SHOWDOWN [SHOW DOWN] [First UK edition - American sheets]

Jorge Amado [Translated by Gregory Rabassa]

ISBN 10: 0553051741 / ISBN 13: 9780553051742

Published by Bantam Books, London, 1988

About this Item

First impression of the first UK edition, printed from the American sheets. A Bantam Book - February 1988 stated on the printer's page. Although a first UK edition, the book is in an American style binding. Translated from the Portuguese by Gregory Rabassa. ***Near fine in black paper-covered boards with a black cloth spine, and titles in gilt. Head and tail of spine slightly creased. Corners sharp. Boards clean and unmarked. Page block edges clean. Spine tight. Internally also near fine with no inscriptions. No creases or tears. Clean pages throughout. ***In a very good colour illustrated dustwrapper, which retains the original publisher's price of £12.95 net. The dustwrapper is complete with no chips or tears - just very slight rubbing and loss to the surface colour at the top of the spine and top of the back foldover. No creases or tears. Very light edge wear and the spine is slightly faded. Dustwrapper bright. ***422 pages. 236 mm x 160 mm. ***'"Showdown" is the story of a city in the hinterland of Brazil's cacao region, Tocaia Grande. Born at the start of this century, when honour took precedence over law, and courage came before power, Tocaio Grande had a renegade beginning; in its grittiness, violence, pettiness and feel of dirt and blood, not unlike the birth of the American West. "Showdown" is the most daring novel in Jorge Amado's long and distinguishes career, In it he opens his heart and leaves us with a tale that will live long in our memories.' ]Quote taken from the front flap of the dustwrapper] ***'Jorge Leal Amado de Faria (10 Aug 1912 - 6 Aug 2001) was a Brazilian writer of the modernist school. He remains the best known of modern Brazilian writers, with his work having been translated into some 49 languages and popularized in film, notably "Dona Flor and Her Two Husbands" in 1976. His work reflects the image of a Mestiço Brazil and is marked by religious syncretism. He depicted a cheerful and optimistic country that was beset, at the same time, with deep social and economic differences. He occupied the 23rd chair of the Brazilian Academy of Letters from 1961 until his death in 2001. He won the 1984 International Nonino Prize in Italy. Jorge Amado also was Federal Deputy for São Paulo as a member of the Brazilian Communist Party (PCB) between 1947 and 1951. In "Showdown", Amado returns to some of his earliest concerns, confronting the historical criminality of Brazilian society, and aiming to show how Brazil has buried its (criminal) past. In fact Showdown is almost an historical continuation of Amado?s novel The Violent Land, first published in 1943. It contains several references to the battles between cacao landowners described in that earlier novel.' [Wiki]***A first impression of the first UK edition, in nice condition. ***For all our books, postage is charged at cost, allowing for packaging: any shipping rates indicated on ABE are an average only: we will reduce the P & P charge where appropriate - please contact us for postal rates for heavier books and sets etc.

Seller Inventory # 8291

Bibliographic Details

• Title: SHOWDOWN [SHOW DOWN] [First UK edition - American sheets]
• Publisher: Bantam Books, London
• Publication Date: 1988
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0553051741
• ISBN 13: 9780553051742
• Binding: Hardcover
• Illustrator: Keith Batcheller [Cover illustration]
• Edition: First UK Edition
• Printing: First Impression
• Condition: Near Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good
• Seller catalogs:
  • First Editions
  • Literature in Translation

About this title

Synopsis

Set in the Brazilian city of Tocaia Grande at the turn of the century, this novel captures the violence, ambition, greed, honor, and earthiness of a time and place in Brazil's history comparable to the legendary American West

Reviews

Brazilian writer Amado's 22nd novel is an unfocused and somewhat maudlin epic set in the lawless wilds of the Bahian jungle, where thugs and prostitutes ply their dismal trades amidst arbitrary bloodshed and hardship. Despite the many dangers posed by men and nature, fertile land is free for the taking, and hard work soon brings prosperity to a forlorn outpost of misfits. As the town grows, its inhabitants, too, are transformed: a whore becomes a midwife, a bandit turns into a cacao-plantation owner. The savage gives way to the domestic as children are born and wells are dug. This is the American dream come to life in a tropical rain forest, with all the facile sentimentality of a Disney creation. An incorrigible storyteller, Amado creates a vast and colorful cast of characters, most of them likable, all of them exotic. Yet, while much happens in this bookcrammed as it is with battles, love affairs and natural disastersin the long run, nothing happens. With no plot or unifying thread, Amado's wordy prose and run-on sentences create little more than a busy patchwork that lacks pattern and direction. Literary Guild alternate.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

In this 21st novel by Brazil's master storyteller, the central character is a town. Already known to followers of Amado's fiction, Tocaia Grande is here depicted in the days before its elevation to county seat and its change of name to Irisopolis. These are the rawer days of its original settlement some 20 years after the Brazilian emancipation of slaves when it was nothing more than a dump with a store and a cluster of fugitives, whores, and stragglers. It's "every man for himself" in this tropical hinterland whose candidacy as a real town comes only with the arrival of one bona fide family consisting almost miraculously of husband, wife, and children. The richness of this collective saga resides in its diversity of characters. Jack Shreve, Allegany Community Coll., Cumberland, Md.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.