Chapters of Brazil's Colonial History 1500-1800

By João Capistrano de Abreu

Book Overview

In all the history of Latin America, few historians have been so influential as the Brazilian scholar Joao Capistrano de Abreu. His own life reflected the changes that swept his country and his academy: the nineteenth century scion of a remote Brazilian province, he paid his way to the capital by selling a slave he had inherited; he went on to bring Brazilian history into the twentieth century, moving it from patriotic sentimentalism to rigorous, rational scholarship. Now, for the first time, his central work, a classic of historical literature, appears in a sharp, clear English translation.
In Chapters in Brazil's Colonial History, Abreu created an integrated history of Brazil in a landmark work of scholarship that is also a literary masterpiece. Breaking with previous writers, who had taken a plodding governor after governor approach that rested upon administration and politics, Abreu offers a startlingly modern analysis of the past, based on the role of the economy, settlement, and the occupation of the interior. In these pages, he combines sharp portraits of dramatic events--close fought battles against Dutch occupation in the 1650s, Indian resistance to often brutal internal expansion--with insightful social history. A master of Brazil's ethnographic landscape, he provides detailed sketches of daily life for Brazilians of all stripes. Abreu first won acclaim for a linguistic study of a Brazilian Indian language; he brings that knowledge to play as he describes the interaction between colonial settlers, African slaves, and native inhabitants, as cultures mixed in the creation of the modern nation. He also stresses the role of the physical landscape and environment in ways that presaged contemporary developments in historical scholarship. And along the way, his distinctive voice provides the reader with rare pleasure. After quoting a vivid description of a typical seventeenth century atrocity, for example, he interrupts his narrative to ask, "Do horrors such as this make it worth thanking the bandeirantes for taming this land and making it part of Brazil?"
This accomplished new translation of a Brazilian classic will be an integral volume in Oxford's new Library of Latin America. Never before available in English, this superb narrative opens Brazil's rich, fascinating past to the general reader, and offers scholars access to a great turning point in historical scholarship.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0195103017
• ISBN13: 9780195103014
• Release Date: November 1997
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 0.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.3" x 5.6" x 8.3"

Customer Reviews

Surprisingly fresh

In its choice of topics, this book is simliar in many ways to other history books from the early 20th Century. A lot of attention is paid to battles, and to catalogues of geographical data or descriptions. It's not an easy book to start with, if you're interested in understanding modern Brazil or its history. But the descriptions of people and of the social climate, especially in the early and later parts of the book, are surprisingly fresh. There are some especially nice touches in the last chapter of the book, such as a few stanzas from a popular song written from the point of view of a famous steer. Also, the author has a wicked sense of humor that made me laugh out loud in a few places. Capistrano de Abreu's sentences are shorter than typical for academic historians of a hundred years ago, with more punch and less purple prose. The translation is fluid and easy to read. The previous reviewer is right, though, about the sorely-felt absence of a map. I tried to follow along using a wall-sized folding map (1:5 million scale) and was able to muddle through, though many of the historical place-names didn't appear on my modern version. In any case, most of the passages where the place-names come fast and furious are less essential for enjoying the book.

Interesting Perspective

With many books written by American or other authors, this book has its own flavor: a brazilian flavor. Written by a Brazilian, he tells a story that does not embelish or take sides. A rather fine book!!