March 2011

"FREEDOM FOR THE FOUNDER OF TEATRO FARMER"

strokes by Víctor Víctor Zavala Cataño Humareda

prisons in our country are rotting, more violence, neglect and cruelty ever state where prisoners are rehabilitated (could not) and struggle to survive under the "law of the jungle" or stronger. If they are, roughly, the conditions for a common criminal, the problem becomes acute when it comes to political prisoners, for them has created grave prisons (with 2 x 2 cells and with average hours of sunshine a day) or the prisons of exile (such as Yanamayo better known as "freezing" at the very low temperatures recorded there) to set him apart and away from their families and human rights organizations , or the dungeons of execution as with El Fronton in 1986 genocide at the hands of Alan Garcia (at the time if convicted by the Court of Human Rights) or the Castro Castro in May 1992 at the hands of the reptile Alberto Kenya Fujimori (also convicted of the same Commission in November 2006).

The incongruity of this is that justice and prisons in this country are not equal for everyone. A clear example is traffickers who enjoy "golden prison" luxuries, vices, and special protection vedettes (the scandals have been mocked in the tabloids.) The same goes for the politicians used as "scapegoats" to whom to pay a political cost perks or send them to that place that is criminal vacional "San Jorge" (where sent to Agustin Mantilla, who enjoyed the treatment of a baron turfman and weekend outings, if tested by the press is not addicted to the regime). Here the wardens are hosting and participating in parties and raves in full view of a government-hyena like that punishing god and benefactor of war know who give the "free will" and freedom in the dim light of the prison.

The case of Victor Zavala Cataño is truly embarrassing to the conscience of this country. Over 20 years in prison, accused of being leader of the PCP-SL (syndication denied by the same dome) with a serious disease of cancer one step and almost blind, is not to be punished as a university professor, playwright and creator of Teatro Campesino in Peru. This is equivalent to the cruelty that troops of Achaeans gave up Hector's body by Achilles (puncturing it and leaving it to be "grazing birds and wild dogs", but before the appeal of the old father of Hector, the relentless Achilles shows his humanity for the old to bury the corpse). Víctor Zavala Cataño is still alive and waiting for an act of humanity, an act of forgiveness that makes us believe that we have not lost the status of "human." If the father of Teatro Campesino had some guilt believe that with more than 20 years of brutal and inhumane prison and paid more than this disgrace we call "justice", "rule of law," "democracy," "law," " criminal code, "" ethical values \u200b\u200b"," constitution "," country ", etc.., etc.

A minute in jail for Victor Zavala Cataño is a minute sanguaza and mud of memory, peace, harmony, history and civilization of our country that has so far proven to be in barbarism or be the same barbarism.

PS: I leave you with the meaning of Article brave teacher, poet and director of the Institute of Books and Reading ", Inlec Peru, Danilo Sanchez Lihon; article that gives this post and that brings an interview VZC made a few days ago at the Castro Castro prison:

TWENTY YEARS IN PRISON FOR HIS IDEAS

FREEDOM FOR THE FOUNDER OF TEATRO FARMER

Lihón
Danilo Sanchez
"We must fight because
land a new day dawn" Víctor Zavala Cataño

I. VISIT

A.

today, 27 March 2011 World Theatre Day, I decided to visit in the Miguel Castro Castro prison, which is one of the terrible prisons of Peru, located at the eastern end, where it ends and begins in Lima Tablazo inhiestos hills of rock, gravel and mist, Victor Zavala Cataño, a man of theater, playwright, actor, university professor and legendary artist, who suffered for twenty years imprisonment continued, as a political prisoner.

do so is like playing a chord deep and hurt, sad passionate yet, what is the sweet and cruel Peru. It felt raw drama and adventure of the desire to forge a different Peru, with impatience and defeat, rebel with indignation at such sacrosanct by so much misery and miserable.

As the bus arrived in dusty streets, I remember and admired the spectacular staging of his play "The Rooster" by the theater director Hernando Cortez, in an emblematic and central stage as La Cabaña, around half of the 60's.

B. Victor Zavala Cataño

feat performed on stage once reserved for the aristocracy of letters Lima, which is their airs, their gestures and loops, which selects with its themes and subtle refinement to the bows of the people now see it flooded with ponchos, chullos and shovels. And the manner of speaking, innocent and jovial, the people of the Andes, of laborers, peasants and chargers also bundles its left, a popular Homeric firm treading the boards once reserved for the golden, that tasted like nobility and emblazoned .

wonder what happened to the overnight it changed? With works in which peasants were initially abused, but soon ended up claiming their rights, beating, pounding his executioners and envisioning the dawn for a victorious country that opened a new era of justice and equality.

This feat was due to a man who put quality in the theater and imposed a perspective and a different ideological proposal. He managed to give the Peruvian scene of the 70 and 80, a face as it had not seen before: make the large rooms, great actors and theater groups groomed, professional and did gallant Teatro Campesino. A feat and one territory had been released without firing a single bullet or had been casualties in dead and wounded.

C.

ever saw him briefly accompanied by Luis Figueroa in the bar Palermo, accompanied by two beautiful ladies, beautiful cherry tree color, and eyes entranced. Even that was different.

was a successful artist, dedicated and who could live and perks and flattery, if you wanted. Could have become a gentleman, or a matron, in courtly power, crouching thrive in academia or at the counters of the media.

conditions and had to print it, others who do not yet have had no scruples to cleave and be sneaky. He preferred to other roads, steep, dangerous and even deadly.

Of course, I am moved by the sacrifice of a work of art that could be larger, powerful and transformative for Peru's base. I moved twenty years in prison!

I moved the drama of a family: wife, children, grandchildren, his life certainly have seen his father or your loved one placed in a prison. I am moved by this aspect of legend he is.

moves me and strengthens their consistency, and his resignation tajancia. For all its drama arrived at the result he now suffers, and this being consistent emotional.

D.

And I find it incredible to think that these days there are writers who suffer imprisonment for twenty years. Naively believed that it happened at times barbaric, dark and primitive, which imprisoned writers and artists and were made to suffer thousand calamities. I thought that happened but at times archaic and remote.

But I am here and talking to him in the library flag 2A maximum security prison in the state, the Miguel Castro Castro. Meeting him as a sweet, human, warm, clear in his ideas, without obstacles or equivocation.

find it to be convicted and confessed crimes, but not ideas. Found in him a being convinced, you think that if life is to sacrifice for the just causes of the people, behold the sacrifice. Here is a full and be a man of integrity.

II. INTERVIEW

1.

- Victor, does what suffer prison time?

- First it was a year from 1987 to 1988, then re-enter the year 1991 until now, which is twenty years continuously, which together make 21. Before that I was in the prison of Yanamayo, to 3.800 meters, which is an icy and inhuman prison in the department of Puno.

- And how do you feel?

According to diagnosis, about the state of my health, should be prostrate, without getting out of bed. I suffer from diverticulitis, the colon, which is pre-cancer. In its current state is a fierce and crippling disease, to which life becomes a nightmare and a disaster, because bows and limits. Should to operate, but I understand that the purpose is to kill, not receiving proper medical care. And, on the other hand, suffer from the eyes, with one I can see a 50 per cent and the other worse, I see only a quarter and that this condition is also pending operation. Without eyes I can not read or write that is what saddens me most.

- And the soul, Victor?

- Firm, strong, invincible. I know that life is a process that includes birth, growth and death. I understand that. Everything is an evolution.

2.

- In the past twenty years, being a prisoner here, feeling the injustice and impotence, have you cried?

- never. I'm standing, untouched. Nothing has come up, nothing has bent. I'm sick, it is true, but that's the nature of life, with the intention of my captors, and those who want me to suffer, to kill me that way, letting my body dent disease. But my spirit is to fight.

- Do you feel guilty about something?

- Sure. I did not invent poverty and misery of my country. I have found here I rooted for centuries. What I can not be insensitive or indifferent to it. I have written and denounced the exploitation of man by man and abuse, aiming a better world for my people. I am not a madman. What are those who think that poverty is normal, you have to live with it. That they happen to be a beggar and victims and other wealthy and perpetrators. Who think differently to that model is neither crazy nor an extremist nor a being delusional or insane. He who rebels against the appalling poverty and infamous is more of a moral being. My theater and my art could not be indifferent to this fact.

3.

- Do not you feel perhaps you've sacrificed your life, your art, your family, your friends and all your fulfillment?

- If I pay with my life, and other requirements and dedicated this protest and position is good, then pay the fee and sacrifice. And I leave this offering as a legacy to future generations.

- What you are charged?

- crimes that have never committed. I felt sorry as top leader. And when someone is placed on that level, and not be judged but only because he is condemned. And he just takes care of everything, charging a minimum and the huge. So I have not been tried but simply doomed.

- Being in prison, having so much to do, is a condition that should be explosive. Is it so?

- I have never released a moan or retracted unless I feel and think and feel and think, let alone I have repented of nothing.

4.

- What is for you Peru, Victor?

- Peru is a proposal to meet a challenge. It is a turbulent country, beautiful and formidable, he has to find its future and its greatness. Anytime Peru will be great, as it has mass organization and social awareness in the village to be developed in the context of our culture that is vibrant and amazing.

- And the current situation, do you think?

- This will change. My vision of Peru is a vision of the future. There are hidden forces that herald great changes and transformations. The events of Bagua and Moquegua and testify and give us shows a new awareness in areas not previously have imagined that they did, as the native communities. Where did those lessons have been learned? This will change, must change. Already we see that it is changing when people come forward to defend their land, their water ditches and rights in general.

5.

How did your love of literature?

- In my community, a book that was book was read, devouring everything. Text could get my hands assimilated it. My brother who was studying in Lima sent me "Mother" by Maxim Gorky, fascinated me as I read it several times, and gave me a very clear direction for what I wanted to do and write.

- And the first thing you wrote?

- It was a school play, which was a recreation of the story of César Vallejo Paco Yunque. It is presented to a teacher reading to their children that story, but there in your class are all characters in the story: Humberto Grieve, Paco Farias, everyone. At the end of the reading break to mourn Paco Yunque inconsolable, sobbing with emotion, but all the comfort and encourage him, saying: Paco Yunque not cry! It is a very simple, yet very touching. It's like imagining everything that happened in Peru someone tell us, see us involved in it, mourn and someone to comfort us. Also won the Theatre School who organized the San Marcos University Theatre, directed by Professor Guillermo Ugarte Chamorro.

6.

- And what do you think is the reason for the Teatro Campesino you propose, created and gave him way, has had much impact and influence?

- It gathered many factors. For example, at the time the theater was in a speech to a plea rather psychological. El Teatro Campesino is a discourse rather outward to the social problem. Everything comes from the inside out. Erase the idea stage, of local and Tabladillo. At the end we present it in the street, on the ground, in plain, sometimes in a hollow, with the farmers around, sitting on the hills, making us a number of functions per day, but the first show did not want to move and were the second and third time, causing overcrowding. It was time of many trips to provinces. My book "The team" for example was released in the hills of central Peru. And we had the luxury of quoting through newsletters, which published newspapers, his debut Ahuac in Huancayo. Naturally no one came, except Jorge Acuña that time we went out to act came shouting, "Here I am ah "" Here I am, ah "" For the record, I come from Lima, ah. " He had to climb the Andes Mountains to attend the premiere of the work.

7.

- Scored a lot, does not it?

- There were so many theater groups farmer who created a National Federation of Popular Theater and was in fact Teatro Campesino. Theatre Festival in 1981 in Cerro de Pasco, thirty groups, 18 were of Teatro Campesino, while a foreign commentator said: "Both chullo poncho and both the Peruvian theater?"

- Now, do you do?

- A write and read, but now severely limited by this eye problem, but may do so as before. I've written a lot. I have work to be published. I have now an overview of many events and things.

- And the family, right?

- All my family is full, free and indestructible. And this happens when the grounds on which prison are suffering consciousness. In a common prisoner's family just the day you go to jail. I know because I talk with people from other halls. In a political prisoner, like me, the family remains faithful and blameless. For example, being in Yanamayo, which is puna, with an icy cold, and to reach which is to make a trip of several days, until there was going to see me but my family, when the visit lasted only thirty minutes. And it was after 15 days.

8.

- You suffered shortages and hardships in your childhood?

- I rebelled by not having suffered hardships but to see others suffer. I am of peasant, but of community and average condition. My father had land and oxen to plow the fields, which gives a position. The only resentment is that we keep punishing their children as their pawns gamonal, until one day my mother, who was sweet and small, and he saluted him back. But when I go to work Huamanga, to lead the university theater, we went every weekend to the countryside and saw there harrowing pictures of extreme poverty. In one of those so often found in a cave puna there lived a farmer and his four daughters, all sick with TB. The mother had died spitting blood and all of them were also affected and they did, so that seemed dead. However, because this is the farmer, gave us food. No one accepted, of course. But, I do. What was it? Barley water with a floating, with a pinch of salt, food all day. Virtually nothing. Not a potato, no corn. I took the dish I was served and devoured it as an oath, as a promise, as a sacrifice. It was like dying, going straight to the hospital or the cemetery. It was my choice. But I was with them, assuming and sharing their fate. Would otherwise have been limited to looking at them and have compassion. I took me there flesh and breath of his fate, with them.

A. PROPOSAL

goodbye When Victor wants to accompany me to the end of the hall door, and it does. He introduces me to all partner in its path. And I am moved by the deference and respect they treat me, your love and distinction. Because, I say: who soy para una persona como él, que lleva veinte años preso?

Ya afuera, siento para mí este día como decisivo y memorable. Y se me hace muy nítido que la literatura no solo son textos, sino las imágenes fascinantes y legendarias de la vida de los autores. Para apreciarlo basta sintonizar con algunos pasajes del acontecer vital de César Vallejo, José María Arguedas, Ciro Alegría, José Carlos Mariátegui, vidas de titanes y gladiadores de fábula.

Respecto a la trayectoria de Víctor Zavala Cataño la encuentro solo comparable a la vida de Guamán Poma, aquel indio lacuaz, irredento, quien nació el año en que los españoles ingresaban al Perú, lost all his property in his own blood to write a complaint, risking his position by his righteous zeal, which assigned him to be prosecuted, imprisoned and eventually forgotten. I find in it the same passion, the same pertinacity and the same delusion about its commitment to the dispossessed, his creative prowess, the sacrifice of his life and his legendary aura.

B.

only need a page add in this fabled life. And that is: to go free by the action of people from arts, humanities and citizenship, we can sympathize with management, the demand and the commitment we put into it.

To be in the story that could break the organized chains, after the theater that did or does, reaching the great work to be done, not only for the immense quality paper which is aesthetic, but its authenticity, and profound moral impact. Let new generations and the future, with the pages he has written in his work and life, are full of pride and strength.

And they know that it is intent of the writers can not shut up. Writing, declare, proclaim. And that enters his life in danger and at risk and suffer imprisonment. But it is beautiful to see the consistency between what is written and paid with his life; considering that the writers are snipers verb, a word and the ideas, not bullets or bombs or mortars. Not your exercise or control the deadly weapons of war but those who create life and open up new horizons as he has opened.

C.

As cultural movements, as intellectually alert, and sensitive and aware historical generation, struggling for leave to heal, to complete and consolidate the great work of Teatro Campesino, legacy and heritage of Peru eternal, which is adding to the stylistic quality the example to be consistent, to show solidarity with the most hurt and suffered from Peru.

Because there is more than being famous and is to be men of conscience, there is something more than success and are the principles; and there is more than literary quality and be consistent with a dramatic reality as Peru. And this is pedagogical, educational and social awareness training. Left

indelibly on the pages that the author of Peru's Teatro Campesino is released. And, conversely, will remain as a disgrace and an embarrassment that he fenezca and did nothing to defend it. Because what I am sure of is that he will remain as a proverbial page, as the paradigm of a writer imprisoned for his ideas. And all this suffered for being faithful to the people, to redeem outstanding that Peru, the poor and dispossessed, and its consistency a national value that society future it will recognize.

D.

He already did his part, is now for us to do ours, claiming that he goes free to cure their diseases, because that is a minimum ratio of our share Human Rights as inherent to the human species.

That goes free and culminates his creative project and the country theater has its corollary, the best epic drama of Peru in the second half of the twentieth century, which further supported the legitimate aspirations of becoming a more just country.

Let and let us make this great page of history, because of the glorious Teatro Campesino that outlined and leave as a realization for Peru and Latin, as that term was forged here, here and irradiated by a man from a rural community of Huamantanga.

Because of this, ask for clemency for Victor Zavala Cataño, we ask because of the centenary of José María Arguedas. Let

mobilization in this regard, given the poor state of health which is, for the story to be compassionate with him but not us. And who on Earth and in Peru, as he put it: "A new day dawns."

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