Aguirre - Softcover

Minta, S

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0224024701 ISBN 13: 9780224024709

Publisher: Random House UK, 1993

Synopsis

Stephen Minta has travelled extensively through Cetral America working closely with the El Salvador Committee for Human Rights and the Nicaragua Health Fund. In the mid-1980s he began his travels through the Andean countries of South America before embarking on the journey that is the subject of this book. He now teaches comparative literature at the University of York. In the late 1550s a Basque adventurer named Lope de Aguirre set out in search of El Dorado. He joined an expedition led by Pedro de Ursua and embarked upon a great journey that would take them across the whole width of South America from the Pacific to the Atlantic. In 1987 Stephen Minta set out on the trial of this expedition. Drawing on the writings of the chroniclers of that time, on eye-witness accounts and on more modern literary allusions, he reconstructs the adventure, charting its tempestuous progress along the Amazon where death and destruction lay in its wake. He relives the atmosphere within the ranks as, in the face of increasingly hostile terrain, illness and inadequate supplies, hopes and aspirations give way to treachery and dissent. The author's own journey takes him from Cuzco in Peru, "a city where you can feel the pain of oblivion", across the Andes, through the heart of Amazonia until Peru "vanishes" into Brazil, then to Margarita Island, off the mainland of Venezuela. In each town and village he evokes a strong sense of history which, combined with anecdotes and unexpected encounters, makes this a remarkable story in itself. Minta moves between 16th-century and contemporary South America; he draws parallels as he goes and enriches our understanding of this land and its people, past and present.

About this title

From Kirkus Reviews

A mixture of modern travelogue and the bizarre history of a 16th-century pioneer in the Spanish Main. In a world where murderers claim to be the victims of abuse, it's almost refreshing to make the acquaintance of Lope de Aguirre, a self-professed villain in the manner of Shakespeare's Iago or Richard III. Minta (Comparative Literature/Univ. of York, England; Gabriel Garc¡a M rquez: Writer of Colombia, not reviewed) tells the story of an expedition mounted to discover El Dorado that degenerates into near starvation and endless treachery along the Amazon between 1560 and 1561. The leader, Pedro de Ursua, is bewitched by the charms of his mestiza lover, proclaimed king in defiance of Philip II, and eventually murdered by Aguirre, a member of de Ursua's group. The expedition begins with the murder of the viceroy of Peru, and a series of hangings and (especially) garottings follows as the group becomes more desperate and Aguirre tries to keep control of his men by means of cruelty and sentimentality. His private army, equipped with the latest antipersonnel device--the arquebus--finally melts away, and Aguirre's ultimate gesture before his own death is to stab his 12- year-old daughter. Minta's language is witty and vivid. He suggests that one element in Aguirre's apparently senseless cruelty was a pioneer's desire to break loose from all institutional and traditional restraints binding him to the motherland. Minta uses as a counterpoint to the story his own re-creation of Aguirre's journey. En route, we are treated to an expert's view of the social and political conditions in contemporary South America, as well as other historical excursions--for example, the stories of how 168 Spaniards toppled the Inca empire of Atahualpa. A must for students of South America and human nature. (Book- of-the-Month Club/Quality Paperback Book Club selection; History Book Club selection) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From Publishers Weekly

In 1560 the new Spanish governor of Inca Peru authorized an expedition to find and conquer El Dorado, the hoped-for source of Inca wealth. An enormous force of armed men, horses, supplies and ships were marshalled to navigate the Amazon. It was an ill-fated search fraught with unimagined disasters--ships sank, horses were lost, men were terrorized and starved by the jungles and the uncharted river. A traitor in the ranks, Lope de Aguirre, hungering for wealth and status, fomented a rebellion, killing the expedition's leader and lieutenants, his comrades and his own daughter. In the late 1980s Minta ( Gabriel Garcia Marquez ) set out with a companion to reconstruct the story by following the expedition's route. Their own ordeal on old Inca paths through jungle and over mountains, often on foot for lack of other transport, though dramatic in itself, continuously distracts from the narrative of Aguirre's drama. Nevertheless, Minta's intimacy with past and present Peru evokes the ambience of the conquest and its immediate sequelae, as well as the still palpable imprint of the Inca on contemporary and rarely visited Andean communities.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Edition details

• Publisher: Random House UK
• Publication date: 1993
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0224024701
• ISBN 13: 9780224024709
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 208