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Eyewear Publishing - Giuseppe Bartoli

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38 pages

English

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Fiction. Latino/Latina Studies. Part political expose, part literary tour-de-force, SINCHI is a gory exploration of one of the darkest periods in Peru's history. Bartoli skilfully sews Peru's mythological history in with the atrocities of the 1980-1993 guerrilla war between American-funded paramilitaries and the insurgent Sendero Luminoso. Weaving an ambitious historical thread that ties together subjugators and their victims across centuries, Bartoli's narration dances between black humour and ferocious accusation as he relates his own account of a civilisation-shattering violence kept hidden from the public eye. SINCHI is a cry of rage and a damning indictment of power and its abuse.

Informations

Publié par	Eyewear Publishing
Date de parution	22 mai 2020
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781839780370
Langue	English
Poids de l'ouvrage	2 Mo

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0250€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

Extrait

First published in 2017
by Eyewear Publishing Ltd
Suite 333, 19-21 Crawford Street
Marylebone, London W1H 1PJ
United Kingdom
Cover design and typeset by Edwin Smet
Printed in England by TJ International Ltd, Padstow, Cornwall
All rights reserved
2017-2020 Giuseppe Bartoli
ISBN 9781839780370
The right of Giuseppe Bartoli to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in accordance with section 77 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988

This is a work of creative nonfiction; all of the persons depicted in the novella are fictitious and in no way represent real individuals.
WWW.EYEWEARPUBLISHING.COM
Giuseppe Bartoli is a Peruvian-Italian-American writer, whose poetry and prose is published widely, in the UK, America, and Peru. He has lived in the UK, Italy, France, and Spain, as well as across South America. This is his debut novel in English.

Oliver Jones (editor) is Peruvian-British, and has a BA from Oxford. He is an editor at Eyewear and the author of several books.

CONTENTS
Sinchi
Endnotes
The only thing more dreadful than the sight of shit is stepping on it. Even worse, being covered in it, like the character of Santiago Nasar in the opening aper u of Cr nica de una Muerte Anunciada . Llama. Guanaco. Vicu a, if you can afford it 1 . Specifics don t matter, because shit is shit. And being full of it is just as bad.
Speaking of shit, if it hadn t been for a hint of twilight, this place would appear to be the asshole of the world. Time-wise, it could go either way, as Inti could easily be confused with Mama Quillya 2 . That is why the Incas built temples for both. Just in case. For moments like this when a random deity might prove to be the difference between living and dying.
This also helps to explain why the Incas built so many of these temples around the empire - just to be safe - like their never-ending litany of gods. Illapa 3 . Pachamama 4 . Mama Cocha 5 . Pacha Kamaq. Pariacaca 6 . None worked out. None of them came to the Inca s rescue when they confused the Spanish for their intangible gods.
Maybe the Spanish were the best thing that ever happened to the Incas. Had they been monotheists, perhaps they d still be around. Sometimes, what appears to be our salvation is in truth the source of our demise.
Refocusing on the sky, it looks like a giant ripe avocado split in half. However, both the pulp and pip of the new day are tightly fastened to the rind of yesterday. Clinging. Its dark texture resembles a pair of black special unit commando boots, imprinting their leathery darkness all over the heavens. And with each impression left behind, there s the possibility of the godless militant whose boots match the footprint.
Men. Women. Children. Treading. Stomping. Marching. Fighting. Dying. And as you read this, their strides begin to echo off your subconscious mind. Giving form. Features. Faces. Fingers. Taking shape and filling in the shades. It s not until you hear their voices - pleas, shouts, shrieks - that the nothingness produces in you the impression of nonbeing. The hysteria is interrupted by a series of guttural noises, similar to coughs, seeking an ear to become sound.
Disoriented by the blankness, finding the source of these noises is like being a bat stuck in infinite space: the sounds have nowhere to bounce off. Perspective is impossible. However, a sign of hope arrives with the passing of a few more minutes, as the sounds begin to travel at intervals, much like waves. It must be Mama Cocha s way of letting her sisters Pachamama and Pariacaca know about the coming dead and the disappeared.
Crashing waves. Crashed economy. Crash course. I cannot hear their voices, see their faces, as before. The spume is ash, and ash proverbially returns to dust. Covering books. Shelves. Hands. Homes. Everything is crushed into a finer powder with each subsequent car bomb. Spewing more dust into the air, until we breathe nothing but ourselves. Our generation will be remembered as air. Vanished. Los desaparecidos 7 .
However, the ensuing darkness has no intention of disappearing, as it makes its presence felt, once again, transmitting a series of crunching sounds without revealing their source. Similar to sitting for over twenty hours on an interprovincial bus next to a paisano nibbling on charqui or chacchando 8 coca leaves with his mouth open, our eavesdropping pays dividends, as the exasperating munching noises make you forget all about the feelings of uncertainty triggered by the inescapable darkness.
Unfortunately, these unpleasant noises cannot prevent the mind from drawing an infinite number of absurd conclusions about the origins of these sounds. Of all peoples, Peruvians take this mannerism and turn it into an art, such is their ability to manipulate that fine line between fact and fiction. For example, when something doesn t sound or seem convenient, Peruvians cover their faces with a black mantilla, as if saying to me this sounds just as good as the truth, so it must be fact .
Copernicus! I m sorry to tell you, but in this country you are wrong. Latin America is your antithesis. Here, the world s not heliocentric: it s Lima-centric. And in Lima, not knowing is worse than bluffing it. So how can you blame the gossip-mongering citizens of a tabloid-dependent nation for making assertions?
Here, a scandal sheet - which reads much like a magical realism novel - might set you back 50p, but a book could cost you up to a week s wages. Here, Monopoly s a game and not the reason there s only one newspaper left to cover a country six times the size of England. Here, self-importance and false prejudices are the unwritten laws of the land. Here, what is printed in capital letters revolves around the first city. Here, we have not even begun to scrape the surface of what s really wrong with Peru.
Like a heart heading into tachycardia - not rest, or arrest - the pair of black special unit commando boots that is the night, can be heard moving. Treading. Stomping. Marching. The brain cannot help itself anymore. It accelerates. The particles of thought are light. Travelling. Conclusions begin to draw themselves, as if saying Deng Xiaoping, you son of a bitch : I ve been here all along! Warning of the true message behind the hanging hides. Wanting to cut off the nooses of guilt that have been tied on my mental lampposts since the 26th of December, 1980 9 .
I ve been waking up ever since in the middle of the night. Sweat-covered. Words on the tip of my tongue. Cangallo. Huamanga. Huanca Sancos. La Mar. Lucanas. Parinacochas. Paucar del Sara Sara. Sucre. V ctor Fajardo. Vilcas Huam n. Huanta 10 . It s not my fault they died first in my dreams, and then in real life. I might as well have been subconsciously a terrorista . An MRtista 11 . A Senderista 12 .
Maybe I should have been the most insignificant columnist for the cheapest tabloid in the nation. Underpaid. Unnoticeable. Untraceable. Unprincipled. Willing to spread gossip all over the toast of truth. They pay for my lies because they cannot come up with their own. And gossip s just what the inner doctor prescribes - only 50p per dose per morning - to momentarily block out the insecurities of the time, even before you hit page three.
Power outages. Curfews. Food shortages. Coups d tat. Murders. Disappearances. Corruption. Terrorism. Given the quality of the press and education in this country: I think they might be watching too much MacGyver 13 .
The real impossibility though, is not to think too much about things. Because the more you stop and think about them, during times of uncertainty neither work nor truth will set you free. So why protect either? Dying in the name of the truth won t maintain your family when you re gone. The state s not going to verify with the Real Academia Espa ola if your version of the word honesty matches theirs. Faith. Fact. Fulfilment. These are all dependent on your surroundings, and here there are no guarantees except the right to remain silent.
On the 26th of December, 1980, guarantees were hung from lampposts alongside dogs. Now we are the hanging dogs, marking the death of a magical realism in which Peruvians have been living for too long. All we are left with is a reality where the heads of the terrorist organisations are highly educated scholars and the general population averages less than one book per person per year.
That is why I fear Peru might not survive: because our weaknesses play too well into the opposing forces strengths. They ve known it ever since the 26th of December, 1980, when the population was too unaware, too ignorant, and too detached from the world to be able to read between the lines. Hence, they know we have no bluff; they ve already called it.
Even if we re lucky enough to win, I m willing to bet that history books ten, fifteen, twenty years from now won t talk about what happened. Desaparecidos . Most won t remember that there ever was a war. In Peru, people tend to forget quickly. And re-elect. And release. And return right back to where they re starting from. Two steps forward and three steps back. M s vale malo conocido que bueno por conocer 14 .
Anything can happen in this country. Who knows, maybe one day the future of the nation - adolescents, students, protesters, young parents - might wake up and decide that all the imprisoned terrorists are in fact political prisoners. The presidential band on the shoulders of the leader of their choice would be like the two-thirds Inca genetic majority surrendering once again to the Catholic invader, mistaken for a god.
I find myself blabbering again. But I guess that s to be expected since I too am a Peruvian. Though, I have a secret for you. Something most people don t know about me: I was born in the United States. That makes me a nationalised Peruvian, a legal alien, a true American. Because who s more Peruvian: the one who s born here or the one who chooses to be here?
And now the state of