Twisted Roots: Latin America's Living Past [Paperback]

Carlos Alberto Montaner (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 1, 2003 | ISBN-10: 0875862608 | ISBN-13: 978-0875862606

A Cuban/Spanish journalist and author examines the historical and cultural influences that shaped Latin America and suggests how they have made it into the most impoverished, unstable and backward region in the Western world.

No one ever saw what happened in Latin America as legitimate or just -- including the descendants of the Conquistadors themselves, says Montaner.

Today's patent economic failure, political instability and poor scientific contribution stem greatly from this unique history. Spaniards, Creoles, Indians and Blacks all have their own aggrieved perspectives, and all are partly justified.

Montaner draws on the cultural and historical currents that made up Spain at the time of the Conquest, including the Gothic, Moorish, Christian and Jewish elements; and explores how Spain tackled the challenge of co-opting, rather than exterminating, the native peoples. A more humane approach than that undertaken in North America, it nonetheless laid the foundations for the long-lasting conflict and confusion that still make Latin America unruly today.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Syndicated columnist and novelist Carlos Alberto Montaner is a frequent lecturer and part-time instructor at the University of Miami (FL), the University of Guatemala, and others.

Born in Cuba, Montaner has lived in Madrid since 1970. Dozens of newspapers in the U.S., Spain and Latin American run his weekly column.

He has published two books with Algora Publishing. His books in Spanish include Fidel Castro y la Revolución cubana, No Perdamos tambien el siglo XXI (Let's Not Lose the 21st Century Too), the novels Perromundo and Trama, and, in collaboration with Plinio Apuleyo Mendoza and Alvaro Vargas Llosa, Manual del perfecto idiota latino americano and Fabricantes de miseria.

Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Algora Publishing (December 1, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0875862608
• ISBN-13: 978-0875862606
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 5.9 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #299,735 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Born in Havana, Cuba, in 1943. Has lived in Madrid since 1970. Has been a university professor in various institutions in Latin America, the United States and Spain. He is a writer and journalist. Dozens of newspapers in Latin America, Spain and the United States have published his weekly column for the past 40 years at least. He has been described by the magazine 'Poder' ('Power') as one of the most widely read and most influential columnists in the Spanish-language world. The number of readers who have access to his articles every week is estimated at 6 million.

He has participated as an observer at several elections in Latin America and in numerous seminars devoted to the strengthening of democracy and the diffusion of the concepts of liberty.

Montaner received the Tolerance Prize awarded by the Comunidad de Madrid in 2007. In 2010 he was awarded the "Juan de Mariana for a life dedicated to the defense of freedom". In 2009 the Universidad Francisco Marroquín in Guatemala was awarded the degree of Doctor Honoris Causa. Previously, the University of Applied Sciences in Peru (UPC) had appointed him a Visiting Professor. In 2007, during the democratic government of Enrique Bolaños, Nicaragua's government gave him the "Orden Rubén Darío".

Montaner has published more than 25 books. Several of them have been translated into English, Portuguese, Russian and Italian. Among the better known and re-edited titles are Journey to the Heart of Cuba; How and Why Communism Disappeared; Liberty, the Key to Prosperity, and the novels Perromundo, A Dog's World, and 1898: The Plot. Some of his most controversial and most widely distributed essays are the best-sellers Guide to the Perfect Latin American Idiot and Manufacturers of Misery, both co-written with Plinio Apuleyo Mendoza and Álvaro Vargas Llosa. The Return of the Idiot, also by the three authors, has been published.

In 2001, he published Twisted Roots; Latin America's Living Past. In this book, which has had several printings and is used as supplementary reading in some Latin American universities, Montaner broaches, from an historic perspective, one of the most pressing issues of our culture: why did the America that emerged from Iberian colonization become the poorest and least stable segment of the West? Before this book, the author, from other angles, had reflected on the topic in two other books published by Plaza & Janés: The Agony of America and Let's Not Also Lose the 21st Century.

His latest books about his native land were titled Cuba: A Century of Painful Learning, published in 2002 during the first centenary of the Cuban republic, and The Cubans: A History of Cuba in One Lesson (2006). To a great extent, both are the result of a series of lectures the author gave at the University of Miami.

In Latin Americans and the West, one of his latest books about Latin America, published in the fall of 2009 in USA by the Interamerican Institute for Democracy, was published in Spanish by Norma Carvajal Publishers in 2003 (Los latinoamericanos y la cultura occidental). In this book the author describes the influences that have molded the Ibero-American world and unequivocably establishes the Western and plural origins of the trends that have given an ethical and esthetic sense to Latin Americans' way of life and artistic manifestations.

Liberty and Its Enemies, published in 2005 by Sudamericana, is devoted to examining and discussing the public policies that have fostered development in certain countries and the policies that have contributed to ruin them in others.

Pillars of Freedom, published in Argentina by Edhasa, appeared in the summer of 2007. It is a book that brings together about 100 articles intended to explain the fundamentals of classical liberal thinking from diverse perspectives.

La mujer del coronel, his third novel, was published in 2011 by Alfaguara.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Well-Rounded and Intriguing Resource, March 12, 2009

By 

A. A. Reader (New York, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Twisted Roots: Latin America's Living Past (Paperback)

This is a very interesting and more importantly readable book. It attempts to dissect the reasons for Latin America's lagging from the rest of the world. To do so it covers an immense amount of history, culture, and personality of the people in charge. The beauty of this book is that it is not a pure economics or political science text, but a window into every element that affected Latin America's current position in the world. Wonderful, easy reading.