The Discovery of Chocolate - Hardcover

Runcie, James

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060184817 ISBN 13: 9780060184810

Publisher: Harper, 2001

Synopsis

A young Spaniard sets off for South America in 1518 with Cortes and the Conquistadors, propelled by his love's declaration that she will not marry until he returns with a special treasure -- a symbol of their love -- that no man or woman has ever before received. But during his travels he falls in love with Ignacia, a native woman who introduces him to the secrets of the most delicious drink he has ever tasted: chocolate. Their passionate affair is cut short by the chaotic conquest of Mexico.

So begins this charming and adventurous story about the magical substance we now know as chocolate, and of the passions and obsessions it has inspired from its earliest days. Our hero later discovers that his lover had secretly added the elixir to life to his chocolate drink. This allows him to travel through history: to Paris during the time of the Revolution, to Vienna in the nineteenth century, to late Victorian England, and to Hershey Pennsylvania -- accompanied all the while by his trusty greyhound, Pedro. unable to die, he searches to recapture the magic of Ignacia's chocolate -- and to learn to love life just as fully. Playful and intelligent, this is a romantic story about love and loss inspired by a very enchanting substance.

About this title

About the Author

James Runcie is an award-winning filmmaker in England. He has scripted three films for BBC Television, reviewed books for the Daily Telegraph, and has written for the Observer, the Evening Standard, and Country Living. This is his first novel.

Reviews

In a series of vignettes that span four centuries and are linked by their focus on chocolate, immortal protagonist Diego de Godoy presides over the discovery and refinement of the divine confection--but his concomitant reflections on life and love, too often trite, leave the reader hungering for more satisfying fare. In 1518, Diego, a young Spaniard anxious to prove his devotion to the lady Isabella, joins a ship of conquistadors bound for the Americas under the leadership of Cort‚s. His devotion to Isabella wanes, however, when, as a guest of Montezuma in Mexico, he meets the lovely Ignacia and tastes the smooth, bittersweet drink she serves him--cacahuatl, or chocolate. Diego and Ignacia spend an idyllic week together before his fellow Spaniards turn on Montezuma and raze his land. The lovers are forced to part, but not before Ignacia serves Diego a magical drink that makes him immortal and able to travel though time. In the centuries that follow, Diego charms Spanish nobility with his mole sauce, prepares chocolate creams with the Marquis de Sade in the Bastille, invents the Sacher torte, undergoes analysis with Sigmund Freud in Vienna and helps Hershey invent the Kiss--though he longs all the while for his Ignacia and resents the curse of his protracted existence. While Runcie, a BBC filmmaker, offers a clever conceit and meticulous, enticing descriptions of chocolate-making, Diego's philosophizing falls short by comparison, and the plot relies to heavily upon contrivance and coincidence. Still, those willing to suspend disbelief and simply go along for the ride will be beguiled by Diego's fanciful, sensual journey. Author tour.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

In this winning blend of fiction and fact, a long-lived Spaniard serves as narrator and guide through the Old World discovery and development of one of life's consuming passions. In 1518, young Diego de Godoy sets sail for the New World to find a rare treasure to win the heart and hand of Isabella. Joining Cortes, Diego journeys to Mexico, where he guards Montezuma; finds his true-love, Ignacia; and through her discovers the delight of the drink of the cacao bean. War parts the lovers, but Ignacia's special chocolate elixir sustains them through the centuries, as Diego's life centers on chocolate: he prepares confections with the Marquis de Sade in the Bastille, helps create the Sacher torte in Vienna (where Sigmund Freud treats him with cocaine and therapy), has a hand in shaping and naming the Hersey Kiss, and discusses life, love, and chocolate mousse with Alice B. Toklas and Gertrude Stein. And he learns that even virtual immortality and chocolate do not bring happiness if love is lacking. A delicious literary debut. Michele Leber
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

The Discovery of Chocolate

By James Runcie

HarperCollins Publishers

Copyright © 2001 James Runcie
All right reserved.
ISBN: 0060184817

Chapter One

Although it is true that I have been considered lunatic on many occasions in the last five hundred years, it must be stated, at the very beginning of this sad and extraordinary tale, that I have been most grievously misunderstood. The elixir of life was drunk in all innocence and my dog had nothing to do with it.

Let me explain.

Having once embarked on a precarious and often dangerous quest, I have now been condemned to roam the world, unable to die. I have lost all trace of my friends and family and have been separated from the only woman that I have ever loved. And although it might seem a blessing to be given the possibility of eternal life and to taste its delights without end, taking pleasure where one will, and living without judgment or morality, it is, in fact, an existence of unremitting purgatory. I cannot believe that this has happened to me and have only decided to tell my story so that others who might seek to cheat death and live such a life should be alert to its dangers.

My troubles began at the age of twenty when I, Diego de Godoy, notary to Emperor Charles V, first crossed the Atlantic as a young man in search of fame and fortune. The year was fifteen hundred and eighteen.

Of course it was all for love.

Isabella de Quintallina, a lady of sixteen years who lived, like me, in Seville, had taken possession of my soul. Although our temperaments seemed ideally suited, my lack of noble birth put me at a considerable disadvantage; and, after six months of prolonged and ardent courtship, I began to doubt if I could ever win her love. I was further dismayed when Isabella set me the following challenge.

If we were to be joined in matrimony, I would have to hazard everything I owned-all my prospects, all my safety, and all my future-on one bold venture. She asked me to travel with the Conquistadors, and return, not only with the gold and riches on which our future life together would depend, but also with a gift which no man or woman had ever received before, a true and secret treasure which only we would share. Isabella had heard that in the New World gold and silver could be plucked from the earth in abundance. Pepper, nutmegs, and cloves could be harvested in all seasons; cinnamon had been found within the bark of a tree; and strange insects could render up vibrant tints to dye her silks the deepest scarlet. She was convinced that I would be able to find a love token that was both spectacular and unique, and would wait for me for two years, suffering the attentions of no other man, until the arrival of her eighteenth birthday. Succeed, and Isabella vowed the world would be mine; however, if I failed, she would have no choice but to seek the hand of another and never look upon me again.

Two years! This was more than all the time in which we had known one another.

Despair entered the very fabric of my being, and I do not think that I had ever felt so alone. My sweet mother had died when I was an infant, and my poor blind father was too distressed to counsel me, terrified that I would never return from such a journey.

But there was no choice.

I must live or die for love.

After presenting me with her portrait in a miniature silver case, Isabella took pity on my plight and gave me her pet greyhound to act as a companion on the long voyage ahead. Tears welled up in her eyes, the hound whimpered in accompaniment, and my beloved implored me to see the sacrifice she had made, asking me to believe that such generosity surely proved her love since there was nothing she valued more in the world than Pedro's devoted and unquestioning loyalty.

This was extremely awkward because, in truth, I did not actually want the dog. I have always detested the manner in which such animals fawn upon their owners, bite the heels of strangers, soil gardens, and rut at the most inopportune moments. But this young puppy was forced into my arms without any suspicion that he might be the last thing in the world that I required. In short, I was landed with him, and could only declare that he was indeed the true testament of her love, and that I would endeavour to return with an equivalent prize.

And so, after tearful and prolonged farewells with my father, I took my leave. Isabella threw herself into my arms, pressing her breasts against my chest, her blond ringlets falling on my shoulders, and then watched from the quayside as I boarded the caravel Santa Gertrudis. Great cries of A dios, A dios, rose from the ship, and the crowds called out, Buen viaje, buen viaje. Slowly, and with a terrible inevitability, the ship pulled away and the sight of my beloved began to recede into the distance. It was as if we were being stretched apart from each other forever. I clasped Isabella's portrait to my bosom and felt a great weight behind my eyes as the tears welled up. All that had previously defined me was swept away by the journey down the Guadalquivir River and out to sea toward the Americas.

I had never before contemplated the life of a sailor, and the inconstancy of the voyage disheartened me; for there was not a moment when our ship was still or we could be at peace. The calm seas which we met at the outset of the journey were interrupted by unwelcome and intemperate gusts of wind, and strange currents pulled the ship in directions in which we had not meant to travel. The nights were filled with the fearsome sounds of dragging, moaning, and creaking, deep in the hull.

Continues...

Continues...

Excerpted from The Discovery of Chocolateby James Runcie Copyright © 2001 by James Runcie. Excerpted by permission.
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Edition details

• Publisher: Harper
• Publication date: 2001
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0060184817
• ISBN 13: 9780060184810
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 272