A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World
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Product Description
The bestselling leader of Blue Latitudes takes us on a thrilling and eye-opening voyage to pre-Mayflower America
On a chance visit to Plymouth Rock, Tony Horwitz realizes he’s mislaid more than a century of American history, from Columbus’s sail in 1492 to Jamestown’s founding in 16-oh-something. Did nothing take place in between? Determined to find out, he embarks on a journey of rediscovery, following in the footsteps of the many Europeans who preceded the Pilgrims to America.
An irresistible blend of history, myth, and mishap, A Voyage Long and Weird captures the marvel and drama of first contact. Vikings, conquistadors, French voyageurs—these and many others roamed an unknown continent in quest of grapes, gold, converts, even a cure for syphilis. Though most failed, their remarkable exploits left an enduring mark on the land and people encountered by late-arriving English settlers.
Tracing this legacy with his own epic trek—from Florida’s Fountain of Youth to Plymouth’s sacred Rock, from desert pueblos to subarctic sweat lodges—Tony Horwitz explores the revealing gap between what we enshrine and what we forget. Showing his trademark talent for humor, narrative, and past insight, A Voyage Long and Weird allows us to rediscover the New World for ourselves.
Tony Horwitz is the leader of Blue Latitudes, Confederates in the Attic, and Baghdad Lacking a Map. He is also a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who has worked for The Wall Street Journal and The New Yorker. He lives in Martha’s Vineyard with his wife, Geraldine Brooks, and their son, Nathaniel.
On a chance visit to Plymouth Rock, Tony Horwitz realizes he’s mislaid more than a century of American history, from Columbus’s sail in 1492 to Jamestown’s founding in 16-oh-something. Determined to find out what happened in between, he embarks on a journey of rediscovery, following in the footsteps of the many Europeans who preceded the Pilgrims to America.
Blending of history, myth, and mishap, A Voyage Long and Weird captures the awe and drama of first contact. Vikings, conquistadors, and French voyageurs are among persons who roamed an unknown continent in quest of grapes, gold, converts, even a cure for syphilis. Though most failed, their exploits left an enduring mark on the land and people encountered by late-arriving English settlers.
Tracing this legacy with his own epic trek—from Florida’s Fountain of Youth to Plymouth’s sacred Rock, from desert pueblos to subarctic sweat lodges—Tony Horwitz explores the revealing gap between what is enshrined and what is forgotten. Showing his trademark talent for humor, narrative, and past insight, A Voyage Long and Weird allows readers to rediscover the New World.
“The pace never flags, even for easily distracted readers, because Horwitz knows how to quick-cut between past narrative and a breezy account of his own travels. It’s the same method he used in [Confederates in the Attic,] deployed with the same success, and unlike many additional, less journalistic histories, in which the material is showed at a curator’s remove, it has the immense value of injecting the past into the present—showing us history as an element of contemporary life, something that still surrounds us and presses in on us, whether we know it or not.”—Andrew Ferguson, The New York Times Book Review
“Never mind his Pulitzer, the best-selling books, the writing jobs at The Wall Street Journal and The New Yorker: Tony Horwitz is a dope. Really, he’ll tell you so himself, and regularly does, though not in so many words, in his amusing and lively new travelogue, A Voyage Long and Weird. Horwitz is probably best known as the leader of Confederates in the Attic, an exploration of how the American Civil War and its cultural backwash still go otherwise semi-normal Americans to do crazy things, like sleep outdoors in 19th-century-style long johns while pretending to be Abner Doubleday. In that book as in this one, Horwitz assumes the pose of a baby-boomer Everyman, overschooled but undereducated. He is chagrined at the basic past facts he was once taught but can no longer remember or, worse, never knew to start with. Like so many of us, he is the incarnation of Father Guido Sarducci’s Five Minute University, where degrees are awarded for reciting the two or three things the average liberal-arts graduate remembers from four years of college. In A Voyage Long and Weird, Horwitz is surprised to learn how small he knows about the Europeans who ‘learned’ America. (One thing he does remember from college is to wrap persons scare-quote inscription around politically contentious words like ‘learn.’) His astonishing ignorance dawned on him during a visit to Plymouth Rock. ‘I’d mislaid an entire century, the one separating Columbus’s sail in 1492 from Jamestown’s founding in 16-0-something,’ he writes. ‘Expensively educated at a private school and university—a history major, no less!—I’d matriculated to middle age with a third grader’s grasp of early America.’ Horwitz resolves to remedy his ignorance by embarking on an intensive self-tutorial mixed with lots of reporting and running around. He looks for Columbus’s remains in the Dominican Republic; tracks Coronado through Mexico, Texas and even Kansas; sifts evidence of the Vikings’ landing in Newfoundland; and gives the Anglos their due in tidewater Virginia. The result is well loved history of the most accessible sort. The pace never flags, even for easily distracted readers, because Horwitz knows how to quick-cut between past narrative and a breezy account of his own travels. It’s the same method he used in Confederates, deployed with the same success, and unlike many additional, less journalistic histories, in which the material is showed at a curator’s remove, it has the immense value of injecting the past into the present—showing us history as an element of contemporary life, something that still surrounds us and presses in on us, whether we know it or not. Usually not. The tales he tells are full of plain characters and wild detail . . . He is an energetic debunker.”—Andrew Ferguson, The New York Times Book Review
“Horwitz traveled from Newfoundland to the Dominican Republic, throughout the American South and Southwest and up to New England, vastly different zones once equally uncharted, now distinct and unrelated. On the road, he spent part of his time reading past books informing him of what happened in these spots, and then part of his time seeking out guides who led him to the sites, or shared the local lore as it has been handed down through the centuries. He has an ear for a excellent yarn and an instinct for the trail leading to an entertaining anecdote, and he deftly weaves his reportorial finds with his past material.”—Nina Burleigh, The Washington Post
“Honest, wonderfully written, and heroically researched . . . Horwitz unearths whole chapters of American history that have been ignored.”—The Boston Globe
“Readers of Horwitz’s 1998 classic about Civil War reenactors, Confederates in the Attic, won’t need to be persuaded to pick up his latest work. Horwitz’s turf stretches from the first Viking explorers to the landing of the Pilgrims—but it wouldn’t be Horwitzian if he didn’t also engage with their contemporary avatars, from
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This book tells the same ancient tale of Spanish,exploration and conquest of
the Americas,in this case North America.The Spanish arrived,on U.S. shores and the native peoples,basically gave their food,land,woman oh forgot their souls to the Spanish at all cost to the detriment of their own self preservation.Nonsense!!!! or should I say commonsense!!!!
One day the right tale of a diverse explanation and experiences of both sides of the isle,will be told.The Spanish explores,looking for opportunity and adventure.Native people,intrigued and aware of the danger dealing with forighners on their soil.
In my opinion,the leader streches out facts and adds his on spin to a complex tale.Where the leader got his facts? no clue.
This book will become a book,you place in the cellar for dust to collect, if it is that lucky, or stuck in a wharehouse do to notackers,waiting to be used as kiddling out on the reservation.
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5
Weird indeed – how Horowitz, in a single sentence justifies dismissing the scholarly revelations of Gavin Manus’s book “1421″. Gavin Manus “1421″ establishes that a Chinese Armada explored the Western Hemisphere and Mapped the Oceans of the Planet. Horowitz, choice to omit this inconvenient truth, proves that the observation of the Reverend Peter Gomes, in his work, is right – myths are more powerful than facts!
– I’m Emmett Abati Doe
Reader’s Rating: 3 / 5
The serious weakness in the book is first suggested in the grossly inaccurate colored map on the inside take in of the book. The map and text show Cabeza de Vaca’s route as beginning in Texas (rather than Florida)and running through central Texas (rather than norther Mexico). Cabeza de Vaca’s route has been extensively covered by well documented past and archeological studies over the past thirty years with no one faintly suggesting the route identified by the leader’s map and narrative. The same comment is made regarding the map and narrative regarding the route of De Soto who spent more time west of the Mississippi than he spent east of the river, including the wide one-year journey to the southwest to try to march overland to Mexico.I know the interest in building the tale and voyage long and weird, but this could have been accomplished within the context of well customary literary studies that abound.
Reader’s Rating: 1 / 5
Brilliant and prompt service. Delivered to Ireland within days in mint condition. Thank you Amazon.
Reader’s Rating: 5 / 5
The topic of this book is brilliant. Sorry to say, the leader wrote of his research intermingling with the past facts in a travelogue fashion. It keeps you waiting for the vital points as he meanders thru the experiences of his travels. This certainly detracted from what he wanted to say about this period of America’s history. Appealing facts when you can get to them.
Reader’s Rating: 2 / 5