Savage Harvest: A Tale of Cannibals, Colonialism, and Michael Rockefeller's Tragic Quest for Primitive Art Epub Download

Savage Harvest: A Tale of Cannibals, Colonialism, and Michael Rockefeller's Tragic Quest for Primitive Art [Kindle Edition]

Author: Carl Hoffman | Language: English | ISBN: B00DB30K30 | Format: PDF, EPUB

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Savage Harvest: A Tale of Cannibals, Colonialism, and Michael Rockefeller's Tragic Quest for Primitive Art Epub Download
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The mysterious disappearance of Michael Rockefeller in New Guinea in 1961 has kept the world and his powerful, influential family guessing for years. Now, Carl Hoffman uncovers startling new evidence that finally tells the full, astonishing story.

Despite exhaustive searches, no trace of Rockefeller was ever found. Soon after his disappearance, rumors surfaced that he'd been killed and ceremonially eaten by the local Asmat—a native tribe of warriors whose complex culture was built around sacred, reciprocal violence, head hunting, and ritual cannibalism. The Dutch government and the Rockefeller family denied the story, and Michael's death was officially ruled a drowning. Yet doubts lingered. Sensational rumors and stories circulated, fueling speculation and intrigue for decades. The real story has long waited to be told—until now.

Retracing Rockefeller's steps, award-winning journalist Carl Hoffman traveled to the jungles of New Guinea, immersing himself in a world of headhunters and cannibals, secret spirits and customs, and getting to know generations of Asmat. Through exhaustive archival research, he uncovered never-before-seen original documents and located witnesses willing to speak publically after fifty years.

In Savage Harvest he finally solves this decades-old mystery and illuminates a culture transformed by years of colonial rule, whose people continue to be shaped by ancient customs and lore. Combining history, art, colonialism, adventure, and ethnography, Savage Harvest is a mesmerizing whodunit, and a fascinating portrait of the clash between two civilizations that resulted in the death of one of America's richest and most powerful scions.

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• File Size: 1805 KB
• Print Length: 336 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow (March 18, 2014)
• Sold by: HarperCollins Publishers
  
• Language: English
• ASIN: B00DB30K30
• Text-to-Speech: Enabled
• X-Ray:
  Enabled
• Lending: Not Enabled
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #584 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
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"Savage Harvest" is about much more than the 1961 disappearance of Michael Rockefeller in Papau, New Guinea. This brilliant book also contains elements of exploration, adventure, anthropology, politics, and personal introspection. My only complaint is that the book is too short. Any of these themes could justify far more words than are presented.

Much like Carl Hoffman's previous book, "The Lunatic Express," everything about "Savage Harvest" is audacious: the physical and financial risks of his two trips, the belief that after so long there was still something new to uncover, the challenge of being accepted by the indigenous Asmat people with whom Hoffman lives, and even the notion that a marketable book could be created from a story in which headhunting and cannibalism are central concepts. Even the structure of the book, in which first-person contemporary reporting is combined with detailed, if plausible and well-documented, recreations of historical events indicates a writer who doesn't like to play it safe.

Now, this is not a breezy read. Any book that begins with a graphic account of one man being killed and ritually eaten by other men requires a certain commitment from the reader. This is a book that I read in small sections, thus allowing me to fully process the many implications of the text. "Savage Harvest" demands, and rewards, a lot of thought. The most powerful message presented by "Savage Harvest" is that the Asmat live in a world profoundly different from the one occupied by those who are likely to read this book. Asmat values, Asmat social expectations, and even the relationship between the Asmat and "reality" can be fundamentally alien to a modern, western mind.

In 1961, Michael Rockefeller, son of Nelson Rockefeller disappeared on his second trip hunting for primitive art in Papua New Guinea. Despite intense searches, officially, the cause of his disappearance and presumed death has remained unknown, a mystery, since. The speculations ranged from his going native, drowning at sea, and being killed and eaten by members of the Asmat cannibal headhunters in the region. Recently, author Carl Hoffman set out to find better answers, and this the story of his experiences.

Hoffman chooses to dispense with anything like an introduction. He offers no calm, rational overview of his report on what happened to Michael Rockefeller. Instead, he opens this masterful account with a body slam followed by knockout blow to the jaw: a detailed account, albeit speculative, of how the murder and following rituals of consuming Michael, body and spirit, might have taken place. When you wake up and shake off this stunning blow (never totally), he takes you on an extensive journey into the hearts and spirits of humans who are radically different from those of us in the "civilized" Western European world. Alien and Other, they truly are.

Hoffman speculates that he and Michael Rockefeller were both lured by the opportunity to know first hand these differences, to know them from the inside. The outcome for Hoffman - the experiences that led to this book - is radically different than for Rockefeller's. His was a killing done by those whose world included spirits of their dead who create havoc if not avenged. Hoffman's well-supported speculation is that the Rockefeller scion most likely was a victim of a ritualized murder done to balance the earlier killings of indigenous cannibal headhunters by (white) Dutch soldiers.

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