La Salle - Hardcover

Vernon, John

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 067080083X ISBN 13: 9780670800834

Publisher: Viking, 1986

The fictional diary entries of the French explorer, La Salle, and his cartographer, Goupil, recount--from two conflicting perspectives--a remarkable journey into a wilderness in which reason, religion, and European power have no place

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About the Author:

John Vernon is a Distinguished Professor of English at Binghamton University and the author of ten books, including a book of poems, a memoir, and five novels. His most recent novel, The Last Canyon, is the story of John Wesley Powell's first trip down the Colorado River. Sue Peabody is an associate professor of history at Washington State University and the author of The Color of Liberty: Histories of Race in France.

From Library Journal:

Eavesdropping on journal entries and letters written by the Sieur de la Salle and his mapmaker, Goupil, provides us with a realistic look at the early exploration of the Mississippi Valley. This first novel portrays La Salle as an increasingly neurotic visionary, and his assistant Goupil as subservient but cognizant of the explorer's quirks. The author introduces us to the pair in alternating passages from the end of La Salle's first trip to America, and then skips ahead to the last trip to Texas and the intervening arrangements. The sense of peeking into these honest, though fictitious, writings is well conveyed by Vernon. A whole book of excerpts might have been boring, but the increasing madness of La Salle and the rough prose of the peasant Goupil creates a rhythm that carries the reader along. A fine novel, and worth adding to most collections. W. Keith McCoy, Dowdell Lib., South Amboy, N.J.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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