I'm a little bit of a fan of Christopher Columbus. The challenges he faced in his life, especially in the first voyage he took across the Atlantic, were tremendous, and he faced them down with what appears to be considerable fortitude, viewed across 5 centuries. The ships he and other explorers sailed in were so small that today they'd probably be termed "boats" instead; the navigational instruments he had were hilariously primitive; his weaponry was not that much further advanced than that of the natives he met; and of course he was hampered by court politics and the fact that he wasn't even Spanish, yet sailed for the Spanish Crown. In spite of all of this, he accomplished a lot more than you'd expect, finding a host of islands in the New World, and founding the first settlement there. Of course, he never really got over the idea that India and China were just across the horizon, a few day's journey away, so his legacy is one of accomplishment rather than theoretical discovery, but he *did* accomplish things, and those accomplishments were of course very crucial in the development of civilization around the globe.
Laurence Bergreen does an excellent job of laying out Columbus's accomplishments, the places he discovered, things he saw, people he met or brought with him on the voyages. Bergreen doesn't ignore the rest of Columbus's life, but he does skim over it, pretty much. From what I remember, we don't know that much about the rest of Columbus's life anyway, so it's not that big of a loss that the author sees fit to concentrate on the voyages themselves, and tries to tell us what is known about them. One of the interesting tidbits you can glean from a careful reading of the book is that Hispaniola (the island that now comprises the Dominican Republic and Haiti) was the island he apparently was most interested in. He visited it in all four voyages, and established his first 2 settlements in the New World here. He left a settlement on Hispaniola when he visited there the first time in 1492, and when he returned a couple of years later to discover that a combination of disease, starvation, dissension, and native hostility had wiped out the settlement, he tried again. Using the experience he'd gained the first time, he endeavored to choose a better settlement site, and planted another colony, which survived and is still there today, the oldest European settlement in the Western Hemisphere. He'd negotiated status as administrator of whatever colony he founded, under Ferdinand and Isabella's jurisdiction, but his skills as an administrator weren't up to his excellence as a navigator. Things eventually fell apart, and at the end of his 3rd voyage he was arrested, his property seized, and he and his followers and loyalists were sent back to Spain. He had a sense of the dramatic and how things would play back in Spain, so he insisted on keeping the shackles on his wrists when he appearred in front of the Sovereigns, and it was a good idea: they ordered him freed and his belongings restored. A 4th voyage cemented his reputation as an intrepid explorer and seafarer, though he wound up stranded on the North Coast of Jamaica for more than a year, the ships being victims of worms that bored holes in their wooden hulls. His sojourn as a castaway, and his rescue, are a fitting end to the story.
Bergreen does an excellent job of outlining all of this, making all the points he feels should be made, and keeping the narrative rumbling right along. Columbus was an interesting character, and when possible Bergreen lets him speak for himself. He also was a product of his time, greedy and at times insensitive to the lives and liberty of the natives on the various islands that he explored. Bergreen does a good job of recounting that while there were people even then who felt that the Indians' rights should be protected, there also were a number of people who pretty much didn't care about anything except enriching themselves, and felt that they were free to steal from the natives, given that they were all pagans.
The author gives credit where credit is due, citing Columbus's original orders dealing with the natives (he insisted that their rights be respected in all things) and how the situation later deteriorated to the point of occasionaly outright conflict. Others involved in Columbus's expeditions (typically critics of his who often revolted against his rule) were worse than he, but of course blamed all of the bad things that happened on Columbus, banking on his status as a Genoese to color the argument. It generally didn't work, and Columbus died much respected, if not financially rewarded, in Spain. The legend that he died in poverty is just that: a legend. Interestingly, there are two claimants to possession of his gravesite. He was originally buried in a tomb in Spain, and moved a few times before being transferred to Santo Domingo on Hispaniola. When that island was transferred to France, bones were moved to Cuba first, then back to Spain, but the administration in Santo Domingo insist that Columbus himself remained with him, some of his relatives being removed by mistake. Probably we'll never know at this point.
I really enjoyed this book, in case you can't tell, and I would recommend it pretty much across the board to everyone. It's very well-written, illustrated with maps of the voyages that are well-done also, and has 3 picture inserts (1 in color) with portraits and pictures of all the relevant characters. Very well-done.
