The Bad Girl (Travesuras de la niña mala) by Mario Vargas Llosa
- 3 days ago
- 5 min read
“Well, at heart I knew she'd never be a normal woman. And I didn't want her to be one, because what I loved in her were the indomitable and unpredictable aspects of her personality”
― Mario Vargas Llosa, Travesuras de la niña mala
I have read my first book by the Peruvian author and Nobel Prize laureate Mario Vargas Llosa: Den stygga flickans rackartyg, or The Bad Girl in English. Vargas Llosa won the prize for “his cartography of structures of power and his trenchant images of the individual’s resistance, revolt, and defeat.” This is a very good description of the novel, although I don’t think it is his most famous work. It is a story about obsession — in this case, a man’s obsession with a woman.
At the start of the novel we meet Ricardo Somocurcio (the narrator) as a young boy. Together with other youngsters they enjoy themselves as young people do, and one day he meets the “Chilean girl.” He falls in love, but circumstances work against them and she disappears. Ricardo’s dream is to live and work in Paris, and this dream is fulfilled when he goes there to study and becomes an interpreter. He is even happier when, one day, he meets the Chilean girl again in Paris.
This becomes the recurring pattern of Ricardo’s life. The girl is a woman striving for another life — richer and more luxurious than Ricardo can ever give her. She appears and disappears over the years, always coming back to Ricardo when she is down and out. Although she hurts him emotionally, he cannot stop loving her.
Vargas Llosa gives us this story against the backdrop of the latter half of the 20th century. There is the Peruvian revolution, the Swinging Sixties, the AIDS epidemic, and the collapse of the Soviet Union. As the times change, so does the girl, always seeking new, wealthy men who can give her a luxurious life.
She returns — or Ricardo happens to meet her — as the wife of a French diplomat, as a revolutionary, as an aristocratic wife in London, a luxury escort in Tokyo, and in other identities in other countries. Every time their paths coincide, he falls in love again, in spite of the fact that she treats him badly.
Themes and Meanings
You cannot really say that the novel is story-driven; rather, it is character-driven. Although we follow Ricardo’s career path, his friends, and his lovers, the main focus is always the bad girl. He is obsessed and she is free. She tells him she cannot live an ordinary life, that she feels like a prisoner. Although she moves between a rich and luxurious life and one that is more mundane, she cannot give up her lifestyle.
The bad girl is constantly changing her name, background, and social class. She is a survivor, able to control the environment she is in at the moment. On the contrary, Ricardo wants to live a quiet life in Paris, and although his work takes him all over the world, he is most content when being in Paris.
These two people — who, I would say, do love each other, but in different ways — represent obsessiveness versus freedom; being satisfied and content versus a constant urge to find something new. Their dreams totally differ. Ricardo knows that the bad girl is not good for him, but he cannot let her go. Every time they meet, he hopes she has changed. At the end of the novel they meet again, but I will not give any spoilers.
The Characters
We only get the narration from Ricardo, so it is difficult to know what the bad girl feels inside. From the beginning she hides how poor she is. In a way, I guess this is why she always looks for a better life. It becomes her “career”: wanting to be someone else than she is. As Ricardo is obsessed with his love for her, she is obsessed with freedom, status, and wealth. When she meets Ricardo, she leaves him when life becomes too stable and quiet. She does not want to be dependent on anyone and is always playing a role depending on the man she meets.
It is difficult to like the character of the bad girl. Maybe because we see her actions from the outside and do not get to know her from the inside. Ricardo, on the other hand, is a good guy — maybe a little too good, stable, and boring. The contrast between their lives really stands out. Why does Ricardo put up with her? That is perhaps the big question in this novel.
It could be a matter of her being his first love, his ideal, his dream. He always waits for her, even if she hurts him. Maybe he admires her mysterious ways, her search for freedom. She is a fantasy that always returns. Then his dream starts again — the dream of being with her forever. In spite of the hurt he feels, he always forgives her. Maybe he thinks he will always be there to catch her when her relationships fail. Maybe he is afraid that without her, his own stable, quiet life without any real drama will be too empty.
The Relationship
It is a very tragic relationship. He is only really happy when she is around, and she recovers with his love but still cannot stay with him. The big question is: does she, in spite of everything, love him? I think she does, in her own way. She always comes back to him, trusts him, and confides in him. Probably he is the only one to whom she shows her true self — a safe haven when she needs it. Although his love is everything, her love is more calculating, less romantic, and she values things he cannot give her. The tragedy is that they love each other in very different ways — ways that do not coincide with what they want in life.
An interesting novel about a very different relationship. Vargas Llosa places the story within the wider context of international and political events during the latter part of the 20th century. This might be important, since it was a time of great developments and possibilities. Set in another time frame, the story of Ricardo and the bad girl might not have fitted so well into the world around them.
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