Explores the life of Sir Roger Casement, a British consul and Irish nationalist who was hanged for treason after he challenged the British authority in Northern Ireland. - (Baker & Taylor)

"In 1916, the Irish nationalist Roger Casement was hanged by the British government for treason. Casement had dedicated his extraordinary life to improving the plight of oppressed peoples around the world--especially the native populations in the BelgianCongo and the Amazon--but when he dared to draw a parallel between the injustices he witnessed in African and American colonies and those committed by the British in Northern Ireland, he became involved in a cause that led to his imprisonment and execution. Ultimately, the scandals surrounding Casement's trial and eventual hanging tainted his image to such a degree that his pioneering human rights work wasn't fully reexamined until the 1960s."--Dust jacket. - (Baker & Taylor)

A Nobel Prize-winning author offers a work of historical fiction that centers around real-life Irish nationalist Roger Casement, who was hanged for treason after he challenged the British authority in Northern Ireland. - (Baker & Taylor)

WINNER OF THE NOBEL PRIZE IN LITERATURE

A subtle and enlightening novel about a neglected human rights pioneer by the Nobel Laureate Mario Vargas Llosa


In 1916, the Irish nationalist Roger Casement was hanged by the British government for treason. Casement had dedicated his extraordinary life to improving the plight of oppressed peoples around the world—especially the native populations in the Belgian Congo and the Amazon—but when he dared to draw a parallel between the injustices he witnessed in African and American colonies and those committed by the British in Northern Ireland, he became involved in a cause that led to his imprisonment and execution. Ultimately, the scandals surrounding Casement's trial and eventual hanging tainted his image to such a degree that his pioneering human rights work wasn't fully reexamined until the 1960s.

In The Dream of the Celt, Mario Vargas Llosa, who has long been regarded as one of Latin America's most vibrant, provocative, and necessary literary voices—a fact confirmed when he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2010—brings this complex character to life as no other writer can. A masterful work, sharply translated by Edith Grossman, The Dream of the Celt tackles a controversial man whose story has long been neglected, and, in so doing, pushes at the boundaries of the historical novel.

Mario Vargas Llosa was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2010 "for his cartography of structures of power and his trenchant images of the individual's resistance, revolt, and defeat." Peru's foremost writer, he has been awarded the Cervantes Prize, the Spanish-speaking world's most distinguished literary honor, and the Jerusalem Prize. His many works include The Feast of the Goat, The Bad Girl, Aunt Julia and the Scriptwriter, The War of the End of the World, and The Storyteller. He lives in London.

Edith Grossman has translated the works of the Nobel laureates Mario Vargas Llosa and Gabriel García Márquez, among others. One of the most important translators of Latin American fiction, her version of Miguel de Cervantes's Don Quixote is considered to be the finest translation of the Spanish masterpiece in the English language.

Booklist Reviews

*Starred Review* The Peruvian Nobel laureate is an aggressive yet elegant writer, unafraid of confronting big social and political issues and complex historical figures and corralling these potent forces into wide-screen novels that never fail to leave readers slammed against the wall in awe and admiration. In his new novel, he has taken from the pages of history a quiet, sober, reflective Irishman in the British diplomatic service. But through his great humanitarian work, Roger Casement spoke loudly about colonial abuse of native peoples in the Congo and Peru, for which he was knighted by the British king in 1911. Startlingly, five years later, he was executed for treason by the same king's government. This seeming disparity, the transition from hero to criminal, is the great drama of Casement's life, rendered by Vargas Llosa with a wondrous mixture of factual accuracy and responsible imagining. Casement's evolution from believing in the colonial system to abhorring it, and then carrying over his newfound and profound hatred of oppression to an intense and ultimately fatal bid to wrest Ireland's home rule from Britain, is a trajectory the author follows with a dynamic richness of detail that leaves the novel a sublime example of historical fiction of the highest order and of literature in its maximum effectiveness. High-Demand Back Story: Prepub buzz announces this as one of the South American master's finest efforts, and literary fiction readers will want to read and discuss. Copyright 2012 Booklist Reviews.