When I was born, in 1946, Lima was home to 640,000 people. Now, as I’m about to turn 77 in the year 2023, Lima is a city of 10 million. The population has grown more than 15-fold. In some ways, you could say that I’ve survived alongside the city. I’ve gotten to know all 43 of its districts and municipalities, and I can say with true pride that I’ve suffered but also delighted in this gray, sleepy city. As Herman Melville describes it, in “Moby Dick”:
Nor is it, altogether, the remembrance of her cathedral-toppling earthquakes; nor the stampedoes of her frantic seas; nor the tearlessness of arid skies that never rain; nor the sight of her wide field of leaning spires, wrenched cope-stones, and crosses all adroop (like canted yards of anchored fleets); and her suburban avenues of house-walls lying over upon each other, as a tossed pack of cards; it is not these things alone which make tearless Lima, the strangest, saddest city thou can’st see. For Lima has taken the white veil; and there is a higher horror in this whiteness of her woe.
Picture a sandy desert that stretches along the Pacific Ocean. This squalid coastline is bisected by a river, the Rimac. In the middle of the oasis created there is a metropolis — uncertain, cheerful, oh so civilized, somewhat isolated from the world. The luscious tropical flora belies the fact that it doesn’t rain here: The proximity to the sea means that the humid air brings forth new buds and shoots all year round.
Despite, or perhaps because of, their many facets and complexities, Lima and Peru have been depicted and imagined in myriad ways since the city’s official founding by Francisco Pizarro in 1535, and the ensuing five centuries has seen numerous visions, histories and interpretations. I myself have approached Lima from different points of view: I’ve written stories about young people in the margins, in the working-class neighborhoods of Lima, and also, as the son of Japanese parents who settled in Peru, I’ve set Limeñan nikkeis to fiction.
What should I read before I pack my bags?
A number of authors offer valuable insights into Peru’s, and Lima’s, complex past. Let’s start with Inca Garcilaso de la Vega (1539—1616). He was the son of a Spanish captain and a palla — a member of Incan royalty — making him mestizo. He’s considered the first Peruvian, spiritually speaking. His “Royal Commentaries of the Incas and General History of Peru,” about the origins of the Incas, the kings of Peru, and their ways of worship, laws and governance in times of peace and war, was first published in Lisbon in 1609. It was very successful — and is still available now. Today, we know that de la Vega’s vision of the Incas was idealized.
Another essential author in Peruvian letters is Ricardo Palma (1833—1919). His “Peruvian Traditions” consists of four volumes of crónicas, or accounts, of the Incas, the Conquista, the period of the viceroyalty, the struggle for independence and the republican era, all told from his vantage point in Lima. Palma is lighthearted, ironic, amusing and anticlerical by nature, and in his writing he makes fun of the sumptuous interiorities of viceroys and courtesans.
To complement Palma, perhaps we could take a look at the watercolors of Pancho Fierro (ca. 1810—1879). He painted hundreds of images that show the customs and characters of 19th century Lima, including artisans, merchants, soldiers and water vendors with their donkeys. Palma owned many of his works, which are now at the Pinacoteca Municipal Ignacio Merino.
Moving now into the 20th century, César Vallejo (1892—1938) and his poetry are essential. The founder of modernist poetry in Peru, Vallejo made Indigenous displacement and sorrow universal with his peculiar, eternal language in “Human Poems.”
Which stories provide a glimpse into modern Lima’s complexity?
The rural Indigenista wave led by Ciro Alegría and José María Arguedas between the 1930s and 1950s was followed by the rise of an urban, fundamentally Limeñan narrative that has made its way into the city’s many corners. It has branched into many works and lineages — not just in literature but also in sociological and historical writing, painting, architecture and culture in general.
From this contradictory world, our 2010 Nobel laureate Mario Vargas Llosa (1936—) is a standout. I will limit myself to discussing his novel “Conversation in the Cathedral,” because it centers on a serious problem of governance: the Latin American dictatorship. Through two volumes and more than 100 characters, Vargas Llosa contemplates the sinister military men who have held power in this country.
I would be remiss not to mention the great Julio Ramón Ribeyro (1929—1994). His stories — many of which were translated into English by Katherine Silver for the 2019 collection “The Word of the Speechless” — focus on the Limeñan middle class and their particular notes of mediocrity, neglect and loneliness. Ribeyro is synonymous with individual and family frustration in the era of the urban oligarchy, which he commits to the page with undeniable objectivity.
Other great Peruvian novels include “A World for Julius,” in which Alfredo Bryce Echenique (1939—) depicts the Limeñan oligarchy with his distinctive sense of humor and irony. Julius is a child of the aristocracy who prefers the company of servants, lackeys and the working-class members of his neighborhood in Miraflores.
I will also add a novel by Santiago Roncagliolo (1975—), “Red April,” which explores the final years of a bloody period in Peruvian history, when the Shining Path guerrillas and a government characterized by hunger and corruption clashed in a terrible war, during which murders and disappearances were our daily bread.
Finally, we have Daniel Alarcón (1977—), whose books “Lost City Radio” and “War by Candlelight” also take on a country convulsed by the war against the Shining Path.
What literary landmarks and bookstores should I visit?
The literary icons perhaps most easily found in Lima’s cultural orbit are Ricardo Palma, César Vallejo, Julio Ramón Ribeyro, Mario Vargas Llosa, José María Arguedas and Alfredo Bryce Echenique. They are everywhere: These authors’ complete works circulate in the big bookstores in the Miraflores neighborhood and in central Lima. Plazas and streets carry their names; in some cases, busts and monuments have been erected in their honor. Even the currency bears images of Palma, Vallejo and Arguedas.
There’s also a permanent used (and pirated) books market on Jirón Amazonas, and a plethora of museums dedicated to pre-Incan cultures as well as the colonial and republican eras.
Augusto Higa Oshiro’s Lima Reading List
“Royal Commentaries of the Incas and General History of Peru,” Inca Garcilaso de la Vega, translated by Harold V. Livermore
“Peruvian Traditions,” Ricardo Palma, translated by Helen Lane
“Human Poems,” César Vallejo, translated by Clayton Eshleman
“Conversation in the Cathedral,” Mario Vargas Llosa, translated by Gregory Rabassa
“The Word of the Speechless,” Julio Ramón Ribeyro, translated by Katherine Silver
“A World for Julius,” Alfredo Bryce Echenique, translated by Dick Gerdes
“Red April,” Santiago Roncagliolo, translated by Edith Grossman
“Lost City Radio” and “War by Candlelight,” Daniel Alarcón
Augusto Higa Oshiro’s “The Enlightenment of Katzuo Nakamatsu,” published in May 2023 by Archipelago Books, was translated by Jennifer Shyue. He died in Lima in April 2023.