Post by RedFlag32 on Aug 23, 2007 20:16:14 GMT
Hugo!: The Hugo Chavez Story from Mud Hut to Perpetual Revolution
"This first major English language biography of Hugo Chavez is a
masterful achievement that finally puts this crucial Latin American
figure of the early 21st Century into context within Venezuela,
within Latin America, as well as internationally. Bart Jones has
gotten hold of great detail and anecdote, and portrays a colorful
leader in times of crisis, rising from low military rank to the
zenith of national power, as Venezuela and its people — and Chavez
himself — begin to take charge of the country's terrific oil reserves
and to flex national muscle on the world stage. An important work for
our era —Chavez will in all likelihood cast a long and significant
political shadow in the Western Hemisphere for the foreseeable
future, and we need to understand this complicated figure as events
unfold."
— Amy Wilentz
Book Description
Bart Jones knows Venezuela intimately and was an eyewitness to
President Hugo Chávez’s rise to power. In Hugo! he tells the story of
Chávez’s impoverished childhood, his military career and the decade
of clandestine political activity that ended in a failed attempt to
seize power in 1992. He describes the election campaign against a
former Miss Universe that finally won Chávez the Presidency and the
dramatic reversals of fortune that have marked it: the struggle to
reform the Venezuelan economy, the coup attempt of 2002 in which he
was kidnapped and faced summary execution, and the oil industry
strike that followed. The full stories of many of these episodes have
never been told before – in English or Spanish. Hugo! is scrupulously
researched and sourced, and as compelling to read as a good novel.
The ruling elites and popular media in Venezuela and the United
States oversimplify by casting Chávez as the heir to Fidel Castro,
and more often than not, they have their facts wrong. The truth is
more complex, and more interesting. The leader of one of the most
powerful economies in Latin America is determined to try to use his
country's wealth to help the poor majority. The Chávez that emerges
from Jones’ account is neither a plaster saint nor a revolutionary
tyrant. He is a master politician — democratically elected to the
presidency three times — an inspired improviser, a Bolivarian
nationalist and an unashamed socialist. His policies have brought him
into conflict with the IMF and the World Bank, the major oil
companies and the Bush White House. By the time he arrived at the
United Nations in September 2006 he had become a figure on the world
stage. When he declared that ‘the devil came here yesterday … the
President of the United States’, it was clear that, right or wrong,
one man was taking on the might of most powerful nation on earth, in
conscious imitation of the Liberator, Simon Bolivar.
About the Author
Bart Jones is currently a reporter for Newsday and worked for eight
years in Venezuela, mainly a foreign correspondent for the Associated
Press. A graduate of Fordham University, he holds a master’s degree
in Social Studies from Columbia University. He has also reported for
The Atlantic City Press in New Jersey, where he won awards from the
Philadelphia Press Association. He lives with his family on Long
Island. Hugo! is his first book.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Hugo Chávez and I were sitting alone on the second floor of the
Miraflores Presidential Palace in Caracas, Venezuela. It was close to
midnight on April 30, 2007. Venezuela was minutes away from making a
small bit of history by taking majority control of four multi-billion
dollar oil projects in the eastern Orinoco River basin from
international companies including ExxonMobil, Chevron Corp, Conoco
and Total. Like many of Chávez’s moves, the oil takeover was
controversial. His detractors claimed it was another step in creating
a totalitarian dictatorship modeled after his mentor in Cuba, Fidel
Castro. His supporters responded that he was proudly re-establishing
national sovereignty over a strategic natural resource where for
years foreign companies had enjoyed a virtual tax holiday. I had a
privileged bird's-eye view of Chávez coordinating the takeover. We
were alone on the patio from 11:10 p.m. to 1:30 a.m. – prime time for
the president. It was my second interview with him in two days – a
rare opportunity to spend time with a man flooded with interview
requests. The conversations that night and the previous one amounted
to nearly four hours. We covered a lot of territory, from Chávez’s
impoverished childhood to the 2002 coup in which he was almost
killed…and at least one sensitive topic he had never spoken about
publicly before and I feared might bring the interview to an abrupt
end. — From the Preface
FULL:
tinyurl.com/yw8fge
"This first major English language biography of Hugo Chavez is a
masterful achievement that finally puts this crucial Latin American
figure of the early 21st Century into context within Venezuela,
within Latin America, as well as internationally. Bart Jones has
gotten hold of great detail and anecdote, and portrays a colorful
leader in times of crisis, rising from low military rank to the
zenith of national power, as Venezuela and its people — and Chavez
himself — begin to take charge of the country's terrific oil reserves
and to flex national muscle on the world stage. An important work for
our era —Chavez will in all likelihood cast a long and significant
political shadow in the Western Hemisphere for the foreseeable
future, and we need to understand this complicated figure as events
unfold."
— Amy Wilentz
Book Description
Bart Jones knows Venezuela intimately and was an eyewitness to
President Hugo Chávez’s rise to power. In Hugo! he tells the story of
Chávez’s impoverished childhood, his military career and the decade
of clandestine political activity that ended in a failed attempt to
seize power in 1992. He describes the election campaign against a
former Miss Universe that finally won Chávez the Presidency and the
dramatic reversals of fortune that have marked it: the struggle to
reform the Venezuelan economy, the coup attempt of 2002 in which he
was kidnapped and faced summary execution, and the oil industry
strike that followed. The full stories of many of these episodes have
never been told before – in English or Spanish. Hugo! is scrupulously
researched and sourced, and as compelling to read as a good novel.
The ruling elites and popular media in Venezuela and the United
States oversimplify by casting Chávez as the heir to Fidel Castro,
and more often than not, they have their facts wrong. The truth is
more complex, and more interesting. The leader of one of the most
powerful economies in Latin America is determined to try to use his
country's wealth to help the poor majority. The Chávez that emerges
from Jones’ account is neither a plaster saint nor a revolutionary
tyrant. He is a master politician — democratically elected to the
presidency three times — an inspired improviser, a Bolivarian
nationalist and an unashamed socialist. His policies have brought him
into conflict with the IMF and the World Bank, the major oil
companies and the Bush White House. By the time he arrived at the
United Nations in September 2006 he had become a figure on the world
stage. When he declared that ‘the devil came here yesterday … the
President of the United States’, it was clear that, right or wrong,
one man was taking on the might of most powerful nation on earth, in
conscious imitation of the Liberator, Simon Bolivar.
About the Author
Bart Jones is currently a reporter for Newsday and worked for eight
years in Venezuela, mainly a foreign correspondent for the Associated
Press. A graduate of Fordham University, he holds a master’s degree
in Social Studies from Columbia University. He has also reported for
The Atlantic City Press in New Jersey, where he won awards from the
Philadelphia Press Association. He lives with his family on Long
Island. Hugo! is his first book.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Hugo Chávez and I were sitting alone on the second floor of the
Miraflores Presidential Palace in Caracas, Venezuela. It was close to
midnight on April 30, 2007. Venezuela was minutes away from making a
small bit of history by taking majority control of four multi-billion
dollar oil projects in the eastern Orinoco River basin from
international companies including ExxonMobil, Chevron Corp, Conoco
and Total. Like many of Chávez’s moves, the oil takeover was
controversial. His detractors claimed it was another step in creating
a totalitarian dictatorship modeled after his mentor in Cuba, Fidel
Castro. His supporters responded that he was proudly re-establishing
national sovereignty over a strategic natural resource where for
years foreign companies had enjoyed a virtual tax holiday. I had a
privileged bird's-eye view of Chávez coordinating the takeover. We
were alone on the patio from 11:10 p.m. to 1:30 a.m. – prime time for
the president. It was my second interview with him in two days – a
rare opportunity to spend time with a man flooded with interview
requests. The conversations that night and the previous one amounted
to nearly four hours. We covered a lot of territory, from Chávez’s
impoverished childhood to the 2002 coup in which he was almost
killed…and at least one sensitive topic he had never spoken about
publicly before and I feared might bring the interview to an abrupt
end. — From the Preface
FULL:
tinyurl.com/yw8fge
