 = The Feast of the Goat = 
 
 The Feast of the Goat ( Spanish : La fiesta del chivo , 2000 ) is a novel by the Peruvian Nobel Prize in Literature laureate Mario Vargas Llosa . The book is set in the Dominican Republic and portrays the assassination of Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo , and its aftermath , from two distinct standpoints a generation apart : during and immediately after the assassination itself , in May 1961 ; and thirty five years later , in 1996 . Throughout , there is also extensive reflection on the heyday of the dictatorship , in the 1950s , and its significance for the island and its inhabitants . 
 The novel follows three interwoven storylines . The first concerns a woman , Urania Cabral , who is back in the Dominican Republic , after a long absence , to visit her ailing father ; she ends up recalling incidents from her youth and recounting a long @-@ held secret to her aunt and cousins . The second story line focuses on the last day in Trujillo 's life from the moment he wakes up onwards , and shows us the regime 's inner circle , to which Urania 's father once belonged . The third strand depicts Trujillo 's assassins , many of whom had previously been government loyalists , as they wait for his car late that night ; after the assassination , this story line shows us the assassins ' persecution . Each aspect of the book 's plot reveals a different viewpoint on the Dominican Republic 's political and social environment , past and present . 
 Readers are shown the regime 's downward spiral , Trujillo 's assassination , and its aftermath through the eyes of insiders , conspirators , and a middle @-@ aged woman looking back . The novel is therefore a kaleidoscopic portrait of dictatorial power , including its psychological effects , and its long @-@ term impact . The novel 's themes include the nature of power and corruption , and their relationship to machismo and sexual perversion in a rigidly hierarchical society with strongly gendered roles . Memory , and the process of remembering , is also an important theme , especially in Urania 's narrative as she recalls her youth in the Dominican Republic . Her story ( and the book as a whole ) ends when she recounts the terrible events that led to her leaving the country at the age of 14 . The book itself serves as a reminder of the atrocities of dictatorship , to ensure that the dangers of absolute power will be remembered by a new generation . 
 Vargas Llosa interlaces fictional elements and historical events : the book is not a documentary , and the Cabral family , for instance , is completely fictional . On the other hand , the characters of Trujillo and Trujillo 's assassins are drawn from the historical record ; Vargas Llosa weaves real historical incidents of brutality and oppression into these people 's stories , to further illuminate the nature of the regime and the responses it provoked . In Vargas Llosa 's words , " It 's a novel , not a history book , so I took many , many liberties . [ . . . ] I have respected the basic facts , but I have changed and deformed many things in order to make the story more persuasive — and I have not exaggerated . " 
 The Feast of the Goat received largely positive reviews , with several reviewers commenting on the book 's depiction of the relationship between sexuality and power , and on the graphic descriptions of violent events . 
 A film version of the novel was released in 2005 , starring Isabella Rossellini , Paul Freeman , and Tomas Milian . Jorge Alí Triana and his daughter Veronica Triana wrote a theatrical adaptation in 2003 . 
 
 = = Background = = 
 
 The Feast of the Goat is only the second of Vargas Llosa 's novels to be set outside Peru ( the first being The War of the End of the World ) . It is also unusual because it is the first to have a female protagonist : as critic Lynn Walford writes of the leading character in The Feast of the Goat , and also Vargas Llosa 's subsequent book The Way to Paradise , " both are utterly unlike any of the other female characters in his previous novels " . 
 The novel examines the dictatorial regime of Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina in the Dominican Republic . Trujillo was , in historian Eric Roorda 's words , " a towering influence in Dominican and Caribbean history " who presided over " one of the most durable regimes of the twentieth century " during the thirty @-@ one years between his seizure of power in 1930 and his assassination in 1961 . Trujillo had trained with the United States Marine Corps during the United States occupation of the island , and graduated from the Haina Military Academy in 1921 . After the U.S. departed in 1924 , he became head of the Dominican National Police which , under his command , was transformed into the Dominican National Army and Trujillo 's personal " virtually autonomous power base " . 
 Trujillo was officially dictator only from 1930 to 1938 , and from 1942 to 1952 , but remained in effective power throughout the entire period . Though his regime was broadly nationalist , Daniel Chirot comments that he had " no particular ideology " and that his economic and social policies were basically progressive . 
 The novel 's title is taken from the popular Dominican merengue Mataron al chivo ( " They Killed the Goat " ) , which refers to Trujillo 's assassination on May 30 , 1961 . Merengue is a style of music created by Ñico Lora in the 1920s and actively promoted by Trujillo himself ; it is now considered the country 's national music . Cultural critics Julie Sellers and Stephen Ropp comment about this particular merengue that , by envisaging the dictator as an animal who could be turned into a stew ( as frequently happened with goats struck down on the Dominican Republic 's highways ) , the song " gave those performing , listening to and dancing to this merengue a sense of control over him and over themselves that they had not experienced for over three decades . " Vargas Llosa quotes the lyrics to Mataron al chivo at the beginning of the novel . 
 
 = = Plot summary = = 
 
 The novel 's narrative is divided into three distinct strands . One is centred on Urania Cabral , a fictional Dominican character ; another deals with the conspirators involved in Trujillo 's assassination ; and the third focuses on Trujillo himself . The novel alternates between these storylines , and also jumps back and forth from 1961 to 1996 , with frequent flashbacks to periods earlier in Trujillo 's regime . 
 The Feast of the Goat begins with the return of Urania to her hometown of Santo Domingo , a city which had been renamed Ciudad Trujillo during Trujillo 's time in power . This storyline is largely introspective and deals with Urania 's memories and her inner turmoil over the events preceding her departure from the Dominican Republic thirty @-@ five years earlier . Urania escaped the crumbling Trujillo regime in 1961 by claiming she planned to study under the tutelage of nuns in Michigan . In the following decades , she becomes a prominent and successful New York lawyer . She finally returns to the Dominican Republic in 1996 , on a whim , and finds herself compelled to confront her father and elements of her past she has long ignored . As Urania speaks to her ailing father , Agustin Cabral , she recalls more and more of the anger and disgust that led to her thirty @-@ five years of silence . Urania retells her father 's descent into political disgrace , and the betrayal that forms the crux of both Urania 's storyline and that of Trujillo himself . 
 The second and third storylines are set in 1961 , in the weeks prior to and following Trujillo 's assassination on 30 May . Each assassin has his own background story , explaining his motivation for his involvement in the assassination plot . Each has been wronged by Trujillo and his regime , by torture and brutality , or through assaults on their pride , their religious faith , their morality , or their loved ones . Vargas Llosa weaves the tale of the men as memories recalled on the night of Trujillo 's death , as the conspirators lie in wait for " The Goat " . Interconnected with these stories are the actions of other famous Trujillistas of the time : Joaquín Balaguer , the puppet president ; Johnny Abbes García , the merciless head of the Military Intelligence Service ( SIM ) ; and various others — some real , some composites of historical figures , and some purely fictional . 
 The third storyline is concerned with the thoughts and motives of Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina himself . The chapters concerning The Goat recall the major events of his time , including the slaughter of thousands of Dominican Haitians in 1937 . They also deal with the Dominican Republic 's tense international relationships during the Cold War , especially with the United States under the presidency of John F. Kennedy , and Cuba under Castro . Vargas Llosa also speculates upon Trujillo 's innermost thoughts and paints a picture of a man whose physical body is failing him . Trujillo is tormented by incontinence and impotence ; and this storyline intersects with Urania 's narrative when it is revealed that Urania was sexually assaulted by Trujillo . He is unable to achieve an erection with Urania , and in frustration and anger he rapes her with his hands . This event is the core of Urania 's shame , and her hatred towards her father . In addition , it is the cause of Trujillo 's repeated anger over the " anemic little bitch " that witnessed his impotence and emotion , and the reason he is en route to sleep with another girl on the night of his assassination . 
 In the novel 's final chapters , the three storylines intersect with increasing frequency . The tone of these chapters is especially dark as they deal primarily with the horrific torture and death of the assassins at the hands of the SIM , the failure of the coup , the rape of Urania , and the concessions made to Trujillo 's most vicious supporters allowing them to enact their horrific revenge on the conspirators and then escape the country . The book ends as Urania prepares to return home , determined this time to keep in touch with her family back on the island . 
 
 = = Characters = = 
 
 
 = = = Modern day = = = 
 
 Urania Cabral and her father Agustín Cabral appear in both the modern day and historical portions of the novel . In the year 1996 , Urania returns to the Dominican Republic for the first time since her departure at the age of 14 . She is a successful New York lawyer who has spent most of the past 35 years trying to overcome the traumas of her childhood , a goal she pursues through an academic fascination with Trujillo and Dominican history . Urania is deeply troubled by the events of her past , and is compelled to confront her father Agustín about his role in those events . Urania visits her father , finding him weakened by age and a severe stroke , so much so that he is barely able to respond physically to her presence , let alone speak . Agustín listens helplessly as Urania recounts his past as " Egghead Cabral " , a high @-@ ranking member of Trujillo 's inner circle , and his drastic fall from grace . Urania details Agustín 's role in the events that led to her rape by the Dominican leader , and to her subsequent lifetime of celibacy and emotional trauma . Agustín 's character in the modern day portion of the novel serves primarily as a sounding board for Urania 's recollections of the Trujillo era and the events that surrounded both Agustín Cabral 's disgrace and Urania 's escape from the country . His responses are minimal and non @-@ vocal , despite the ardency of Urania 's accusations and the enormity of his own actions during Trujillo 's reign . 
 
 = = = The Trujillo regime = = = 
 
 Rafael Trujillo , known also as The Goat , The Chief , and The Benefactor , is a fictionalized character based on the real dictator of the Dominican Republic from 1930 to 1961 and the official President of the Republic from 1930 to 1938 and 1943 to 1952 . In The Feast of the Goat , Vargas Llosa imagines the innermost thoughts of the dictator , and retells The Goat 's last hours from his own perspective . Trujillo 's character struggles with aging and the physical problems of incontinence and impotence . Through fictional events and first person narrative , the reader is given insight into the man who , during his " thirty @-@ one years of horrendous political crimes " , modernized the country 's infrastructure and military , but whose regime 's attacks against its enemies overseas ( particularly the attempted assassination of Rómulo Betancourt , president of Venezuela ) led to the imposition of economic sanctions on the Dominican Republic by the Organization of American States in the 1950s . The resultant economic downturn , in conjunction with other factors , leads to the CIA supported assassination plot that ends Trujillo 's life on May 30 , 1961 . 
 Trujillo 's regime is supported by Johnny Abbes García , the head of the Military Intelligence Service ( SIM ) , a brutal man to whom many " disappearances , ... executions , ... sudden falls into disgrace " are attributed . Abbes and his intelligence officers are notorious for their cruelty , particularly their habit of killing dissidents by throwing them into shark @-@ infested waters . Colonel Abbes " may be the devil , but he 's useful to the Chief ; everything bad is attributed to him and only the good to Trujillo " . Trujillo 's son , Ramfis Trujillo , is a loyal supporter of the Chief . After unsuccessful attempts at schooling in the United States , Ramfis returns to the Dominican Republic to serve in his father 's military . He is a well @-@ known womanizer . Upon Trujillo 's death , Ramfis seeks revenge , even going so far as to torture and kill his uncle by marriage , General Jose Roman , for his part in the assassination conspiracy . 
 Joaquín Balaguer , Trujillo 's puppet president is also a supporter , and initially his seemingly innocuous character holds no real power . Following Trujillo 's death , the calm and serenity of Balaguer bring about real change in his character , and General Román comments that " this insignificant man whom everyone had always considered a mere clerk , a purely decorative figure in the regime , began to acquire surprising authority " . It is Balaguer who guides much of the action in the last sections of the book . 
 
 = = = Conspirators = = = 
 
 The storyline concerning the assassination primarily follows the four conspirators who directly participate in Trujillo 's death . Antonio Imbert Barrera is one of the few conspirators who survives the violent reprisals that follow Trujillo 's assassination . Imbert is a politician who becomes disillusioned with the deception and cruelty of the Trujillo regime . His first plan to kill Trujillo was foiled by the unsuccessful attempted overthrow of the regime by Cuban paramilitary forces . Now convinced of the difficulty of his task , Imbert joins the other conspirators in plotting Trujillo 's death . Among the others is Antonio de la Maza , one of Trujillo 's personal guards . Antonio 's brother is killed as part of a government cover @-@ up and Antonio swears revenge upon Trujillo . Salvador Estrella Sadhalá , known as " Turk " , is a devout Catholic who , in indignation at the regime 's many crimes against God , swears an oath against Trujillo . Turk eventually turns himself in for fear that the regime was torturing his family . Both Turk and his innocent brother are then tortured for months . His father remains loyal to Trujillo and disowns Turk to his face . Despite all of this , Turk refuses to commit suicide and does not lose faith in God . He is later executed by Ramfis and other high level government men . Turk 's close friend , Amado García Guerrero , known as Amadito , is a Lieutenant in the army who gave up his beloved as proof of his loyalty to Trujillo , and then later was forced to kill her brother to prove himself to Trujillo . Amadito 's disgust with himself and disillusionment with the regime lead to his decision to help to kill Trujillo . Following the assassination he hides out with de la Maza and dies fighting . In the aftermath of the assassination , Amadito and Antonio de la Maza choose to fight the members of SIM who come to arrest them , opting to die in battle rather than be captured and tortured . 
 
 = = Major themes = = 
 
 The Feast of the Goat 's major themes include political corruption , machismo , memory , and writing and power . Olga Lorenzo , reviewer for The Melbourne Age , suggests that overall Vargas Llosa 's aim is to reveal the irrational forces of Latin tradition that give rise to despotism . 
 
 = = = Political corruption = = = 
 
 The structure of Dominican society was hierarchical , with strongly gendered roles . Rafael Trujillo , the ruler , was a cruel dictator who haunts the people of Santo Domingo even 35 years after his death . He is a true caudillo , ruling with brutality and corruption . He creates a personality cult in his capitalist society and encourages decadence within his regime . Prior to promotion to a position of responsibility , an officer is required to pass a " test of loyalty " . His people are to remain loyal to him all cost , and are periodically tested by public humiliation and censure even though acts of disloyalty were rare . Trujillo violates women and children as an expression of political and sexual power , and in some cases takes the wife or child of his lieutenants , many of whom still remain blindly loyal . Even the church and military institutions are employed to give women to the tyrant for pleasure . 
 Many of the assassins had belonged to the Trujillo regime or had at one point been its staunch supporters , only to find their support for him eroded by the state 's crimes against its people . Imbert , one of the assassins , sums up this realization in a comment prompted by the murder of the Mirabal sisters : " They kill our fathers , our brothers , our friends . And now they 're killing our women . And here we sit , resigned , waiting our turn . " In an interview , Vargas Llosa describes the corruption and brutality of Trujillo 's regime : " He had more or less all the common traits of a Latin American dictator , but pushed to the extreme . In cruelty , I think he went far far away from the rest — and in corruption , too . " 
 
 = = = Machismo = = = 
 
 According to literary scholar Peter Anthony Niessa , the two important components of machismo are aggressive behaviour and hyper @-@ sexuality . Aggressive behaviour is exhibited by displays of power and strength , while hyper @-@ sexuality is revealed through sexual activity with as many partners as possible . These two components shape the portrayal of Trujillo and his regime in The Feast of the Goat . As Lorenzo observes , Vargas Llosa " reveals traditions of machismo , of abusive fathers , and of child @-@ rearing practices that repeat the shaming of children , so that each generation bequeaths a withering of the soul to the subsequent one . " 
 In a display of both aspects of machismo , Trujillo demanded of his aides and cabinet that they provide him with sexual access to their wives and daughters . Mario Vargas Llosa wrote of Trujillo 's machismo and treatment of women , " [ h ] e went to bed with his ministers ' wives , not only because he liked these ladies but because it was a way to test his ministers . He wanted to know if they were ready to accept this extreme humiliation . Mainly the ministers were prepared to play this grotesque role — and they remained loyal to Trujillo even after his death . " Trujillo 's sexual conquests and public humiliations of his enemies also serve to affirm his political power and machismo . In Niessa 's words , " The implication is that maximum virility equals political dominance . " 
 Trujillo 's attempted sexual conquest of Urania is an example of both political manipulation of Agustín Cabral and sexual power over young women . However , as Trujillo 's penis remains flaccid throughout the encounter and he is humiliated in front of the young girl , the encounter fails to satisfy his requirements for machismo . 
 
 = = = Memory = = = 
 
 All of the novel 's storylines concern memory in some sense or another . The most apparent confrontation of memory is on the part of Urania Cabral , who has returned to the Dominican Republic for the first time in 30 years , and is forced to confront her father and the traumas that led her to leave the country at 14 . She was the victim of sexual abuse at the hands of the dictator himself , a sacrifice her father made to try to gain favor with the dictator again , a fact to which she alludes throughout the book , but which is only revealed at the very end : the book concludes with her recounting the memory of that night to her aunt and cousins , who never knew the true reason she left the country . When her aunt is surprised that she remembers all these details , she responds that while she forgets many things , " I remember everything about that night . " For Urania , forgetting the atrocities committed by the regime is unacceptable . Her father , on the other hand , is not capable of joining her in this process of remembering , since he has suffered a stroke and is not capable of speaking ; however , Urania is angry that he chose to forget these things while he was still capable of acknowledging them . 
 Memory is also important in the sections of the novel that deal with the assassins . Each recalls the events that led him to take part in the assassination of Trujillo . These incidents included the 1956 Galindez kidnapping and murder , the 1960 murder of the Mirabal sisters , and the 1961 split with the Catholic Church . These historical events are used by Vargas Llosa to connect the assassins with specific moments that demonstrate the violence of Trujillo 's regime . Trujillo , too , is shown reflecting on the past , not least his own formation and training at the hands of the US Marines . 
 But above all Mario Vargas Llosa uses the fictional Urania to facilitate the novel 's attempt at remembering the regime . The novel opens and closes with Urania 's story , effectively framing the narrative in the terms of remembering the past and understanding its legacy in the present . In addition , because of her academic study of the history of the Trujillo regime , Urania is also confronting the memory of the regime for the country as a whole . This is in keeping with one purpose of the book , which is to ensure that the atrocities of the dictatorship and the dangers of absolute power will be remembered by a new generation . 
 
 = = = Writing and power = = = 
 
 In her treatment of the novel , María Regina Ruiz claims that power gives its wielder the ability to make prohibitions ; prohibitions that are reflected in history , the study of which reveals what is and what is not told . The government 's actions in The Feast of the Goat demonstrate the discourse of prohibition : foreign newspapers and magazines were prohibited from entering Trujillo 's country as they were seen as a threat to the government 's ideas . Mario Vargas Llosa takes part in this discourse by recounting what was prohibited . 
 Ruiz notes that writing also has the power to transform reality . It brings the reader back to the past , allowing the reader to comprehend myths or distorted stories told by historians . Ruiz contends that knowing the past is crucial to one 's understanding of the present that takes us to postmodernism , and argues that The Feast of the Goat can thus be seen as a postmodern discourse that gives power to history recreation . 
 The construction of fictions surrounding the events of Trujillo 's regime allow a degree of freedom from the horrors that took places . Author Julia Alvarez contends that these events can " only finally be understood by fiction , only finally be redeemed by the imagination " , while Richard Patterson claims that Vargas Llosa " reconfigures , and to a large degree demythologizes " Trujillo and his brutal reign through use of narrative structure . Vargas Llosa 's writing acts as a cathartic force for this period in history . 
 
 = = Fact and fiction = = 
 
 The novel is a combination of fact and fiction . Blending together these two elements is important in any historical novel , but especially in The Feast of the Goat because Vargas Llosa chose to narrate an actual event through the minds of both real and fictional characters . Some characters are fictional , and those that are non @-@ fictional still have fictionalized aspects in the book . The general details of the assassination are true , and the assassins are all real people . While they lie in wait for the Dictator to arrive , they recount actual crimes of the regime , such as the murder of the Mirabal sisters . However , other details are invented by Vargas Llosa , such as Amadito 's murder of the brother of the woman he loved . 
 Those within the regime are also a mix of fictional characters and real people . President Balaguer is real , but the entire Cabral family is completely fictional . According to Wolff , Vargas Llosa " uses history as a starting point in constructing a fictionalized account of Trujillo 's " spiritual colonization " of the Dominican Republic as experienced by one Dominican family . The fictional Cabral family allows Vargas Llosa to show two sides of the Trujillo regime : through Agustin , the reader sees ultimate dedication and sacrifice to the leader of the nation ; through Urania , the violence of the regime and the legacy of pain it left behind . Vargas Llosa also fictionalized the internal thoughts of the characters who were non @-@ fictional , especially those of the Goat himself . According to literary scholar Richard Patterson , " Vargas Llosa 's expands all the way into the very " dark area " of Trujillo 's consciousness ( as the storyteller dares to conceive it ) . " 
 Vargas Llosa also built an image of the regime with the troubled historical events . With regard to the historical accuracy of the book , Vargas Llosa has said " It 's a novel , not a history book , so I took many , many liberties . The only limitation I imposed on myself was that I was not going to invent anything that couldn 't have happened within the framework of life in the Dominican Republic . I have respected the basic facts , but I have changed and deformed many things in order to make the story more persuasive — and I have not exaggerated . " 
 
 = = Critical reception = = 
 
 The realist style of The Feast of the Goat is recognized by some reviewers as being a break from a more allegorical approach to the dictator novel . The novel received largely positive reviews , most of which were willing to accept sacrifices of historical accuracy in favour of good storytelling . 
 A common comment on the novel is the graphic nature of the many acts of torture and murder which are depicted in the novel . Vargas lets the reader see the realities of an oppressive regime with a degree of detail not often used by his compatriots in Latin American literature , as Michael Wood suggests in the London Review of Books : " Vargas Llosa ... tells us far more about the details of day @-@ to @-@ day intrigue , and the sordid , sadistic minutiae of torture and murder . " Walter Kirn of the New York Times suggests that the " grisly scenes of dungeon interrogations and torture sessions " cast other aspects of the novel in a pale light , draining them of their significance and impact . Similarly , Kirn implies that the " narrative machinery " mentioned by Wood as being somewhat unwieldy also produces a largely superfluous storyline . The plot line centered on Urania Cabral is described by Sturrock as being an emotional centre that focuses the novel , and Wood agrees that her confrontations with past demons hold the readers attention . In contrast , Kirn 's review states that Urania 's segments are " talky and atmospheric ... [ and ] seem to be on loan from another sort of book . " 
 Most reviews of The Feast of the Goat make either indirect of direct reference to the relationship between sexuality and power . Salon reviewer Laura Miller , writer for The Observer Jonathan Heawood , Walter Kirn , and Michael Wood each detail the connection between Trujillo 's gradual loss of ultimate control , both over his body and his followers . The means by which Trujillo reinforces political power through sexual acts and begins to lose personal conviction as his body fails him are topics of frequent discussion among reviewers . 
 In 2011 Bernard Diederich , author of the 1978 non @-@ fiction book Trujillo . The Death of the Goat , accused Vargas @-@ Llosa of plagiarism . 
 
 = = Adaptations = = 
 
 An English @-@ language film adaptation of the novel was made in 2005 , directed by Luis Llosa , Mario Vargas Llosa 's cousin . It stars Isabella Rossellini as Urania Cabral , Paul Freeman as her father Agustin , Stephanie Leonidas as Uranita and Tomas Milian as Rafael Leonidas Trujillo . It was filmed in both the Dominican Republic and in Spain . Reviewing the film for the trade paper Variety , critic Jonathan Holland called it " less a feast than a somewhat rushed , but thoroughly enjoyable , three @-@ course meal " , commenting that the main difference from the source novel was the sacrifice of psychological nuance . 
 The novel has also been adapted for the stage , by Jorge Alí Triana and his daughter Veronica Triana , directed by Jorge Triana : the play was put on ( in Spanish , but with simultaneous translation to English ) at Repertorio Español ( www.repertorio.org / chivo ) in New York in 2003 ; and the production moved to Lima in 2007 . A feature of the novel 's stage version is that the same actor plays both Agustin Cabral and Rafael Trujillo . For reviewer Bruce Weber , this makes the point " that Trujillo 's control of the nation depended on gutless collaborators " . 
 
 