Isle of Passion: A Novel - Hardcover

Restrepo, Laura

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060088982 ISBN 13: 9780060088989

Publisher: Ecco, 2005

Synopsis

Base on true events, this brilliantly rendered novel recounts a dramatic tale of survival, and a woman’s determination to triumph over a harrowing fate.

In 1908, Mexican captain Ramón Arnaud and his young bride, Alicia, set sail for Clipperton, a tiny Pacific atoll once dubbed "Isle of Passion" by Spanish explorers. Accompanied by eleven soldiers and their families, the captain is under orders to defend the isolated but strategically well situated island against an improbable French invasion. With its treacherous coral reef and stagnant lagoon, Clipperton is a dire, forbidding place for the new inhabitants. Rigid military order soon gives way to more informal island living, but under Ramón's guidance and inspired by Alicia's determination the group manages to create a viable community. There are a food store, pharmacy, lighthouse, even dinner parties. But then, amid political upheaval at home and the first rumblings of World War I, the Clipperton residents are forgotten. The supply ship slated to come every two months comes every third, then sixth, then not at all. Left to the mercies of nature and each other, they fall victim one by one to scurvy, hunger, despair, rivalry, lust and, ultimately, violence.

Alicia, steadfast and resourceful, becomes a beacon of strength for the remaining castaways, whose collective survival will depend upon her courage and cunning. Drawing on historical records, archives and interviews, prize-winning novelist Laura Restrepo has reimagined the incredible true story of love and war, hardship and endurance, adventure and hope on the Isle of Passion. In prose that is lush, evocative and utterly beguiling, she brings to life a bizarre, moving episode in Mexican history and its extraordinary, unforgettable heroine.

About this title

About the Author

Laura Restrepo is the bestselling author of six novels, including The Dark Bride, A Tale of the Dispossessed, and Delirio, which received Spain's prestigious Alfaguara Prize. She lives in Colombia.

Laura Restrepo fue profesora de literatura en la Universidad de Colombia, editora política en la revista Semana y miembro de la Comisión Nacional para la Paz. Ha escrito destacadas novelas tales como Leopardo al sol; Dulce Compañía, que obtuvo el premio Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz en México y el premio France Culture en Francia; y Delirio, que obtuvo el premio Alfaguara. Actualmente vive en Bogotá, Colombia.

From The Washington Post

Long before "Lost" or "Survivor," literature offered wonderfully imagined answers to the question: What happens to people stranded on a desert isle? Lord of the Flies, Robinson Crusoe and The Swiss Family Robinson all depict the pleasures and the plight of island castaways. And now Colombian journalist Laura Restrepo offers a new take on this scenario in Isle of Passion.

In her new novel, based on real-life events, a small group of Mexican soldiers and their families are sent in 1908 by the Mexican government to defend a remote Pacific atoll named Clipperton in the unlikely event of a French invasion. The group's leader is Capt. Ramón Arnaud, who greets this strange commission with patriotic, and somewhat delusional, fervor. Appointed the island's governor, he brings along his young bride, Alicia, and together they establish a sort of utopia on Clipperton.

The island becomes a microcosm of society as the castaways recreate human social history: They divide property, food, labor. They figure out ways to provide education, medical care and entertainment. So successful is the world they create that when Ramón and Alicia return briefly to their homeland, Alicia declares, "Clipperton is paradise compared with the rest of Mexico." But once back, their peaceful Clipperton society falls victim to a hurricane and an outbreak of scurvy. Almost overnight, resources diminish and violence erupts. A la Lord of the Flies, utopia becomes dystopia, and the stranded survivors must piece together the remains of their broken civilization and hope for rescue.

Sadly, they are awaiting help from a government in ruins. The president who sent Ramón to Clipperton has been deposed by a rebel, who, in turn, is murdered by the head of the army. The Mexican Revolution is in full swing, and the remote atoll is all but forgotten. Restrepo deals only peripherally with the Mexican political upheavals, but the island's collapsing society seems, at times, to mirror the revolution. For at stake on the mainland, as well, is the distribution of property and resources, instigating a cycle of distrust and violence. (Restrepo herself has a real-life understanding of political struggles: In addition to working as a journalist, she was a member of the 1984 Peace Commission that brought the Colombian government and guerrillas to the negotiating table.)

From the midst of Clipperton's ruptured society, however, two romantic stories emerge. Ramón and Alicia, near-strangers when they arrive on the island as newlyweds, soon forge a sensual and loving bond: "In Clipperton they had the time and intimacy necessary to master the art of making love to each other." At the same time, Gustav Schultz, the German representative of the island's guano operation, becomes enamored of Alicia's Mexican servant, Altagracia, and the two begin a secret, passionate affair. But just as utopia collapses into dystopia, the pleasure of these loves soon becomes the pain of abandonment: Ramón dies (I'm not spoiling anything; we learn this by page 11), and Schultz is taken from the island.

While many stories flirt with themes of desertion and isolation, one appeal of the castaway tale is that it dramatizes what it is to feel stranded. Without their lovers, Alicia and Altagracia feel not only emotionally abandoned but, quite literally, marooned, and their despair is all the more affecting for the extreme physicality of it. The novel's emotional landscape is captured in its title, Isle of Passion, the name that Magellan gave the island in the 16th century. For while "passion" can mean both love and suffering, zeal and torment, it always refers to feeling in the extreme. And Restrepo charts a wide and intense range of human experience in this compelling story of castaways.

Review by Jennifer Vanderbes
Copyright 2005, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved.

Edition details

• Publisher: Ecco
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 0060088982
• ISBN 13: 9780060088989
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 272