Caribbean Books

I picked this book by using the "pick a random book with your eyes closed" method at the library.

For an American this book can be tough to start. The "poor talk" that Lovelace used throughout the book can be a little tough to get through, but don't give up! It is too good of a book to let one minor flaw stop you. (And a little secret: As the book progresses, Lovelace seems to have trouble keeping up the "poor talk" and becomes a lot smoother to read).

Lovelace's use of description is almost without comparison. He has Hugo's gift of description without having to use chapters to describe a building, person, or general area. His one line descriptions hit so dead on that you almost feel as if you are standing in "the Hill".

The story itself is also an amazing read, but most reviewers seemed to have missed the biggest purpose behind this book (whether Lovelace intended it or not, it is the overall theme). The major theme is that we all judge people without knowing them fully. We hold people back because we don't like the partial picture we are presented. We never take the time to learn the whole story. As you read the book, you think to yourself how you want to be better. You don't want to judge. You vow to yourself that you will stop, when suddenly the last paragraph hits and you realize, "Wow, I am STILL judging without the whole story, maybe it's not possible to stop." If the last paragraph did not make you think this, I suggest you reread the book and think about each character and how you feel about them.

Overall, an amazing read. Lovelace writes an amazing book, with the only flaw being that the "poor talk" seems a little forced. As the book progressed, he seemed to get into a more comfortable area.

Definitely Recommended!

Don't get me wrong I enjoyed this story but in all honesty I thought it was a GOOD but not GREAT story. A little too stiff for me. I did like the characters but at times the reading got a little too much like work just trying to get to another part of the story that was a little more fun and not as much work. [I think I said that right], nothing personal just one reader's opinion.

The "double vision" of Caribbean life is portrayed in the life of Aldrick who is caught between generational and cultural conflicts. And all of this during Carnival! The Dragon Can't Dance was almost prophetic in the depiction of the commercialization of Mas. Change always brings choice and Lovelace's characters highlight the necessary pain that comes with any decision.

In Earl Lovelace, without exception, we have the Master Storyteller of the Caribbean. Even years after its publication (1979 and 1998), "Dragon" remains peerless as an authentic, forceful voice of postcolonial Trinidadian society. Nowhere else have the intricacies of carnival been more profoundly explored and dissected than here by the artful mastery of prose in this defining portrait. Lovelace's stinging critique of race and politics is poignant and luminously presented. With heavy symbolism and sensitivity, the story reaches successfully beyond Caribbean life to touch the larger human condition itself. The central figure of Aldrick (whose "mission" is to performa the Dragon dance during carnival) embodies a entire people's frustrations and aspirations. This is an unexaggerated powerful tale by one my absolute favorite Caribbean writers. This story is timeless and one of Lovelace's best creations, far surpassing, in my opinion, his other wonderful novels like "The Wine of Astonishment", "The Schoolmaster", or even "Salt." Anyone sincerely interested in Caribbean culture and literature will find this novel indispensable reading.

Alan Cambeira
Author of AZUCAR! The Story of Sugar (a novel)

I loved this book so much that I recommended it to all my family and friends. Earl Lovelace captured everything that Carnival means for Trini people. The characters are so real that the faces that I chose to see them as, were faces of people that I actaully knew in my family. LOL. This novel will make all readers want to take a trip to Trinidad and experience life there. This book is just too sweet for words!!!!

Daniel Putowski's writing makes you feel like you are sitting in a bar in the laid-back Caribbean, listening to the regulars tell the stories about the colorful characters they have known in their lives. For those who have visited and loved Aruba, it is an insight into a part of the Island they never see. Although he definitely shows us the seamier side of Aruba, he does it with the a very warm and sympathetic eye. He doesn't miss the gentleness of the Aruban character, even when dealing with drug dealers and hookers. A really nice book to read on the beach.

I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed this book. I am a 17 time visitor to Aruba and this book put me right on the island. It is not the Aruba that we are used to seeing. It is the dark side of the island. An Island Away details the lives of four people and how all their lives cross. Charlie is an artist and a bar owner. Luz is a prostitute working for 90 days on the island. Sam is a transplanted Aruban who made his fortune in Miami and is returning to retire and live on the island. Beck is a tugboat captain whose boat goes down in a storm and washes up on Aruba. This is a very real story of survival, romance and "how it used to be" in modern day Aruba. An Island Away takes you on a tour of the seamy side of paradise detailing the lives and loves of the aforementioned characters who are painted as colorful and resorceful survivors in a world where the weak get swallowed up and spit out

An Island Away was all it was cracked up to be: an exploration of a side of Aruba that tourists rarely see. I really got to know the main characters and the scenes were straight out of my childhood since I, too, was born and grew up in the shadow of the Lago oil refinery.

Who would have thought that the story of a prostitute, a couple of chollers, and a couple of hard partiers would be so compelling?

As someone who has been traveling to Aruba for the past 15 years, I loved An Island Away. Daniel actually made me feel like I was right there while the story was being told.

I look forward to the sequel... and, can't wait to see what happens to my two favorite characters ~ Luz and Captain Beck! Hurry Daniel, I'll be back in February, and would love to read the new book while on island.

Thanks for a great story!

One doesn't expect this much quality from a first book. After all writing is a craft and practice develops it. However, Putkowski's first book An Island Away is well crafted and a riveting story. I couldn't put it down. The characters are developed early on in the book, so much so very quickly they cease to be characters and are soon very real people. What is amazing is how Putkowski was able ot get into the mind of a woman who is a prostitute, carefully describing how she might feel and react.

The book also had cinematic qualities, you could see the ocean, the sky, feel the dry breezes of Aruba, see the wonderful paintings by Andres on the little house's walls. Also, being from the Philadelphia area I can see Nate Beck taking his tug down the Delaware River. I can believe I probably passed his tug many times on my way over the Platt or Rt. 95 bridges.

Definitely worth buying and reading. I hear Putkowski is working on a second book and I can't wait to read it.

Mr Neruda captures the feeling and emotion of love in these written works. They are from the movie IL POSTINO and have incredible impact.

after watching il postino the italian film the poetry in the movie had me craving more. excellent what a talent how lucky his wife was to have so much love directed toward her.

POETRY by Pablo Neruda

And it was at that age...Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no, they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.

I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating plantations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.

And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
I felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke loose on the wind.

When I first read this poem, something within me blossomed. It was as if Neruda had found a way to pry open my soul and let the True Light, the True Love, and the True Life of my life to finally come forth; naked, unashamed, and gloriously beautiful.

Even though this book only contains ten little poems, you will get so much enjoyment out of each and every one of them. I even gave a copy of this book to someone whose primary reading interests were that of Mad Magazine and the classifieds and he said he never imagined that reading could be so sensual and yet so soulful.

May your heart and soul break wide open and may the radiant jewels that are within come forth for all to see.

Peace and blessings...

A great, tiny smattering of love poems by the great Chilean poet and activist, mainly featuring the work of his used in the Italian film, "Il Postino" (if you're a poet and you haven't seen it, you're not actually a poet. You're a person with a journal filled likely with meandering words and diary ruminations and you will give birth to children with monocled vision due to their cyclopian disformities). A must-have for anyone deigning to create poetry of the love stripe, and totally affordable. A perfect launhcing pad for anyone not yet aware of Neruda's incredible amount of excellent, excellent work.

Love, Ten Poems by Pablo Neruda is a romantic short collection by one of the most sensual and romantic poets I have ever read. Neruda draws all of your senses into his world and you want to stay there, never to leave. One wants to find the beauty as he paints it for you, the reader. His wife is the muse of most of his love sonnets. As Neruda says, "Love is so short, forgetting is so long."

I recommend this incredible poet to all who love to read poetry and to those who long to find their love and especially to those who have that love in their life. Neruda's romance will stir your heart and have you soaring.

Read it with your significant other and the emotions will carry you both up and away. Neruda's poems are powerful and their beauty sears into your heart with his words echoing long after. These poems were featured in the movie, The Postman. You cannot help feeing affected by the power of Neruda. He has to be one of THE most powerful masters of the written word.

My Life is a fascinating book. I was most attracted to the style in which Trotsky took responsibity for his mistakes. He didn't try to blame others for what happened at Kronstadt. My Life is a wonderful show of a great and bizarre life. Since the McCarthy era, it has become fashionable to slander revolutionaries or look for "Physcological" motives. My Life is written from a bias, but it certainly has none of taint of an author who tries to discredit someone smarter than them. My Life also show Trotsky as a complete person- bound by unbreakable ties to an idea. My Life is written as many different things- half autobiography and half history of the revolution. The only thing I found bad about My Life is how absorbed it is in its time. My Life is entertaining and readable, and includes some rather funny incidents- like Trotsky naming his socks after Soviet leaders. The only fault is that My Life requires a basic understanding of events to be fully understood. For instance, if you haven't the foggiest what permenant revolution is, you may need to find out. My Life is idea-based, and challenges readers to discover those ideas- and then to do something about them. Buy the book-it is worth a $1,000

Today we expect our political memoir writers to take part in a game of show and tell about the most intimate details of their private personal lives on their road to celebrity. Refreshingly, you will find no such tantalizing details in Russian Bolshevik leader Leon Trotsky's memoir written in 1930 just after Stalin had exiled him to Turkey. Instead you will find a thoughtful political self-examination by a man trying to draw the lessons of his fall from power in order to set his future political agenda. This task is in accord with his stated conception of his role as an individual agent at service in the historical struggle toward a socialist future. Thus, underlying the selection of events highlighted in the memoir such as the rise of the revolutionary wave in Russia in 1905 and 1917, the devastation to the socialist program of World War I and the degeneration of the Russian Revolution especially after Lenin's death and the failure of the German Revolution of 1923 is a sense of urgency about the need for continued struggle for a socialist future. It also provides a platform as well for polemics against those foes and former supporters who have either abandoned or betrayed that struggle.

At the beginning of the 21st century when socialist political programs are in decline it is hard to imagine the spirit that drove Trotsky to dedicate his whole life to the fight for a socialist society. However, at the beginning of the 20th century he represented only the most consistent and audacious of a revolutionary generation of Eastern Europeans and Russians who set out to change the history of the 20th century. It was as if the best and brightest of that generation were afraid, for better or worse, not to take part in the revolutionary political struggles that would shape the modern world. As Trotsky notes this element was lacking, with the exceptions of Rosa Luxemburg, Karl Liebknecht and precious few others, in the Western labor movement. Trotsky using his own experiences tells the story of the creation of this revolutionary cadre with care and generally proper proportions.

Many of the events such as the disputes within the Russian revolutionary movement, the attempts by the Western Powers to overthrow the Bolsheviks in the Civil War after their seizure of power and the struggle of the various tendencies inside the Russian Communist Party and in the Communist International discussed in the book may not be familiar to today's audience. Nevertheless one can still learn something from the strength of Trotsky's commitment to his cause and the fight to preserve his personal and political integrity against overwhelming odds. As the organizer of the October Revolution, creator of the Red Army in the Civil War, orator, writer and fighter Trotsky he was one of the most feared men of the early 20th century to friend and foe alike. Nevertheless, I do not believe that he took his personal fall from power as a world historic tragedy. Moreover, he does not gloss over his political mistakes. While one would not want to be on the receiving end of his rapier tongue neither does he generally do personal injustice to his various political opponents. Politicians, revolutionary or otherwise, in our times should take note.

The phrase "Life is Beautiful" in the Italian film came from Leon Trotkys's last testament. It was written in exile in Mexico. At the time Trotsky's friends, family, and comrades were being harassed, slandered and murdered by Stalin, when he himself faced imminent assasination. He also faced death from the growing illnesses that had slowed him. Yet, in his testament he proclaimed that life is beautiful. Life must be cleansed of the evil and garbage Capitalism and Stalinism have left to this world.

Read this book and you will see how Trotsky's life became valuable for him because he decided to fight oppression, decided to learn about the world to fight, and never stopped fighting. Maybe your life can be beautiful if you read this book, and decide to fight like Trotsky did.

The introduction by the late Joseph Hansen Trotsky's secretary in Mexico is worth the price of the book. Joe explains how the household and work center in Mexico functioned, about how Trotsky valued hard work, but also valued celebrating comrades birthdays, hobbies like raising rabbits, trips to sites of Mexican history. Reading this also tells you how Joe organized the staff at World Outlook/ Intercontinental Press, working with him was one of the great privileges of my life.

In these pages and memoirs of Trotsky by Joe, George Novack, Farrell Dobbs, and other comrades who knew Trotskty, you could find how serious Trotsky enjoyed and embraced life. In Turkey if he wanted to go fishing, he went to sea with Turkish fishers in their trawlers. If he wanted to raise rabbits as a hobby, he soon was taking care of something bordered on a commercial rabbit farm. Both in valuing work--chained to his desk was the term Trotsky passed down--and valuing parties and celebrations of new people coming onto the staff and leaving, Trotsky made his life beautiful.

Read this book, valued as much as a literary work as a political statement, and learn how you can make your life beautiful.

This is many books in one. A fine autobiography from a literary point of view, a historical document with brilliant insights into the time period and major players, and, most important, a rich and sustained polemic in favor of a life of commitment to revolutionary, working class politics. Trotsky dedicated his later life to keeping alive the continuity of Lenin and the Russian Revolution, and what a fascinating, courageous life it was, full of prison, exile, escape, insurrection, and more exile. Trotsky was an inspiring man of action, one of two or three figures who matter most to the working class. The politics of the working class struggle for total human emancipation is the piston that drives both the man and his autobiography.If not available from Amazon, booksfrompathfinder will have it. Click on "New and Used" near the top of the page.

When I decided to write this review, I had to choose between the various reasons why it's so beautiful and important. But, above all, I think that, in a world where the necessity of Marxist was supposedly to be more deeply felt than ever, what repels most people that would be liable to lend an ear to it is the repelling Stalinist mythology of the revolutionary as the relentless, ruthless, single-minded, google-eyed fanatical. Trotsky, on the contrary begins by assessing that, although his life was out of the ordinary, he neverthless remained a men with a penchant for a well-ordered ordinary life; that he found pleasure in seeing a well-ordered table or a well-kept fence; that he didn't becomne a revolutionary out of a feeling of opression, but because of being faced with a life that, although prosperous, offered him nothing but grey drudgery and no opprtunity for individual achievement; that he, like all revolutionaries, was a man like any other. I think that would be reason enough to commend this modern classic to the reader of today, outside from the wonderful style, the importance of the events narrated and so much else.

There are very few authors who can create characters who live with you long after you have read the last page. Glenville is one of them.
Song of Night left me gazing out my window searching for even the faintest flicker of fireflies.
I highly recommend this book.

I loved Song of Night. I could not put the book down once I got into it. It was the kind of book that put me in the story and in the lives of everyone in it. I could not put it down until I finished it. After reading that book I cannot wait to visit Barbados.

I PURCHASED THIS BOOK AND ADDED IT TO MY GREAT COLLECTION OF NOVELS BY BLACK AUTHORS.WHEN I OPENED THE PAGES I COULD NOT PUT THIS BOOK DOWN.I LOVE THIS STORY,IMIDIATELY I MOVED MYSELF INTO THAT VILLAGE I LIVED THERE FOR THREE DAYS WHILE I READ THIS STORY.
CYAN(A FIREHOUSE OF PASSION)OF COURSE WAS MY FAVOURITE CHARACTER.I IDENTIFIED SO MUCH WITH HER,I FELT HER PAIN AND HER PASSION FOR LIFE.I CRIED AND I WAS ALSO FILL WITH LAUGHTER,SHE WAS SO STRONG AND YET SO VULNERABLE.ALL OF THE CHARACTERS WERE SO REALISTIC .
MR LOVELL SHOWS US A SIDE OF BARBADOS THAT WE ALL NEED TO TAKE A MORE SERIOUS LOOK INTO .THIS BOOK SHOULD BE ON THE SHELF OF EVERY PUBLIC SERVANT IN BARBADOS MOST OF ALL THE PRIME MINISTER.
THANK YOU GLENVILLE LOVELL KEEP TELLING YOUR STORIES WE NEED TO HEAR MORE.

Cyan (also known as Night) grew up in a small seaside village on the island of Barbados with her father, mother and sister. At a very early stage in her life, she is faced with some very unsettling events that re-arranges the family structure and in the process, Cyan is forced to make decisions and deal with issues seemingly far beyond her years. Her character becomes strong-willed and very independent in her thinking and actions. The book is set in Barbados, and has a unique Caribbean flavor - the story is fascinating, that seems to unmistakably transcends the people, culture and politics of the island. It's a cleverly written story that to me reflects the circle of life, decisions and resulting consequences. Song of Night captures this and more! Another excellent read by Glenville Lovell!

Mr. Lovell brings out the real life of a young girl growing up in beautiful Barbados. I felt as thought I knew Cyan personally, she was sassy and real during all of her traumatic adventures. All of the characters were phenomenal. This book made me a laugh and it made me cry. Mr. Lovell also did an excellent job in presenting the facts about Barbados and its problems. I'm waiting for a sequel.

As you'll know if you've been to Santo Domingo, Robert Crassweller's "Trujillo" has long been the best-known biography of the dead Dominican dictator, perhaps owing partly to its omnipresence in the island's hotel gift shops. But "Death of the Goat" by Bernard Diederich is in my opinion the best and most readable non-fiction work through which to explore Trujillo and his bloody regime.

"Death of the Goat" has as its focal point the assasination of Rafael Trujillo, that is, the end of a 30-year-long story: the preparations, the backgrounds of the assasins, the frantic attempts to hide once the deed was done. But while focusing on the deed Diederich does an outstanding job of explaining how things got to that point, and does so less with the formality of a historian than with the incisiveness of an investigative reporter. This book is especially valuable for the light it sheds on the six months after Trujillo's assasination. Far from bringing about an immediate collapse to the regime, the assasination ushered in a six-month reign of terror during which Trujillo's family, led by the bloodthirsty Ramfis, exacted horrifyingly gruesome revenge on anyone they believed to have been involved in the plot. The torture visited on men such as father and son Miguel Angel Báez and Miguel Angel Báez Diaz is painful to read about even today and definitely not for those with weak stomachs. The curtain did not really fall on the "Era of Trujillo" until his sons executed their last captives at Trujillo's hacienda in November 1961 and then fled the country with their father's body and a hefty chunk of their nation's wealth.

The insightful and shocking look Diederich provides at the period after the assasination is essential reading for anyone seeking knowledge of the modern Dominican Republic. Perhaps most unbelievable of all is the fact that Joaquín Balaguer, one of Trujillo's rubber-stamp "Presidentes", could through his silence collaborate with such atrocities and yet still be elected president time and time again, most recently in 1994. Also hard to comprehend is how one of Balaguer's political allies could be Donald Reid Cabral, whose brother Robert committed suicide after the plot rather than be taken alive by the remaining Trujilloites whom Balaguer was involved with. In Dominican politics, truth really IS stranger than fiction. Diederich shows us why.

Fascinating!!! Very well written. A must read for all.

As one of the previous reviewers describe, read Crassweller's book about Trujillo to really get a good picture of how awful this Dominican dictator was to his people. For those interested in the assasination of the dictator, Diederich's book describes in minute detail of how the murder took place. Crassweller's book leaves much of this out. Trujillo was as bad to his people as Saddam is to the Iraqi people.
One good point of this book is the reader's knowledge that Diederich was there at the time in the country. This is no author piecing something together from written sources, but a news correspondent covering the Dominican Republic during the time of the incident. The book was very readable.

THis is a great read. Popular history. A great book about an extraordinary act of heroism in which a small band of men killed a brutal dictator.

My parents are from the Dominican Republic and all during my childhood I heard my father tell stories about the infamous dictator known as Trujillo. While reading this book and asking my parents questions about certain details, I can say that the author truly did describe the horrors lived during those thirty years while Trujillo governed the country. I enjoyed the book very much and would recommend it highly.

A little boy who doesn't like to read much is entranced by these Jack Sparrow books. They're well written for kids with a sense of adventure. Like the Hardy Boys or a dozen other series before them, they deliver a consistent and familiar character in cleverly worked plots. The one thing I'd like to change would be to add few more illustrations. All you get here is the illustration on the cover.

I bought these books for my 12yr old daughter. She's a huge POTC fan & has gobbled these books down. Now she has the whole set (9 in all). She enjoyed them immensely & wishes more were available.

My grandson loves Jack Sparrow, and so for his birthday we got him two books. He was delighted and now has the entire set. It's wonderful when you can see enthusiam about reading with all the electronic distractions that there are.

We are just starting on this book, the 5th in the series and a start of a new adventure for the young explorers. "Captain (please!)" Jack Sparrow and his crew seek a well-deserved rest after their experience with the Sword of Cortes, only to find themselves in the middle of another mystery and at the heart of the wrath of one of their crewmate's village! This book is another page turner that leaves my son begging for the next chapter and the next book in the series! Perfect for us die-hard POTC fans!

I've read the entire series so far (Vol. 1-7) to my nine year old son. It's something we share-our love for Captain Jack Sparrow and the crew of The Barnacle. The entire series is funny and exciting. It is so easy to picture Jack Sparrow as a teenager. I can't wait for Volume 8!!!

This is a very nice book, another amazing collection of (anti)poems and visual artefactos by Parra.

Remarkable translation of Liz Werner.

This is an english edition, but since some of these poems have not appeared previously, this book will also be a must-have for Parra followers in the spanish community. But even for old poems, is a very interesting experience to read the antipoems in a different language and to see them find their way in the intricacies of each language. It is necessary to say, however, that in the introduction Werner clearly states that Parra thinks that these are not really translations, because antipoems cannot be translated, so these are rewrittings. But probably the best possible ones.

Parra style, for those that have not heard about him, is better understood by reading it than by using descriptions:

TO MAKE A LONG STORY SHORT

To make a long story short
I leave all my possessions
to the Municipal Slaughterhouse
to the Special Forces Unit of the Police Department
to Lucky Dog Lotto

So now if you want you can shoot

This book is truly magnificent. Parra has one of the most clever minds in poetry today. His antipoems are very attractive as they move away from the old traditional poetic style. I understand Parra will be proposed for the Literature Nobel Prize next year (2001). I couldn't agree more.

There are a wide variety of translations here; in both quality and fidelity to the original spanish. The fact that the poems are presented with both the original and the translation makes this book worth it. The Miller Williams and William Carlos Williams translations are wonderful, but some translations, like those by Ginsberg suffer from perhaps too much beat aesethetic co-oped into the work. Still, Parra is wonderful, full of grit and strange images; yet the Spanish, aside from a few words that are only found in Chilean Spanish, is clear and easy to read. I have even translated some of these poems myself. This is amazing work.

Theodor Adorno claimed that to write poetry after Auschwitz is barbaric. If so, then Parra is the one man who can justifiably escape the charge of barbarity. What Parra writes is nothing less than a full-scale assault on poetry, or as he calls it, "anti-poetry". Parra's work stands in violation of everything that poetry has ever been. If you are used to lyricism and poetic embellishment and will accept nothing less, you will hate this book. Either that, or it will revolutionize how you see the poetic art. Parra is for poetry what the WWF is for entertainment: it is raw, crass and, as people say, "in your face". It is also brilliant. It is not poetry, but it is, in its own unique way, poetic. And like much of the best poetry always has been, it is immersed in life. Its themes are those we all recognize: crooked police, pestering grandchildren, the morning alarm. It expresses for us what we would all like to express but do not or will not. I suppose one could call it catharsis through anti-art. And perhaps in our post-holocaust world, the most genuine art IS anti-art.

This is it, this is where poetry had to go after its many incarnations and its eventual and fateful death. Parra takes (knowingly or unwittingly) Derrida's concept of differrance and uses it to sledge hammer away his words into his `antipoems'. You'll find no Byron in his pages, or even any Cummings, not to mention any particular style per se. There's so much experimenting -and simplifying- with the word here one doesn't know what one is reading anymore... poems? random (though coherent within themselves) thoughts on paper? cooking recipes? jokes? straightforward reflections on banal life? political commentary?.. yes, all of this.

If there is anything `anti' here is anti-boredom, each `piece' jumps out of the page with offhand easiness, and pomposity is reduced to the reader's own dull lack of imagination. Parra does so much away with droll academic stodginess and allows the invigorating flow of his... expressive, often hilarious and profound, communications; for it is this in the end that comes through -to which anyone at any reading level can enjoy. There are even some `poems' done in a cool artwork-doodle style. What a stimulating and inspired work of art.

Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution
By Laurent Dubois

The book for me was very informative and the writing style makes it an easy read for the masses. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, and I am encouraged to learn even more about Haiti and the Revolution and how it sent shock waves throughout the western world.

I am beginning to understand why the west has a policy of pretending that Haiti doesn't exist. Their feelings are still hurt that a bunch of African slaves defeated the most powerful army at that time - Napoleon's army. Not only that, Haiti's defeat of the French army encourage and gave hope to the slaves of North America. Can anyone say Nat Turner, Denmark Vesey and Gabriel Prosser?! During Denmark Vesey's trail, there was testimony from his co-conspirators that he had connections with Haiti, and after burning down Charleston, the Haitians were ready to receive them.

After Napoleon's defeat, he had to sell his US territory for a song. Y'all may know it as the Lousiana Purchase. The English purchased the land and double the size of the US.

Of course, their intention was to expand slavery in North America.

I give this book a five star and highly recommend it for an easy read and introduction of the Haitian Revolution.

This was a great book! It helped me understand the importance of Haiti prior to gaining independance from France and why the country is in its state today. The story is heartbreaking but also impowering and reading it will make you want to know more about Haiti and what can be done to help its citizens.

The story of the sucessful slave rebellion, complete with perhaps a dozen illustrations. This work is very engaging, and the subject is rarely studied by today's students. I have recommended this book to many people, it is really great.

This book was a true pleasure to read. DuBois is the kind of historian who deserves to be teaching high school students (I mean this as a compliment) because while makes sure to include all relevant details about the Haitain revolution, he makes this book read like a fascinating story. This is a wonderful and well developed book, suitable for both laymen and scholars.
I am pleased that DuBois kept his editorializing to a minimum and described the events of the Haitian revolution in a very much nuanced manner. I recommend this this book to anyone looking for a detailed, but surprisingly easy to read discussion of that famous "first successful slave rebellion."

The Amerikkkan government has repeatedly blocked loans to Haiti from the IMF, that would raise Haitians quality of life by providing clean water, roads and medical supplies. Why would such a super hyper-power as the U.S. stoop so low as to block much needed aid to it's tiny island neighbor, after the International Monetary Fund was ready to release the loans?

Apparently their "is somebody to blame for their grinding poverty" besides "bad karma".

The Haitians represent the unconquered slave, the valiant Africans who's military genius and tactics are studied even today. Those Haitians who sent Napoleons 60,000 plus army back across the sea, allowing a ungrateful America to acquire the Louisiana Territory.

It is clear to me now, as it was to Dessalines then, that more "whites chopped up by angry blacks" should have taken place, (rather than a loyalty to a country they never saw, France) as it is really all that ignorant Europeans and their European-American cousins understand.

They lack the requisite moral courage and intelligence to right any wrongs as it pertains to Africans through out the diaspora.

Mr. Baxter would undoubtedly have become the victim of a sugar cane machete, at the very least for suggesting that " slavery was better than the conditions back home", which would seem funny were it not so sad of a commentary.

This is an excellent edition of the collected poems of Octavio Paz, with English translations facing the Spanish originals. I purchased this as a gift for my Spanish teacher and she was delighted! My favorites are his poems written when he served as a Mexican diplomat in India and Japan. His sensitive mind absorbed the nuances of place and religion, which are recreated for us in the poems. His efforts at haiku en espagnol are enlightening, pun intended.

I bought this book after reading an excerpt of one of Paz's poems at a camp. I didn't know what poem it was from, so I bought the book and scoured it until I found the poem. It was Brotherhood. The poetry is beautiful and moving. It is the type of poetry you can read and enjoy no matter if you understand what it is saying, the writing is that beautiful

Octavio Paz has since passed through this world leaving behind a beautiful web of words with the tapestry of things seen and unseen. Paz does an ambidextrous job of mixing in elements of surrealism with the bone of natural objects and that which is very real. His, and the translator Eliot Weinberger ... along with the help of other poet translators to include Bishop, Levertov, Tomlinson--all of their words come alive with beautiful language. The translation seems true to the intent.

What is essential about this book is that each poem comes with the bilingual translation in English and accompanied by the original works in Spanish. Two years of high school Spanish, as well as two years in college, has rendered me with a woefully inadequate ineptitude of all words and understanding of that language. But I don't think that the translation can ever capture the sound, the alliteration, the true tongue/la lingua and fluid language that Paz meant in his original Spanish. Even if I don't understand a lick of what's on the left side of the page in Spanish at least it can be read for it's beautiful sound. Listen to this, "Through the conduits of bone I night I water I forest that moves forward I tongue I body I sun-bone Through the conduits of night" and then on the even-numbered page, "Por el arcaduz de hueso yo noche yo agua yo bosque que avanza yo lengua yo cuerpo yo hueso de sol Por el arcaduz de noche."

What are you doing still sitting here reading my crappy writing when you could be reading Ocatavio Paz? Go get the book...you'll see.

Example 1: "Un cuerpo, un cuerpo solo, sólo un cuerpo,/un cuerpo como día derramado/y noche devorada". Example 2: "Lates entre la sombra/blanca y desnuda: río." Octavio Paz is one of the first voices of the xxth century mexican poetry. He is the most important blend between clasicism and the modern trends in poetical expresion. He lived in France and thus, he experienced surrealism and mingled with the likes of Breton, Éluard, et al. In México he estimulated the literary critic and reviews to new standars of excelence. Read O. Paz.

Paz' poetry is sublime, and elegant. The words and ideas simply slip off the page. Its like taking a bath in chocolate.

Paz consistently suprises the reader with new ideas, form, language. Paz creates an atmosphere that is soothing, and enchanting. I would highly recommend this work.