Customer Reviews

Samba in the Night

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That's what this book's title should be. I have actually read the book, in case you're wondering. The author lacks a minimum knowledge of African religions, of Spiritism as structured by Kardec in France, of how both migrated and evolved in Brazil, and of the Brazilian culture and idiosyncrasy. Finally he absolutely lacks the scientific method one could expect from an anthropologist(perhaps because he attempted to write a paperback novel rather than a scientific study). This book could easily have been written by an undergraduate correspondent of, say, "Let's go Brazil". French Professor Roger Bastide, albeit repeating many of the mistakes that most novices in the field of non-orthodox religions make, had at least a better understanding of the Brazilian history and social strata. Hess' book is very weak.

I'm an anthropology professor and a Brazil specialist. This book was innovative and valuable when it first came out and still is. I used it just this year (2011) in a course on Brazil at a top-tier US college. It is an excellent introduction to spiritism, umbanda, and candomblé as practiced in Brazil, and it fulfills its promise of showing how the beliefs and practices of these lived traditions are integrated in wider Brazilian social life. Its methods and writing style are fully compatible with the standards of anthropological ethnographic research established in the 1980s. The author's success in his subsequent career also reinforces its value. Any review which starts out "I have not read this book, but..." should be dismissed out of hand, of course. This book deserves a higher rating.

I have not actually read the book, so perhaps I have no right to write any comments on it based solely on the bits of information presented in this page. But if you're curious to find out why I took the time to write this, please read on.

First and foremost, Spiritism and Kardecism are two different words for the same belief system. Allan Kardec compiled this doctrine in the 19th century, which he called "Spiritism" to make a clear distinction between this belief system and the broader term "Spiritualism". The latter word refers to the idea of the existence of the immortal "soul" and so one could say that any religion that embraces this idea is spiritualist. Spiritism, on the other hand, is a very well defined belief system composed of philosophical, scientific and religious facets. It does not support mysticism and does not favour the execution of any type of ritual.

Spiritism is a lesson of love and everlasting life in a continued pursuit of self-improvement and harmony with all the creation throughout multiple existences. The title of this work alone seems to associate this doctrine with "music" and "night" giving me the impression that the book is off to a bumpy start. While "music" and "night" are elements of rituals in Afro-Brazilian religions like Umbanda and Candomble, they could not have any relation to a doctrine, which as I said before, has no rituals. It saddens me to see that a scholarly work such as this one can have a title which taken out of context would help to induce one to a misconception. Even if all the facts are set straight as the text goes on, having spotted such contradictory associations in the book's title has lead me to believe that my time would be better spent reading alternative sources.

I suggest the potential reader of this book be aware of these facts before taking to heart the ideas exposed in it and point the interested to the authoritative texts compiled by Allan Kardec which are the most honest and accurate portraial of what Spiritism is all about.