Reputations

Political cartoonist Javier Mallarino has earned a fearsome reputation; his powerful and effective caricatures are more influential than politicians themselves in ruining people's lives, rescinding laws, and toppling ministries. At a reception after a celebration honoring his 40-year career, he unexpectedly meets Samanta Leal, who reminds him of an incident that occurred 28 years earlier when an unpopular legislator, Adolfo Cuéllar, may have molested her. Javier didn't wait for an investigation but instead assumed him guilty and the next day exposed the perpetrator in a cartoon, precipitating the legislator's resignation and eventual suicide. Now, looking back, he questions the veracity of the accusation and the ethics of his vocation. Vásquez explores both the environment that permits the creation of all-powerful reputations and the amoral ease with which they can be destroyed. In that fine thin line between satire and slander, are individuals responsible, or are they just pawns of the influence wielded by the media? Vásquez also uses one of his favorite themes—the power of memory—that proved so effective in his celebrated The Sound of Things Falling.