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Loading... Cabeza de Vaca's Adventures in the Unknown Interior of America (1542)by Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca, Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca
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Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book. No current Talk conversations about this book. Relato de primera mano de una tremenda aventura de uno de los primeros exploradores de Estados Unidos y Mexico. ( ) Expecting a tale of a voyage and mainland travels, the horrors detailed by Cabeza de Vaca were a shock. From near starvation and slavery through bizarre customs to betrayal by "Christians," to becoming faith healers, this was captivating despite a ton of repletion. Given Cabeza's stance here against Spanish slavery, it was bewildering to read that he was eventually sent home in dishonor from South America for allegedly mistreating native people. There are three things that really struck me about this book. First, it reads very much like Marco Polo does, simple sentences, slightly formulaic, and little description beyond “the people of this country go naked and have a strange custom”. This is partly because Cabeza de Vaca can’t write Spanish for anything and had to be simplified, and partly because he’s writing a manual and a map, of sorts, for the King of Spain. Second, it really was one darn thing after another for him, at least how he tells it. First there’s a shipwreck, then they put in at the wrong spot, then they run out of food and have to eat the horses, and then they have to build a boat but don’t know how, and then their new boats get wrecked…. Third, for all that Cabeza de Vaca goes on about the uncivilized peoples he encounters, with their inexplicable customs and tendency to enslave him*, he also talks about how they’re willing to take him in and give him food when they have little, and how the Spanish should work with and accommodate their cultures rather than slaughtering them. (He also seems to be under the impression they thought he was a god most of the time, however.) I’m still not sure what I think of the book. It’s curious, and an interesting if incomplete look at the American Southwest in the 16th century, but is it good? Would I recommend it? I guess if you’re interested, go for it. It’s a short read. *It’s hard to tell from the text whether this is true slavery, most of the time, or just “well, you’re here and if we’re going to feed you, you need to contribute.” All the historical background I’ve read says slavery, but I wouldn’t be surprised if the writers were casually racist too. 6/10 no reviews | add a review
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This enthralling story of survival is the first major narrative of the exploration of North America by Europeans (1528-36). The author of Castaways (Naufragios), Alvar Nez Cabeza de Vaca, was a fortune-seeking nobleman and the treasurer of an expedition to claim for Spain a vast area that includes today's Florida, Louisiana, and Texas. A shipwreck forced him and a handful of men to make the long westward journey on foot to meet up with Hernn Corts. In order to survive, Cabeza de Vaca joined native peoples along the way, learning their languages and practices and serving them as a slave and later as a physician. When after eight years he finally reached the West, he was not recognized by his compatriots. In his writing Cabeza de Vaca displays great interest in the cultures of the native peoples he encountered on his odyssey. As he forged intimate bonds with some of them, sharing their brutal living conditions and curing their sick, he found himself on a voyage of self-discovery that was to make his reunion with his fellow Spaniards less joyful than expected. Cabeza de Vaca's gripping narrative is a trove of ethnographic information, with descriptions and interpretations of native cultures that make it a powerful precursor to modern anthropology. Frances M. Lpez-Morillas's translation beautifully captures the sixteenth-century original. Based as it is on Enrique Pupo-Walker's definitive critical edition, it promises to become the authoritative English translation. No library descriptions found. |
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Google Books — Loading... GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)970.01History and Geography North America North America North America -1599LC ClassificationRatingAverage:
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