Name: Civilizations
Rating: 3.583333333333333 (6 reviews)
ISBN: 9781250858870

Laurent Binet

Sam Taylor

A Novel

Civilizations

Florence

Les Quinétiens comprenaient qu'il se jouait quelque chose de grave ici autour de différents groupes de croyances, les juifs et les conversos, les morisques mahométisants, les luthériens, les vieux et les nouveaux chrétiens. Ils ne saisissaient pas exactement ce qui était en jeu derrière ces histoires de dieu cloué et de cuisine au lard mais ils savaient que les Levantins prenaient tout ça très à cœur, comme la cérémonie des bûchers l'avait prouvé amplement.

Vers l’an mille : la fille d’Erik le Rouge met cap au sud. 1492 : Colomb ne découvre pas l’Amérique. 1531 : les Incas envahissent l’Europe. À quelles conditions ce qui a été aurait-il pu ne pas être ? Il a manqué trois choses aux Indiens pour résister aux conquistadors. Donnez-leur le cheval, le fer, les anticorps, et toute l’histoire du monde est à refaire. Civilizations est le roman de cette hypothèse : Atahualpa débarque dans l’Europe de Charles Quint. Pour y trouver quoi ? L’Inquisition espagnole, la Réforme de Luther, le capitalisme naissant. Le prodige de l’imprimerie, et ses feuilles qui parlent. Des monarchies exténuées par leurs guerres sans fin, sous la menace constante des Turcs. Une mer infestée de pirates. Un continent déchiré par les querelles religieuses et dynastiques. Mais surtout, des populations brimées, affamées, au bord du soulèvement, juifs de Tolède, maures de Grenade, paysans allemands : des alliés. De Cuzco à Aix-la-Chapelle, et jusqu’à la bataille de Lépante, voici le récit de la mondialisation renversée, telle qu’au fond, il s’en fallut d’un rien pour qu’elle l’emporte, et devienne réalité.

roman

Kendall McClain

It is brilliant yes but just not for me! The largest section about the Incan conquests got a bit muddied for me and it felt drawn out! Was good but the Viking section carried for sure

Intelligemment construit, mais assez inégal. Mélange de passages savoureux et d’autres beaucoup plus ennuyeux.

Nelson Zagalo

"Civilizations" é um excelente sucessor de "A Sétima Função da Linguagem" (2015) (análise VI), deixando para trás as teorias da comunicação para se focar na história da descoberta do Novo Mundo, só que agora o Novo Mundo já não é a América, mas a Europa. "Civilizations" usa um artifício inicial para garantir imunidade adquirida às populações das Américas aquando da chegada dos espanhóis, a partir do que se desenvolve todo um volte-face. Assim, em vez de termos Pizarro a dominar Atahualpa, como muito bem nos conta Jared Diamond, em "Guns, Germs, and Steel" (1997) (análise VI), temos Atahualpa a dominar Carlos V, o grande Imperador Romano-Germânico. 
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...continua no blog https://virtual-illusion.blogspot.com...

Leah

Mae 

An ambitious and highly entertaining novel of revisionist history from the author of the international bestseller HHhH, Laurent Binet's Civilizations is nothing less than a strangely believable counterfactual history of the modern world, fizzing with ideas about colonization, empire-building, and the eternal human quest for domination. It is an electrifying novel by one of Europe's most exciting writers. Freydis is a woman warrior and leader of a band of Viking explorers setting out to the south. They meet local tribes, exchange skills, are taken prisoner, and get as far as Panama. But nobody ultimately knows what became of them. Fast forward five hundred years to 1492 and we're reading the journals of Christopher Columbus, mid-Atlantic on his own famous voyage of exploration to the Americas, dreaming of gold and conquest. But he and his men are taken captive by Incas. Even as their suffering increases, his faith in his superiority, and in his mission, is unshaken. Thirty years later, Atahualpa, the last Inca emperor, arrives in Europe in the ships stolen from Columbus. He finds a continent divided by religious and dynastic quarrels, the Spanish Inquisition, Luther's Reformation, capitalism, the miracle of the printing press, endless warmongering between the ruling monarchies, and constant threat from the Turks. But most of all he finds downtrodden populations ready for revolution. Fortunately, he has a recent bestseller as a guidebook to acquiring power—Machiavelli's The Prince. The stage is set for a Europe ruled by Incas and Aztecs, and for a great war that will change history forever.

Civilizations A Novel

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