Vargas Llosa, Mario

London. 1978. Jonathan Cape. 1st British Edition. Very Good in Slightly Worn Dustjacket With Small Tears To the Front and Back Top. 0224016245. Translated from the Spanish by Gregory Kolovakos & Ronald Christ. 244 pages. hardcover. Jacket illustration by Anita Lovitt. keywords: Literature Translated Peru Latin America . FROM THE PUBLISHER - Both a farce and a fable, CAPTAIN PANTOJA AND THE SPECIAL SERVICE marks a new direction in the literary development of Mario Vargas Llosa. Here, through a wonderfully comic montage of letters, military documents, radio broadcasts, dream sequences and dialogue, the author combines political satire with psychology, social criticism with humor, morality with uproarious sexuality. Pantaleon Pantoja, an Army captain who has been ordered to organize a special brigade of women to service the lonely troops in the jungle, meets with such success that he is forced to disband the very brigade he created. In the process, he nearly loses his wife and mother, while battling with religious zealots, a hypocritical radio announcer, the female ‘recruits' and the Army that gave him the mission in the first place. The various elements of the story include arguments among the military officers over the morality of the brigade; a religious leader who wins thousands of converts (including Pantaleon's mother) by crucifying himself; a radio broadcaster who attempts to blackmail the Army; the private lives of the prostitutes themselves; and Captain Pantoja's involvement with one of his ‘recruits.' VARGAS LLOSA brilliantly dissects social and moral clichEs, popular culture, military jargon, religious fervor and blackmail-all of which he presents and satirizes simultaneously. inventory #2533 ISBN: 0224016245.