Why read Royal Commentaries of the Incas and General History of Peru?

Book cover of Royal Commentaries of the Incas and General History of Peru

Book description

Garcilaso de la Vega, the first native of the New World to attain importance as a writer in the Old, was born in Cuzco in 1539, the illegitimate son of a Spanish cavalier and an Inca princess. Although he was educated as a gentleman of Spain and won an important…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Royal Commentaries of the Incas and General History of Peru as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Jorge Aguilar Mora, Josefa Salmón, and Barbara C. Ewell

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I recommend this book because it makes me understand the value of being part of many cultures, of a multicultural world, of building bridges between those cultures and surviving in all of them, just as the Inca Garcilaso did, growing up in his mother’s indigenous culture as a member of Inca royalty, while also acknowledging his Spanish father’s culture. I love the way this piece is almost a biography, written in lucid prose, and thus providing an early instance of the linguistic, historical, and cultural fusion that became a distinguishing mark of Spanish American culture. Inca Garcilaso’s text teaches us…

From Jorge's list on The best books (in English) to see the world from a Latin American perspective.