Scandals in the House of Birds - Hardcover

Tarn, Nathaniel

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1568860447 ISBN 13: 9781568860442

Publisher: Marsillo Publishers, 1999

Synopsis

Based on a 30-year span of fieldwork in the Lake Atitlßn region of Guatemala, this volume weaves together the voices of the authors, villagers of the area, and their oral histories to tell the story of the theft and eventual return of the Maxim=n, a wooden statue venerated since pre-Columbian times. Along the way the myths and religious and political ramifications of the crime are brought to light, and a portrait of the indigenous culture of the area emerges. Annotation c. by Book News, Inc., Portland, Or.

About this title

From the Author:

a Note on the Book
This "multivoiced epic of a sacred crime," apart from telling a very unusual story of the loss and recuperation of a Tzutujil Maya mask after almost a lifetime, is the result of an experiment funded by the prestigious Wenner Grenn Foundation for Anthropological Research, New York. The aim was to see whether it would be possible to find a new language for some kinds of cultural anthropology: one which, without departing from scientific exactitude, would not abdicate literary potentials.

Like all serious scientific and literary work, the book requests a minimum of attention.

For three main reasons, the diary-type entries alternate between those made in 1952-3 and those made in 1979 (with a few from 1969).

1] Substantial changes in Santiago Atitlan over thirty years are thus recorded;

2] the same with considerable changes in the writer's understanding of belief and ritual (compare chapters 16 and 19); and

3] the workings of both the writer's mind and that of several participants are perhaps thus better illustrated than in most academic monographs.

Another aim of the book is to show how age-old conflicts between Maya of different minds continue in contemporary forms and to serve as a Memorial to the hundreds of dead in Atitlan, massacred in the course of Guatemala's atrocious Civil War.

Some small points: The book is entirely written by Nathaniel Tarn. Mr.Martin Prechtel's contribution of information was limited to 1979: he has since changed his attitudes and gone on his own entirely different way (see p. ix, para 1). There is an Introduction (pp. vii - x).

About this edition

• Publisher: Marsillo Publishers
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 1568860447
• ISBN 13: 9781568860442
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 407