bookstores because the hammer and sickle come out in the reissue of Red April. Storytelling is a very dangerous job in Peru. Journalists who tell sensitive stories face absurd amounts of legal proceedings because those investigated can afford it. When Red April was first published it had already been the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), and there was a time when Peruvians wanted to hear their stories. The impact of this novel opened up a very sensitive topic that needed to be talked about. There was such a decade, but then there was a backlash against it, even against the symbols of the 80s.

—Prosecutor Chacaltana - the main character of Abril rojo - wants to do things right, but at some point reality explodes in his face. I think that this prosecutor is like Peruvian society that, although we want to do things right, reality explodes.

“We are a society that prefers not to talk about problems and, therefore, does not solve them. I think that one of the things that makes me able to write and my work has such an impact is that I don't live in Peru; I don't get the pressure that many journalists and writers receive to tell stories. It seems to me that we should write novels that we don't want to talk about, our darkest sides of our society. Red April is a book that doesn't tell you what to think, it sends you to discuss and debate; that's the best thing about stories and it's very good in a very polarized environment. They force you to stand on the feet of people who are not like you and explore that humanity of monsters or wonder why someone comes to this. Novels touch the heart. They are not history books that matter because of the information they have. By following these characters you get into their shoes and into the things that have happened like violence in Peru. We need to put ourselves in the shoes of the other person who are not like us and learn to live together.

— Will that ever happen in Peru?

—If we are not able to agree on a democracy, it is when a group like Shining Path or a right-wing authoritarianism comes.

—You have lived through dictatorship, the war on terror, exile and immigration, and you live outside Peru a little more than two decades ago, how do you see Peru from afar?

“My books are a way to return and consider my identity. The love of Peruvian readers is very important because it means that what I write still matters. I am much more pessimistic now than I was in almost two decades and I have been criticized for being naive. The pandemic swept away our shortcomings, undressed many things we didn't want to see and ruined our political system. We have a political class that doesn't end up liking, but we don't have another. We need you to come to an agreement. That also keeps talent and honest people away from politics because if a government is going to last two months it means there isn't a project.

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