The River of Doubt
Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey
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The River of Doubt
Acheter pour 42,25 $
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Narrateur(s):
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Paul Michael
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Auteur(s):
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Candice Millard
À propos de cet audio
The River of Doubt; it is a black, uncharted tributary of the Amazon that snakes through one of the most treacherous jungles in the world. Indians armed with poison-tipped arrows haunt its shadows; piranhas glide through its waters; boulder-strewn rapids turn the river into a roiling cauldron.
After his humiliating election defeat in 1912, Roosevelt set his sights on the most punishing physical challenge he could find, the first descent of an unmapped, rapids-choked tributary of the Amazon. Together with his son Kermit and Brazil's most famous explorer, Candido Mariano da Silva Rondon, Roosevelt accomplished a feat so great that many at the time refused to believe it. In the process, he changed the map of the western hemisphere forever.
Along the way, Roosevelt and his men faced an unbelievable series of hardships, losing their canoes and supplies to punishing whitewater rapids, and enduring starvation, Indian attack, disease, drowning, and a murder within their own ranks. Three men died, and Roosevelt was brought to the brink of suicide. The River of Doubt brings alive these extraordinary events in a powerful nonfiction narrative thriller that happens to feature one of the most famous Americans who ever lived.
From the soaring beauty of the Amazon rain forest to the darkest night of Theodore Roosevelt's life, here is Candice Millard's dazzling debut.
©2005 Candice Miller (P)2005 Books on TapeCe que les critiques en disent
"Millard...nails the suspense element of this story perfectly, but equally important to her success is the marvelous amount of detail she provides on the wildlife that Roosevelt and his fellow explorers encountered on their journey, as well as the cannibalistic indigenous tribe that stalked them much of the way." (Publishers Weekly)
What an adventure!
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This book taught me how much of an absolute legend Teddy really was.
Teddy was certifiably based.
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one of the best exploration stories
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The book is far more than just an adventure story, however. The narrative explores much of Roosevelt's personal life from his early childhood through losing his first wife, political success followed by political failures, and into his semi-retirement returning to his interest in natural sciences. The story does not follow chronologically, instead using the journey to dip back and forth into different parts of the president's past, from his illness as a child to his time in the Wild West. His political career is seen more from a lens of the personality behind the power, rather than his political decisions (for example, he was once shot on the campaign trail but refused medical rest and made a speech later that day still wearing his bloodied clothes - for maximum emotional impact of course).
The journey down the River of Doubt - so named because nobody knew where it led - is fascinating. The expedition itself was only half on the water, as the men and supplies needed to march through the jungle for over a month just to reach the source of the river. The struggles the men faced, including a mutineering and murderous aboriginal worker, uncertain relations with the local inhabitants, illness and poisons, relentless rapids and whirlpools, and starvation, are enough to get your heart racing, but this became so much more than just an adventure to conquer nature - it became a fight for Roosevelt's life, and one that he never really recovered from.
I really enjoyed the story, was captured by the adventure story but enthralled by the human interest stories about the president and his motley crew of companions. I was left laughing in bewilderment at the foolishness of the marauding men who, knowing nothing better in the early 20th century, set out with dozens of pounds of tea, 8 sets of eyeglasses for the president, volumes of French poetry, and nary a tested canoe between them.
I was most interested in the way the men around the president worried over and cared for the great man himself. Perhaps politics is on the mind, but it was an interesting analogy to watching today's presidential inner circle. This story deals with how an arguably very competent outdoorsman and expedition leader could be put so much at risk by power-hungry people refusing to see the bigger picture of their actions for the president and those around him, notably how putting the president before all others might result in the presidents support dropping away from him as people grew dissatisfied or dead. It is hard to imagine a president today taking on a journey such as this - for the time, danger, and even just the required fortitude.
I have a new appreciation for Theodore Roosevelt after reading this book. While I'm not sure I like the man, he does embody some lost element of pioneering, guns blazing, Renaissance man explorer. I think I'm ok with the presidents of today not holding dear to some of those qualities, but it shows the difference between our perceptions of importance that a president setting out to conquer nature would at the same time be devoted to his literature and find it his saving grace in the darkest days in the jungle.
The audiobook version I listened to was excellent, the narrator perfectly alternating between English and Portuguese names and words, his pace and voice instilling the adventure and power of both the river and the politics. I'd highly recommend this book.
Phenomenal narration, and amazing survival story
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The ending is very good and has full closure for everyone in the story
Slow start but captivated me
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I never knew a lot about this time in Roosevelt.
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Great for a mix of history and adventure
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Disappointingly dry fact based
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Informative but dry. Came away from it thinking characters completely foolhardy and naïve without ever recognizing the obvious need to cut their losses and bolt back to civilization. But who am I. An armchair Audible listener!
Drier than it should’ve been, given the wetness of the Amazon
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