This book is based on the historical events took place in Dominican Republic during 1960's.The country was ruled by Dr.Rafael Leonidas Trujillo Molina called simply as Trujilo or the Chief,or the Goat.Before reading this book i never heard of Trujillo.This story revolves around the assassins who murdered the Trujillo.
Trujillo Era
Over thirty years Trujilo ruled the Dominican Republic with iron fist.He had unquestionable authority on his subjects.He was trained by US Marines.He became president of the Dominican Republic in 1930, from that time officially or unofficially he was the ruler of the country.People were lived in constant fear during his regime. His government was made of mostly his relatives and his own family.His rule is considered as one of the bloodiest in history of all of Americas specially the Caribbeans. Among the cruel things he had done, the
Parsley Massacre was the cruelest, as many as 20,000 to 30,000 people were dead in span of five days.His speech at Dajabon on 2nd October 1937 showed his intentions clearly.
"For some months, I have traveled and traversed the border in every sense of the word. I have seen, investigated, and inquired about the needs of the population. To the Dominicans who were complaining of the depredations by Haitians living among them, thefts of cattle, provisions, fruits, etc., and were thus prevented from enjoying in peace the products of their labor, I have responded, ‘I will fix this.’ And we have already begun to remedy the situation. Three hundred Haitians are now dead in Banica. This remedy will continue." - taken from Wikipedia
The author explains how the Chief struggled with his impotence and his anger towards it.
Joaquin Balaguer was his puppet president, who just followed whatever the Chief told.But the puppet president proved that he was capable of running the country when he calmly handled the situations after the murder of the Chief.
Urania, the daughter of Augstin Cabral
Urania daughter of Augstin Cabral,the Egghead,retuns to Dominican Repulic after almost 30 years, she visits her father who is very sick need assistance for his day-to-day activities.The hatred in her overflows when she explains what happened to her during Trujillo's rein to her aunt and her cousins.Augstin Cabral was one of the senator in Trujillo's government.He lost his favor with the Chief as he was suspected of allying with the Americans,which was not true. Augstin Cabral was one of the few who worked with heart out for Trujillo. After loosing everything including his money and official status,he wanted to make amends with the Chief and regain his lost place.The only option he had that time was Urania.On advise of his long time friend Manuel Alfonso, he agreed to send Urania to Chief's guest house. The Augstin Cabral family in this book are fictionalized characters.
The Assassins
These were the people involved in Trujillo's assasination plot:
Modesto Diaz, Salvador Estrella Sadhala, Antonio de la Maza, Amado García Guerrero, Manuel Caceres Michel, Juan Tomas Diaz,Roberto Pastoriza, Luis Amiama, Antonio Imbert Barrera, Pedro Livio Cedeo, and Huascar Tejeda.Most of them worked in any one of Trujillo's assests i.e factories and farms.Some of the worked in military.Many of these assassins were influenced by the evil done by the regime specially the murder of
Mirabal sisters
Their plot was to ambush Trujilo's car and shoot him till he die and restore Civilian Military rule by Pupo Romano, the defense head. On 30th May 1961 tuesday night , they ambushed the Chief's car and shot him many times before fleeing from the spot with their newly brought car from America.But Pupo Romano did not do anything as planned instead he was scared to death by the things happened in the palace.He was captured latter and executed by the Military Intelligence Service(SIM).
Another important character of this story was Johnny Abbes Garcia, the head of SIM.He was the most trusted man by Chief.He had undisputed powers in defence as well.He was the most feared man in all of Dominican Republic during Trujillo's regime.The methods which he used to torture his victims were horrible, my gosh! this man was a beast.
The story is seen through the eyes of Trujillo's close friends , the assasins and the ordinary people, in this case Urania.Everything happened during the Era was captured beautifully by the author.Its very interesting to know how the employees of this kind of regime worked specially in the defense.As written in this book,one of the assassin Antonio Imbert got many chances to kill the Chief when he worked in defense but he never did, in fact he never tried!!(I dont understand this) The way author switches between the stories of Urania,the assassins and Trujilo is simply wonderful.One must have a knack of talent to write like this and make the reader understand the plot clearly,
Mario Vargas Llosa is excellent in this.Its also very interesting to read the history of a country in three different dimension.
Mario Vargas Llosa is a Peruvian writer who received Nobel Prize for literature in 2010.He has written many wonderful books.
More about Trujilo
More about Johnny Abbes Garcia
Ramfis Trujilo
Porfirio Rubirosa
More info about Dominican Republic:
Flag:The blue is said to stand for Liberty, red for the fire and blood of the independence struggle and the white cross is a symbol of sacrifice.
National Animal :Palm Chat / Cigua Palmera (Dulus dominicus)
National Flower :Mahogany (Swietenia mahagoni)
National Costume:chacabanas
National Dance :Merengue
National Day :February 27
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| Map of Dominican Republic |
