Hay while the sun shines
Ian McEwan is milling around the beautiful
courtyard of the Santa Clara Hotel in Cartagena, Colombia.
"The temperature here is wonderful," he says.
"This must be the temperature of paradise." The
British novelist is in town for the Hay Festival Cartagena,
one of six international offshoots of the annual literary
event in Hay on Wye. But what exactly is a festival like
this doing in a place like Colombia?
Despite its many problems and its strict
class system, Colombia is going through something of a renaissance.
The country's president, Álvaro Uribe, has been in
power since 2002 and has presided over a period of relative
calm after 30 years of violence in which drug cartels funded
paramilitaries in the jungle, who in turn protected the
cartels' business interests (almost 80 per cent of the world's
cocaine comes from Colombia). Uribe's solution was aggressively
to tackle the narcotics trade in the jungle while providing
more security in major cities.
It has been a controversial strategy, drawing
criticism from human rights groups. Senior figures in the
Uribe administration have themselves been linked to drug
trafficking and right-wing death squads. But eight years
on, Colombia is arguably a safer place. Or at least it feels
that way.
In Cartagena, the "Venice of the
Caribbean", time stands still as horse-drawn carriages
pass down lantern-lit streets and the voices of street vendors
float on the tropical breezes. I asked Peter Florence, Hay's
founder, how he felt about the festival coming to Cartagena.
"For most countries, security is taken for granted.
But security is new for Colombia. And that security feels
like an adventure."
Among the authors attracted to Hay Cartagena
is Mario Vargas Llosa. His talk was dominated by the buzz
phrase of the festival, "perpetual presidents".
Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe and Colombia's feared neighbour,
Hugo Chávez of Venezuela, were mentioned as culprits.
"Perpetual presidents have left their countries in
disaster," Llosa said through a translator. "As
a Peruvian I have a lot of experience with this." This
was greeted with raucous laughter and applause. Later I
met a business teacher from Cartagena, and asked her about
the audience's reaction. "Uribe is trying to change
the constitution to remain in power for a third term in
the same way. But most Colombians don't want to change because
we think things are good now."
In Cartagena there is a sense that there
are now two Colombia's. At one of the many lavish parties
hosted by Bogotanos with second homes on the coast, a live
salsa band played while empanadas and aguardiente were served
by the pool. When I returned to my hotel in Getsemani, the
working-class quarter just outside the old town, I met a
French economics professor who had retired to Cartagena.
He told me that "64 per cent of Colombia is owned by
0.04 per cent of the people. That's where all the problems
stem from."
It is often said that periods of great
instability produce great art. If this is true, I asked
Juan Gabriel Vásquez, a Colombian author whom many
tip as the heir apparent to Gabriel García Márquez,
is Colombia going through a golden age during this time
of relative quiet? "I don't think conflict leads invariably
to great art," he said. "If it did, Colombia would
have produced nothing but masterpieces since 1810."
But Colombia is full of masterpieces. And
people's attitudes towards culture are changing as the country
begins to export more of it. The pop singers Shakira and
Juanes have both sold millions of albums in the US and Europe.
But what is more surprising is the international success
of the tele novela, the Colombian soap opera. On my way
back to London, I stopped in Bogotá and met the king
of the format, Fernando Gaitán, the screenwriter/producer
who created the global hit Ugly Betty.
"Colombia is well known by everyone for its violence.
So I thought it was very interesting to counteract that
image," he said, surrounded by his awards in his penthouse
office. "Colombia is a country that consumes its own
culture. This is very rare. My work focuses on everyday
lives, the matters that are universal, like love stories.
It's the universal stories that travel abroad, not the stories
of violence."
So does Hay Cartagena, with all its gravitas
and prestige, need to reflect the more complicated texture
of Colombian culture? The London-based Colombian academic
Oscar Guardiola-Rivera, author of the forthcoming book What
If Latin America Ruled the World?, just shrugged.
"Given that there are so few scenarios for rational
discussion in my country, that Hay Cartagena exists is an
unqualified good for Colombia." And there's new hope
for Colombians who think their country is stagnant. In March,
the constitutional court rejected Uribe's attempt to change
the constitution to get a third presidential term. And now
Colombia is in the grip of election fever. The former mayor
of Bogotá, Antanas Mockus, is gathering momentum
as the candidate of choice for the left-leaning student
population looking to challenge the long conservative rule.
They go to the polls later this month, so Colombia won't
have a perpetual president any time soon.
Kevin Conroy Scott
is a literary agent at Tibor Jones & Associates and
on the board of the Colombiage arts festival.
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