La Chunga (piece)

This article describes a play. For the Spanish dancer of the same name, see La Chunga .

La Chunga ( Spanish: La Chunga ) is a play in two acts by the Peruvian Nobel Prize for Literature, Mario Vargas Llosa , which premiered on January 30, 1986 at the Canout Theater in Lima . The first act consists of five, the second of ten scenes. Each scene is titled.

characters

• The chunga
• Meche
• The mono
• Josefino
• José
• Lituma

content

1

The Chunga, an elderly landlady in a pub in Piura around 1945 , is seen by the guests as a man-woman. This lesbian calls a normally loving woman an “idiot” and “her husband's slave”. The guests are the indomitable Mono, José and Lituma. The creed of these work-shy journeymen is expressed in a verse of their hymn: "Drinking, rascals, birds is our first duty." Josefino, another guest, runs into debts at the gaming table with the invincible. So this lude sells his pretty young friend Meche to the Chunga for 3,000 soles for one night.

2

The Meche obeys - also because it has already learned to obey. Sometimes she had to kneel before the brutal Josefino. During the lesbian intercourse the Meche submits; repeats the sensual, domineering chunga: "I am your slave and now I want to be your whore."

The chunga is also a matchmaker. She got the 3000 soles from Lituma, who wanted to own the meche. Lituma enters the chunga's bedroom. The chunga goes. The sexual intercourse proclaimed by the chunga does not occur. Lituma loves the Meche, wants to escape with her and marry her.

The mono enters the bedroom. He lets himself be whipped by the Chunga and the Meche for a perfidy perpetrated on a virgin years ago (the mono: "I put it in her back.").

The Meche did not flee from Piura head over heels. She was probably made pregnant by Josefino, whom she fears. The chunga uses all the art of persuasion. The 'Meche is supposed to go away with Lituma.

When the chunga does not agree to run a brothel with Josefino, he humiliates them with a fellatio .

The Chunga summons the Meche once again to flee the violence. Above all, the Meche should hide from the Chunga where it is fleeing to. Because if Josefino puts the knife to her throat again, she will chat for better or for worse. The Chunga slips the Meche the 3000 soles.

Form and interpretation

The viewer does not see it exactly as the piece is sketched above under “Content”. In addition to the real level, a virtual level is offered on the stage. The title of the second scene of the second act refers to the unreal: “The tensioner's dream”. In several scenes of the second act, one character is present on the stage, but is "overlooked" by the remaining characters. This technique is increasing. When Josefino forces the chunga to fellatio at the end of the piece, the stage instructions "... what the invisible chunga does to him" and "The chunga has materialized itself again next to Josefino" lead to the solo performance of this sexual practice (with actually two people in the game should be) through Josefino on stage.

There is a large gap in time between the two files. The second act takes place in the present. The Meche is gone. Scenically, the gap is bridged with fragments.

reception

Scheerer calls the milieu of this piece, which is not hostile to men, "filthy, violent, obscene". Josefino's motive is understandable. Once in a lifetime he wanted to be rich - like the whites . Scheerer asks: Has the 'Meche left? Where could she have gone with the money?

The play is less about the two women's fear of the pimp Josefino than about a decent life for women in Latin America . The essence of the piece is: the chunga remains and endures the violence as an elder, but it helps the younger Meche to break out; for a new beginning.

See also

Vargas Llosa likes to use northern Peru as a setting and there the figure of Lituma - see for example “ The green house ” or also “ Who killed Palomino Molero? "

literature

Used edition

• La Chunga. One piece. German by Dagmar Ploetz . Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1989 (es 1555 (New Series Volume 555)), ISBN 3-518-11555-3

Secondary literature

• Thomas M. Scheerer : Mario Vargas Llosa. Life and work. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt am Main 1991, ISBN 3-518-38289-6

Individual evidence

1. ↑ chungo, chunga, span. = Bad, spoiled, untrustworthy (Santillana Universidad de Salamanca (ed.): Diccionario Salamanca de la lengua española . Grupo Santillana de Ediciones, Madrid 1996, ISBN 84-294-4371-1 , p. 318 . )
2. ↑ Edition used, p. 6, 4. Zvo and first sentence in the Spanish article
3. ↑ Edition used, p. 31
4. ↑ Edition used, p. 36, 10. Zvu
5. ↑ Edition used, p. 78, 2. Zvo
6. ↑ Edition used, p. 51, 10. Zvo
7. ↑ Edition used, p. 45, 8. Zvo
8. ↑ Edition used, p. 69, 12. Zvo
9. ↑ Edition used, pp. 83, 12. Zvu and p. 84, 6. Zvo
10. ↑ Edition used, p. 84, 7. Zvo
11. ↑ Edition used, p. 84, 3rd Zvu
12. ↑ Scheerer, pp. 147–151
13. ↑ The output used is not free from printing errors (see for example p. 39, 11. Zvu).