The Epic of Latin America

by John Armstrong Crow

Uniquely comprehensive and comparative, praised for its devotion to social and cultural developments as well as politics and economics, The Epic of Latin America is once again revised and brought up to date, with chapters on the great upheavals of the 1980s. The book received the Gold Medal of the Commonwealth Club of California for outstanding literary achievement by a California author and was selected by the American Library Association as one of the "fifty best books of the year."

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Politics

992 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1980

Reviews

[Kevin Tole · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is no doubt a great brick of a book and as an overview of Latin American development serves the pupose well. It adequately covers the historical development of the countries of Latin America from year dot to whenever the edition you get goes up to. It is also pretty strong on the cultural and literary developments in Latin America. Its drawbacks though are notable - the first and foremost being that it is written from a North American/US perspective. Secondly some of the reported sourcing seems somewhat suspect ie. The Los Angeles Times and the Christian Science Monitor. But most of all the reporting of the majority recent politics appears to my own eyes, having spent much time in Latin America, to be deeply flawed. Its analysis of Central America from the 40's onwards looks flawed and shabby, overwhelmingly neglecting the excesses of CIA and US involvement in the support of right wing dictatorships and death squads. The chapter on Cuba is so crucially flawed as to be worthless. I searched in vain for mentions of the Bay of Pigs and the one-minute-to-midnight crisis of the 20th Century. If this is reported and written up so badly, then how badly are the other sections covered?
That made me question much of the validity of the description and reporting of other countries.
Where Crow IS excellent on is an overview of the Spanish conquest and decline of South America and he identifies a number of crucial characteristics which have been translated from 16th and 17th Century European Spanish and Portugese not to mention English ethic into South/Latin American traits.
Therefore as much as this is a vast overview and a tour de force of a history book, it needs to be taken on with a degree of critique. Whether there is another book out there that covers this ground I doubt, so this book should be used as a basis to then find more detailed information from other sources and DEFINETLY his views on developments since 1960 should be avoided.
A pity to have reached this conclusion after 900 pages but there ya go. Good for US college student papers I would say.

[Brett · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don't usually endorse college text books as a source of entertaining reading, but I have to say that this one riveted me.

This book starts in ancient times amongst the Olmecs, the Toltecs, the Aztecs, the Mayans, and the Incas. You follow the rise of their empires up through the Spanish conquest and on to modern times.

For those who appreciate Hispanic culture and want to know more about it, then this is a must read for you.

The struggle for freedom and prosperity in Latin America for the majority is an ongoing saga that can break your heart and fill you with yearning for a better tomorrow for these beautiful people.

[Robert Diaz · Rating 5 out of 5]

Covers so much history, a lot easier to read and understand than I expected. Very informative, to the point of being so disheartening all the maltreatment of the indigenous peoples in a constant play for power and wealth. Not all that surprising, but it's definitely nothing I learned in grade school. Well worth reading, for sure.

[Glenn Robinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Extremely thorough history of Latin America and all the countries throughout the hemisphere up to 1990.

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

my edition was 1946, not the newer updated one. would have liked the other more, this was just too much too fast, retained very little info from it but spent a great deal of reading time on it.

[Marrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

It has always left me curious how some Americans can argue that Mexicans should not be “admitted” to this country, given that no matter what you call it, most of our southwestern states are Mexico (if a man steals your car and says it's his, is it really truly ever his?) and how our immigration scheme is so deficient, but these same Americans will point to it and say people should immigrate here “legally” using that deficient and defective system. I’ve never bought into that nonsense. If you want someone to use the system, you have to have a system that works efficiently. So listening to that hair hat Donald Trump spout his nonsense recently has really chapped my you-know-what, as we Texans sometimes say.

But enough of my rant and on to the book. I bought my copy of The Epic of Latin America, by John Crow many years ago. But it was not until recently that I took it off my shelf and dived in. The catalyst for the sudden interest in it after over a decade of it sitting collecting dust? Simply put: when I have a son or daughter, soon enough, he/she will be what my wife and I call a “Blaxican.” If you can’t figure out the meaning of the term, maybe you should have a heart-to-heart with yourself. But being well versed in the history of my African origins, I want to be able to educate my future son or daughter on his/her Indio and Spanish origins as well. Because we are all products of centuries of things that went before us, whether we consciously acknowledge this or not.

Anyhow, back to the book. It is dense, running over just over 900 pages. But you’ll feel enriched by every word on every page. It took me eight months to get from front cover to the references because there is so much information on each page. Crow takes what could have been a disastrously dry topic and makes it jump off the page. It truly does unfold as an epic.

The subject matter of the book is the development of all countries south of the American southern border, and by extension and tangentially at times, development of American history as it relates to those countries’ developments. The book opens in the year 1491 and carries on up to the 1990s. The author is unflinching in setting forth the brutality and centuries long thug behavior that the Europeans got up to in what we now call Latin America. But the author does it in a way that is as non-judgmental as one can be when recounting centuries of criminal behavior.

The book is an awesome read for anyone that is into history and how it relates to current events, and for people who are not afraid to face the barbarism that was carried out in the name of fostering imperialism and capitalism in Latin America.

[Czarny Pies · Rating 4 out of 5]

John Crow's Epic of Latin America is an excellent introduction to the New World south of the Rio Grande river. Somehow, Crow manages to present the vast region of Central and South America as single entity which is the way that North Americans generally regard their neighbours to the South. There is of course some justification for this common view held in the English World. For several centuries the entire region was ruled by the two countries of the Iberian peninsula Spain and Portugal. Thus all of Latin America was monolithically Catholic and speaking one of two mutually comprehensible Latin based languages.

Crow's achievement is that he takes the popular belief that there is such a thing as Latin America and makes a coherent narrative on this assumption. He manages not only to address the economic and political developments but also the literary and cultural history. Crow notes that their are significant cultural differences between the Spanish and Portuguese nations. Due to its Portuguese values, Brasil has been relatively free of civil wars and has managed to industrialize well ahead of the Spanish countries. However, simplistic this view may be, it is argued very cogently by Crow. This is an excellent introduction to the history of a very large region of our planet. It is well written and highly entertaining.

[Jon-Erik · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an impressive effort of over 900 pages. Sometimes, you might bristle at the sweeping generalizations about the currents of history, but overall, if you are, like most North Americans, generally ignorant of the history of the rest of the hemisphere, this is a great book.

It is a little thin on Central America and very thin on the Caribbean, but it's hard to get every detail of over 500 years of history of about half the world.

There are a lot of books on this subject that amount to nothing more than Anti-gringo polemics on the one hand, or lame apologetics on the other. This is neither, and it's relatively free of judgments.

My only question is, why did I learn more about the mostly irrelevant history of France and Italy in school than I did about Mexico, which is right next door?

[Keith · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book during the summer for a Spanish class I was going to take in the fall. I read it early because the 1,000+ pages I knew would be too much to read during the regular semester. First day of class I learned that the teacher changed the book. Had some interesting information.

I loved the little etymology of words and the unfolding of the clash of cultures when I read this. Despite the teacher's abrupt change in curriculum I am happy I read it.

[Kimberly · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this book, even though it was used as a text book in one of my history classes. Not knowing much about other books on Latin American history, I don't know how it ranks thusly. But it is a fascinating read and a good first choice for studying this topic.

[Odilie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good, detailed account of the origins of Latin American culture, history, etc.

[Albert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Don't think this one can be beaten in terms of coverage and readability. Accuracy may be a different matter but still a good starter for further research.

[Mills College Library]

980 C953e 1992