Aguirre : the re-creation of a sixteenth-century journey across South America
(Book)
Description
Loading Description...
Also in this Series
Checking series information...
Copies
Location | Call Number | Status |
---|---|---|
Conejos Library District - LAJARA - NONFICTION | 980 Min | On Shelf |
More Copies In Prospector
Loading Prospector Copies...
More Details
Published
New York : H. Holt, 1994.
Format
Book
Edition
1st American ed.
Physical Desc
244 pages : ill. ; 22 cm.
Language
English
Notes
Bibliography
Includes bibliographical references (p. [231]-234) and index.
Description
"In 1560 Lope de Aguirre, an obscure Basque of no great estate, joined the largest expedition ever mounted in Spanish Peru. Its goal was the mythical El Dorado, and before it came to an end, it would cross a continent, pushing well into terra incognita and leaving behind a trail of mutiny and blood." "Nearing fifty when he set out, Aguirre was unattractive and overbearing, even faintly ridiculous. Yet somehow in the course of that long trek across South America, this crude and common man rallied a fighting force large enough to earn him the status of rebel and traitor so that, at his violent end, all traces of his passing were obliterated by official proclamation, his dwellings and land leveled, ploughed under, and strewn with salt. It was obliteration on a grand scale, and it says much about the threat Aguirre posed to the imperial order. For if Aguirre, a man of towering rages and rancors, was psychotic, he was also a precursor of the rampant individualism that would, almost three centuries later, climax in a ferment of revolution, extinguishing the old order forever." "Contemporaneous history is unreliable in the best of times and no more so than with the chronicles of Aguirre's day. Thus he has remained shrouded in mystery. Now, knowledgeably sifting this original source material and measuring it against his own powerful imagination, Stephen Minta arrives at speculative history that rings with truth and narrative that pulses with life." "Combining informed readings of the texts with his own adventurous re-creation of the journey, Minta spins a tale that radiates a strangely modern cast, one whose unanswered questions have haunted us through four centuries and whose protagonists epitomize so much of the European encounter with the New World. Theirs is a tale of human foible, grandiose ambition, and false pride, and it strikes with the immediacy and truth of the finest fiction, the authority and power of the best narrative history."--BOOK JACKET.
Reviews from GoodReads
Loading GoodReads Reviews.
Citations
APA Citation, 7th Edition (style guide)
Minta, S. (1994). Aguirre: the re-creation of a sixteenth-century journey across South America (1st American ed.). H. Holt.
Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation, 17th Edition (style guide)Minta, Stephen. 1994. Aguirre: The Re-creation of a Sixteenth-century Journey Across South America. H. Holt.
Chicago / Turabian - Humanities (Notes and Bibliography) Citation, 17th Edition (style guide)Minta, Stephen. Aguirre: The Re-creation of a Sixteenth-century Journey Across South America H. Holt, 1994.
MLA Citation, 9th Edition (style guide)Minta, Stephen. Aguirre: The Re-creation of a Sixteenth-century Journey Across South America 1st American ed., H. Holt, 1994.
Note! Citations contain only title, author, edition, publisher, and year published. Citations should be used as a guideline and should be double checked for accuracy. Citation formats are based on standards as of August 2021.
Staff View
Loading Staff View.