The 74-year-old Peruvian writer Mario Vargas Llosa made a name for himself with a series of books published in Spain during the Franco regime in the 1960s. Books such as The City and the Dogs and Conversation in the Cathedral are now considered classics of Spanish literature, and helped secure the author the Nobel Prize for Literature this year.

However, according to an article in El Pais newspaper, the books did not appear unexpurgated. Spanish censors objected to what they considered rude language and obscenity in the author’s books, and Vargas Llosa agreed to alter contentious sections. At issue were specific words such as “balls,” “fuck,” and “shit” (which would be considered tame by today’s standards), as well as a more pervasive immorality.

According to the Guardian, one censor summed up The City and the Dogs by saying, “It is all generally repellent and refers throughout to not only to general immorality [sic]  but to poofery, and that says it all.” Another censor claimed that Conversation in the Cathedral “should not be published under any conditions.” That censor went on:

The obscenity only occasionally turns into pornography, though one example is the bedroom scene between the lesbians Queta and Hortensia on pages 360 to 363.

It is perhaps unsurprising to note the staunchly Catholic Franco regime’s antipathy to homosexual themes and characters in Vargas Llosa’s novels; it is somewhat more surprising to hear of the author’s acquiescence to altering the problematic passages.

From the CBC: