Looking for History : Dispatches from Latin America [Hardcover]

Alma Guillermoprieto (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 10, 2001 | Series: Age of Unreason

Since Alma Guillermoprieto became The New Yorker's Latin American correspondent a decade ago, she has emerged as the most informed and admired writer on her part of the world. In these superb pieces of reportage and analysis she anatomizes a region we are intimately linked with yet sadly ignorant of.

She writes in depth about three countries that are in deep difficulty: Cuba, to which she returned after many years—a place in an exhausting holding pattern, waiting for Castro's departure yet anxious about what may replace him. Colombia, in which she has spent several years and which is fatally splintered among the government, the left-wing guerrillas who control large sections of the country, thanks in part to money from the drug trade, and the right-wing paramilitaries. Mexico, where she lives, which is beset by the uprising in Chiapas (where she encounters the legendary masked leader, Marcos) and by the corruption of the government, yet emerging for the first time into some kind of real democracy.

Finally, she gives us the stories of Eva Perón—and so of Argentina; Che Guevara—and so of the aborted Marxist revolution in Latin America; and Mario Vargas Llosa, the great Peruvian novelist who in 1990 lost the battle for the presidency to Alberto Fujimori.

Looking for History is personal reportage that is infused with the author's unique understanding of a world that she is a part of, but that she can also stand apart from and sympathetically observe.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Guillermoprieto (The Heart That Bleeds: Latin America Now), Latin America correspondent for the New Yorker and the New York Review of Books, presents a collection of essays focusing on Colombia, Cuba and Mexico in the 1990s, accompanied by wonderfully elegant sketches of Eva Per¢n of Argentina and Mario Vargas Llosa of Peru. There is some repetition, but this flaw does not seriously detract from her message that although Latin American political culture in the latter half of the 20th century is largely shrouded in myth, particularly because of its potent relationship with the U.S., it does indeed have "its own independent life." Apparent throughout is the author's ability to capture a historical moment and place it in context: for example, her observations of the pope's visit in January 1998 to a Cuba led by Fidel Castro dressed in a dark suit, and not his usual army fatigues, who made many political concessions for the privilege of paying homage to the pope. The chapter on John Paul II is flanked by portraits of Che Guevara and of Castro, the former steeped in romantic fanaticism, the latter seen as clinging to power long after his revolution has been bypassed by history. Guillermoprieto's writing seems unaffected by any obvious political bias; she excoriates the violence of the left (the murderous guerrilla brigades of Colombia) and of the right (the murderous Colombian paramilitary forces). Above all, the author displays an insightful grasp of the absurdities and chaos (one of the root causes of which is the U.S.'s inexhaustible appetite for drugs) that, in her view, permeate Latin American politics.

Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal

Guillermoprieto, a staff editor at The New Yorker, is a well-known and astute observer of Latin America. This collection of 17 of her essays, all adapted from pieces published in The New Yorker and the New York Review of Books, focuses on recent political events in the region. The essays are primarily about three countries: Cuba, where revolutionary idealism had to face reality; Colombia, where revolutions have always failed; and Mexico, a land of political fantasy. Among the stories, book reviews, and descriptions are perceptive and insightful observations of Latin American politics and society that help illuminate this important part of the world. This volume will be of interest to Latin American collections as well as current affairs libraries. Mark L. Grover, Brigham Young Univ., Provo, UT
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Pantheon; First Edition edition (April 10, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375420940
• ISBN-13: 978-0375420948
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.8 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,910,198 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

26 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing, June 9, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Looking for History : Dispatches from Latin America (Hardcover)

I think I must have a problem with expectations: I think I expected a sequel to "The Heart that Bleeds", likely the best non-fiction, book/survey ever written about the whole of latin america in the 20th century (coupled with Mark Danner's work, Tina Rosenberg's "Children of Cane", Silvana Paternostro's new work, Jonathan Kandell's work on Mexico City, and Patrick Oster's "The Mexicans", you will know Latin America as well as you could barring travel). I love Alma Guillemoprieto's work, I think she really has created fine articles. But this book is too thin, it only looks at four situations (Mexico, Peru (a dusting at best of her old work), Argentina, Cuba) and does not say anything new or reveal anything really. I could have gleamed this information from the washington post and New York Times. I don't think the approach from a historian's perspective has worked. The stories of latin america needed a voice, I do not think it was captured within the pages of "Looking for History."

What happened to the citizens of Latin America? Why did all scenes disappear?

Why is this such a rehashing of your past work? Ms Guillermoprieto, The Heart that Bleeds was such a brilliant and insightful addition to the english speaking world's knowledge of Latin America, (arguably among the top 5 ever!) I wish it had been expanded in your new work and revised to include the situations in Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile, more of Peru, Brazil, Panama, Costa Rica, Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador and Ecuador. So much has happened, and no one yet has defined the situations in book form.

IN SUM, this is a shout out to Alma Guillermoprieto, Tina Rosenberg, Silvana Paternostro, Mark Danner, Jonathan Kandell, Patrick Oster: there is a book about modern latin america waiting to be written. Only you authors, and Patrick Symmes, can write the next work that gives these countries a voice to explain the headlines and maelstrom of change afoot throughout Latin America. (By the way, Patrick Symmes wrote a great, great work in Chasing Che. That book is awesome.) I truly wish that this is taken to heart, though it be written by a fan of yours.

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A clear, illustrative view of modern Latin America, April 10, 2001

By 

Michael K. McKeon - See all my reviews

This review is from: Looking for History : Dispatches from Latin America (Hardcover)

This is an excellent primer for the reader who seeks an overview of the diverse currents in modern Latin America. The study is not comprehensive; it is a sampler of articles addressing a number of separate and distinct Latin American situations (Cuba, Peru, Mexico, Colombia) which includes historical figures who served as catalysts (Eva Peron, Che Guevara). She references a number of other recent (accurate and well written) works on Latin America enabling the reader to pursue additional study.

Guillermoprieto writes in a clear, crisp readable fashion which incorporating understatement and irony. Her perspective is Latin American and she is direct and honest regarding the pervasive influence of the United States. Refreshingly, however, she refrains from simplistically depicting Latin Americans as martyrs and clearly places an appropriate degree of responsibility with Latin Americans for their own fate.

A fine book -- well written, interesting, informative. Highly recommended for the person who wishes to get further up to speed on the complex and extremely varied social and political milieus in the hemisphere's Spanish speaking nations.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Alma Guillermoprieto knows what she's talking about!, August 23, 2002

By A Customer

This review is from: Looking for History: Dispatches from Latin America (Paperback)

"Looking for History" is an enjoyable, vivid collection of articles on Latin America. The piece on Eva Peron is especially fascinating and surreal. Here Guillermoprieto is at her best, writing a very balanced portrait of a near-mythic character. We learn that Eva and Juan Peron were both unlikely superstars and yet somehow, once united, became a political and media tag-team powerhouse. We also learn that the story of Eva's corpse is perhaps more interesting, and certainly more bizarre, than her real life. Stuffed by a taxidermist, her body traveled across the Atlantic several times -- at one point collecting dust in an attic -- before being laid to rest in Buenos Aires decades after her death. Guillermoprieto does not report new facts here. Anyone who has read a good biography on Evita will already know the lurid details surrounding the corpse. But Guillermoprieto handles this material so well that it reads better than a Borges story. Indeed, she seems to know that any good telling of Latin America, whether factual or fictional, must include some dimension of absurdity.

Some of the strongest articles in "Looking for History" are on Colombia's civil war. She details how the FARC, the country's largest guerilla group, went from a ragtag team of 200 Marxist fighters to a revolutionary army that now has some 17,000 troops. She also goes into the background of Colombia's rightwing death squads, particularly the AUC, and shows how these paramilitary units actually feed off of the rebels. She mentions, for example, that one-third of the AUC's members are actually fighters plucked from the guerilla groups. Many of these converts are former hostages of the AUC, who have even been viciously tortured and beaten by the paramilitaries. Once released, the guerillas often return to the death squads and freely join the enemy side. It is a strange story, and Guillermoprieto interviews these converts -- many of them women -- to understand what made them fight in the first place, and then what made them into turncoats. These personal stories, so confused, so profoundly chaotic, seem to represent the turmoil of the entire Colombian nation. Here loyalties are tangled, identities fractured, and the lines between civilian and soldier hopelessly blurred. Guillermoprieto communicates this all so well, showing that no one is truly innocent or, for that matter, completely villainous.

Finally, the pieces on Mexico are exceptional, especially the one on Subcomandante Marcos. Her portrait of the Zapatista leader is complex but fair, not presenting him as a sacred hero, nor as some warmongering radical. She fits him somewhere in between, flawed for sure, but also noble. He is a man motivated by ego and fame, enjoying the hero worship that now surrounds him. But he also spearheaded a just cause -- the rights of the Indian peasant -- and used a savvy media campaign to champion this group and overthrow a corrupt regime. This approach to revolution, using words over AK-47s, distinguishes Marcos, making him a truly unique rebel leader. And Guillermoprieto is quick to point this out. But she is also willing to point out his failures -- some of which have cost many innocent lives. On top of this, she includes a number of rare but interesting historical facts on Mexico and its southern states in particular. She mentions that President Lazaro Cardenas, back in the late 1930s, was the very first Mexican leader to ever visit Chiapas, and that the region was so remote in those days that it took him six weeks to reach his destination. There were no railways and very few navigable roads -- the president had to use burros and horses to complete his trip.

All the articles are peppered with these kinds of facts, making the book a fun and informative read. Moreover, and perhaps more important, Guillermoprieto doesn't pull any punches. She describes Latin America as it is. Intriguing, yes. Lively, most definitely. But also pitiful, horrific, violent, evil, petty and perhaps, in some ways, hopeless. "Looking for History" is not politically correct; it is just correct.