About this item
A narrative history of the unlikely Maoist rebellion that terrorized Peru even after the fall of global Communism.On May 17, 1980, on the eve of Perus presidential election, five masked men stormed a small town in the Andean heartland. They set election ballots ablaze and vanished into the night, but not before planting a red hammer-and-sickle banner in the town square. The lone man arrested the next morning later swore allegiance to a group called Shining Path. The tale of how this ferocious group of guerrilla insurgents launched a decade-long reign of terror, and how brave police investigators and journalists brought it to justice, may be the most compelling chapter in modern Latin American history, but the full story has never been told.Described by a U.S. State Department cable as "cold-blooded and bestial," Shining Path orchestrated bombings, assassinations, and massacres across the cities, countryside, and jungles of Peru in a murderous campaign to seize power and impose a Communist government. At its helm was the professor-turned-revolutionary Abimael Guzmán, who launched his single-minded insurrection alongside two women: his charismatic young wife, Augusta La Torre, and the formidable Elena Iparraguirre, who married Guzmán soon after Augustas mysterious death. Their fanatical devotion to an outmoded and dogmatic ideology, and the militarys bloody response, led to the death of nearly 70,000 Peruvians.Orin Starn and Miguel La Sernas narrative history of Shining Path is both panoramic and intimate, set against the socioeconomic upheavals of Perus rocky transition from military dictatorship to elected democracy. They take readers deep into the heart of the rebellion, and the lives and country it nearly destroyed. We hear the voices of the mountain villagers who organized a fierce rural resistance, and meet the irrepressible black activist María Elena Moyano and the Nobel Prize-winning novelist Mario Vargas Llosa, who each fought to end the bloodshed. Deftly written, The Shining Path is an exquisitely detailed account of a little-remembered war that must never be forgotten. 42 black and white illustrations
About the Author
Orin Starn is an anthropologist and writer. He has worked for many years in Peru among other places, and is lead editor of the popular "The Peru Reader" as well authoring his own book "Nightwatch" about Andean village organizing. Starn, who grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area, also wrote the award-winning "Ishi's Brain" about the life and legend of the last survivor of California's Yahi tribe. His interest in sports and society led to a book called "The Passion of Tiger Woods," which examines the superstar golfer's place in American culture. He also offers an online course called "Sports and Society" taken by many thousands of students worldwide. Starn's most recent book, co-authored with historian Miguel La Serna, is "The Shining Path: Love, Madness and Revolution in the Andes" about the story of a deadly guerrilla insurgency in Peru. His op-ed pieces have run in the Los Angeles Times and other newspapers, and he has appeared on NPR, ESPN and many other radio and tv programs. Starn is a professor in the Department of Cultural Anthropology at Duke University, where he has won the university's highest undergraduate teaching award. He lives in Durham, N.C. with his wife and son.
