Into the Heart: One Man's Pursuit of Love and Knowledge Among the Yanomama (Charnwood Library) [Large Print] [Hardcover]

Kenneth Good (Author)

Book Description

Series: Charnwood Library | Publication Date: November 1992

The true story of an American anthropologist who lived with a primitive Amazon tribe, fell in love with one of its women, and risked death to bring her out of the jungle. "An amazing tale of adventure and romance".--Kirkus Reviews. 16 pages of photographs.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

This is an extraordinarily human account of the Yanomama Indians of the Amazon rain forest, a people who have in the past been rather dehumanized by anthropologist Napoleon Chagnon's Yanomama: The Fierce People (Holt, 1968). Good began working with them in the mid-1970s, living in their communities, studying their lives, and eventually marrying a Yanomama. He does not avoid discussing the violence they are capable of wreaking upon one another, but he sets it within the broader context of love, kindness, and respect that permeates most of their interpersonal lives. This is a personal rather than scholarly account, but it provides such powerful counterpoint to the woefully unfair--but widely circulated--accounts of the Yanomama that it should be made available everywhere.
- Glenn Petersen, Baruch Coll., CUNY
Copyright 1991 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 528 pages
• Publisher: Ulverscroft Large Print Books (November 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0708986501
• ISBN-13: 978-0708986509
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,013,417 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Into the Heart review, April 22, 2004

By 

Martha Byar (Butlerville, IN USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Into the Heart: One Man's Pursuit of Love and Knowledge Among the Yanomama (Charnwood Library) (Hardcover)

Into the Heart is a book written by Kenneth Good, an anthropologist. Good went to the rainforests in Brazil to live among the Yanomama. He went there to study their way of life. He discovered how different these people are from the people in the United States.
Their diet consisted of what they hunted and things they planted. They worked very hard and lived off the land. These people never complained no matter how bad a situation was. Unlike our society, the only transportation they had was by foot, they slept either outdoors or in houses with large open rooms with many people, and they did not have medicine or doctors.
During his stay, Good learned the lifestyle of the Yanomama. He learned their ways and accepted the things they did. While there, he met a very young Yanomama girl. He gradually fell in love with her. Even though they had major cultural differences, the two of them left the rainforest and came to the United States where they were married.
This is an excellent book to read. There was suspense not knowing what was going to happen next. It was extremely interesting to see how other people in the world live as compared to our own traditions. Plus it had some romance mixed in by the marriage of this couple from totally different cultures. I would recommend that everyone read this very interesting book.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Unique, informative and fascinating., April 18, 2004

By 

algo41 "algo41" (philadelphia, pa United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Into the Heart: One Man's Pursuit of Love and Knowledge Among the Yanomama (Paperback)

An anthropologist spends many years (multiple trips) amongst the Yanomamo Indians of the Amazon, who had had very little contact with civilization, and only a limited amount of its goods (e.g. some matches, a few better axes). He eventually marries one of the tribe, who returns to the United States with him. Anthropologist's faculty advisor is a real villain. The account is personal, rather than scholarly, although Good did write scholarly papers, and he refrains from much abstract analysis or generalization. The Indians have strong human emotional attachments for children, and family, and are not very violent, but the society is very sexist, tribes are prone to get mad at other tribes, and there isn't much concept of an abstract morality. It is a utilitarian morality, and tribe members are not likely to stick their necks out to protest unfair treatment to others. Disapproval does carry weight.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A remarkable story, October 6, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Into the Heart: One Man's Pursuit of Love and Knowledge Among the Yanomama (Charnwood Library) (Hardcover)

This is a truly remarkable book, much different from most anthropological literature. Although Good sets out to do a very mainstream anthropological study, he gets drawn in to the community, and what ensues is a fascinating tale, a touching love story, and hopefully, a major change in people's beliefs about so-called "primitive tribes". As Good becomes more and more frustrated with the competitive and stuffy world of academia and more connected to his Yanomama tribe, he truly begins to change his life. Remarkable!