Reading this was like walking down a strange path, one filled with twists and turns. Perhaps, before beginning the trek, you ingest some hallucinogeniReading this was like walking down a strange path, one filled with twists and turns. Perhaps, before beginning the trek, you ingest some hallucinogenic mushrooms. You begin to speak in tongues. You’re transported to another world, another time. Eventually, you stumble onto a grand city, one that floats in a massive, mirror-like lake. Welcome to the great city of Tenochtitlan, where the emperor Moctezuma is currently welcoming the party of the sweaty, malodorous Spanish conquistadores, led by Hernan Cortes and his cronies.
This is an imaginative retelling of the “conquest” of Mesoamerica. However, author Alvaro Enrigue lends the indigenous a voice of their own, since theirs were silenced by colonizing priests and insecure men grasping for titles of royalty. There’s plenty of comedic elements, mixed with absurdity, and I think Tarantino would enjoy turning this into a film.
Enrigue is a gifted writer, and his style is quite unorthodox. Conversations do not include quotation marks, which can be jarring at first. I would love to reread this in Spanish since this is a translation.
This was quite enjoyable, and I want to read his first work, Sudden Death. Read the blurb, it sounds insane....more
I listened to this on Audible while reading Simon Winchester’s The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity and the Making of the Oxford EI listened to this on Audible while reading Simon Winchester’s The Professor and the Madman: A Tale of Murder, Insanity and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary by Simon Winchester, and both complemented each other wonderfully.
The former is a work of historical fiction, and tells the story of Esme, whose father is an editor of the Oxford English Dictionary. As a child, she would play underneath the tables of the Scriptorium, which consists of a small shed converted into a workspace. Rare or odd words discovered by the public were written on small slips and mailed there, at the request of the dictionary’s primary editor James Murrary. One day, Esme sees a slip fall to the ground, unbeknownst to the adults. The slip contains the word bondmaid. Soon after, she realizes some words are deemed less important than others.
I enjoyed the story, specifically the historical aspect. The creation of the OED is a very interesting tale, and the fictional and nonfictional realms mesh thanks to Williams’ writing and storytelling.
If you’re a logophile you’ll enjoy this one....more
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