A Voyage Long and Strange: On the Trail of Vikings, Conquistadors, Lost Colonists, and Other Adventurers in Early America
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Product Description
W hat happened in North America between Columbus’s sail in 1492 and the Pilgrims’ arrival in 1620?
On a visit to Plymouth Rock, Tony Horwitz realizes he doesn’t have a clue, nor do most Americans. So he sets off across the continent to rediscover the wild era when Europeans first roamed the New World in quest of gold, glory, converts, and eternal youth. Horwitz tells the tale of these courageous and regularly crazed explorers while retracing their steps on his own epic trek–an odyssey that takes him inside an Indian sweat lodge in subarctic Canada, down the Mississippi in a canoe, on a road trip fueled by buffalo meat, and into sixty pounds of armor as a conquistador reenactor in Florida.
A Voyage Long and Weird is a rich mix of erudition and modern-day adventure that brings the forgotten first chapter of America’s history vividly to life.
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Horwitz treats this vital past topic with all the professionalism and seriousness of a judge at a hot dog eating contest yammering about health care issues.
I applaud that at least Horwitz admits upfront his total ignorance of the history of pre-Pilgrim America. By why in the name of Leif Ericson and Hank Desoto does he find it necessary to spend a couple of hundred pages proving it? The cause of past accuracy is not advanced by the endless recitation of interviews with whining park rangers, religious fanatics, space cadets and assorted hucksters.
If you want to read about one man’s journey across the US and the people he meets then stick with William Least Heat Moon and forgeo this dime store knock off.
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5
This book appears to be equal parts terrible travelogue, past text and local booster page. Horwitz divides his time between a past narrative of the America, a discussion of the current state of the localities that past events and characters passed through, and his own experiences in persons areas.
The past parts are really reasonably appealing and readable. The problem with them is that they are over all too quickly. Then we get to listen to a all-purpose description of some areas of North America that you aren’t really likely to want to visit, even if you are as huge of a history buff as I am. Yeah, I reflect L’Anse Aux Meadow is really cool but I don’t really want to go there, especially after reading Horwitz description of HIS visit. Question yourself: do you really want to read a lengthy description and recent history of some tiny town in the panhandle of Texas? I’m from Texas and I don’t want to.
Regularly in the book Horwitz goes on and on about a location that is basically nothing in the middle of no-where. But, some legendary figure camped there back in the 1600’s or there was a huge Indian settlement there in the 1500’s. So Horwitz feels compelled to go stand there and tell you how dull it is and how terrible the food was and how the motel had bedbugs. The reason that nobody goes there anymore is because there really is no reason to go there and most of the people he is following around didn’t want to be there either. Add to that a lot of times he can’t even be sure if that IS the site he is supposed to be at. But, Horwitz goes on and on about po-dunk and BFE and doesn’t even bother to try to romanticize it. Which, I really appreciated but it doesn’t make the book any more fun to read.
If you are a name who has a limited exposure to the history of the Americas this book is really a pretty excellent primer. It will expose you to some appealing characters and some fascinating things about your own back yard that you never knew, which is permanently fun.
But, If you are the sort of person who has a like for history, you know who you are, then you will probably find this book as dull as I did.
Reader’s Rating: 2 / 5
If you want to know about early exploration, a much better book is 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus. Horowitz’s book just rubbed me the incorrect way. Whine, whine, whine. Nothing new or very appealing in this book.
Reader’s Rating: 2 / 5
Although I was familiar with some of the material open here from both personal travel and additional authors, the two things I really like about this book are Mr Horwitz’s style and the fact he brought all this information together in one book.
Following the varied tales in chronological order really helps give a sense of the exploration of America. It also points out how much we have bought into the American myths because we’re not taught these tales.
If you’ve a youngster in your house who despises history, this book (and several others in Mr Horwitz’s canon) are the perfect entry point to help change their minds.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
I loved Horwitz’s “Confederates in the Attic,” and his same strengths are on spectacle in “A Voyage Long and Weird.” His humor is even more seasoned and his insights are more keenly drawn. I especially loved his return to Plymouth, MA, where he distills what he thinks he has learned after his long journeys trailing selected early explorers of North America. His rhythm of mixing a distilled version of the early journeys with his modern encounters is effective and something I came to delight in. He is not worried to mix it up with a variety of people, and seems to have the ability to get people to tell appealing tales. I most appreciated that he has really read excellent literature, both primary and secondary, and has agreed a excellent annotated reading list as an appendix. It’s informal history at its best.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5