Isaac F. Holton

Western authors have a way of thinking and writing about the rest of the world that has not much changed over the past 200 years. People and their cultures in Africa, Asia, including the Middle East, and Latin-America are the object of study, and anthropological description often primarily serves to emphasize the superiority of Western man and civilization. As a result of this consistency in style, New Granada. Twenty months in the Andes by Isaac F. Holton reads as a contemporary travelogue. Only occasional mention of swords and pistols were lying on the table (p. 7) suggests that the book was first published in 1857.

Its author was a university lecturer, and although his prime interest was botany, plants and crops feature but little in the book, which deals mainly with the people he encountered, their culture and customs. Holton's style is less that of an academic, than of a journalist, and although he held a chair as a Professor of Botany in New York, his descriptions of people in their everyday lives, their houses, schools and ceremonies, more betray his background as a missionary, and his future career as a journalist.

It seems Holton was fascinated by all and everything he saw, and apparently, the astonishment was mutual. In his dealings, Holton treats the indigenous people in a fair way, observing all aspects of life and leaving none undescribed. The use of Spanish words in the text is ubiquitous, but not overbearing.

Sometimes, Holton is truly baffled, as during his visit to a prison. The prison ward is out on the street, while the door to the cell is unlocked. Answering the traveller why the prisoners do not attempt escape, the tell him escape from the adobe dwelling would be a piece of cake, but what withholds them is that escape "is against the law." (p. 126).

Travelling through Colombia, Holton remarks that Colombian coffee is the best he has ever had, and his spelling of "Cho-co-la-te" spells out a similar fascination.

What makes the reading of New Granada. Twenty months in the Andes feel so modern is perhaps the use of direct speech. Short conversations are rendered in direct speech throughout the book. It also contributes to the sense that over and above all, Holton was foremostly interested in the people he met on the way.

New Granada. Twenty months in the Andes remained in print for more than 100 years, and was studied as an authoritative source on Latin America throughout that period, well up-to the 1970s.… (mais)