Safe Return Doubtful

translated from the Spanish (Mexico) by Natasha Wimmer

The retelling of history in such an irreverent, wryly disregarding manner is everything you wouldn’t expect from a historic novel, but is hugely entertaining throughout.

This is a spritely reimagining of an encounter between Cortés and Moctezuma, occurring over the course of one day in the November of 1519 in the labyrinthine city of Mehxicoh-Tenoxtitlan.
On this stage plays out so many things to appreciate, whether it is the horses of the conquistadores, such a novelty to their hosts, loose about the palace, or the aged Moctezuma himself, self-medicating his depression in his room, high on mushrooms and cactus-of-tongues, while his sister, who also is his wife, try to come up with a plan to save the empire. When the Emperor does leave his room it is often to roam the palace in his nightshirt chewing grasshopper tacos. He is mentally unstable, though no one will question his word for fear of being brutally sacrificed.

Enrigue’s writing is the real pleasure here, combined of course with the incredible translation of Natasha Wimmer; it is crammed with glorious detail, refined and elegant, yet a moment later, bawdy and depraved. I can imagine his influences, the Python’s historic work, Angela Carter perhaps, but this is very much his own style.
One can’t dispute the facts of history, but with an imagination as potent as his, it can amuse and delight in a whole new way.

The novel’s last pages are a particular pleasure, as Cortés’s dream is stymied in a blood-soaked resolution that demolishes everything we knew from those often tedious school text books.
Nobody may know what exactly happened in those days and months, but it most certainly wasn’t this.
We do however know that more than 90 percent of the Indigenous population was wiped out by disease and slavery, so for a few moments at least, it feels fitting to turn it on its head.

Here’s a couple of clips..

I’m going to need some cactus-of-tongues. The shaman screwed up his eyes, making a hissing sound that expressed both shock and disapproval. It’s very strong, he said, something to try once in a lifetime, maybe twice, and this would be the fourth or fifth time I’ve given you one; you might get lost on the trip. The huey tlatoani closed his eyes. The empire weighs on one’s shoulders, he said, sometimes too heavy; help is needed. What do you want it for? My meeting is with the chief of the Caxtilteca. Who? Make it ready, that’s an order: two pieces, no more. The shaman shrugged. You’re the boss, he said, but don’t say later that I didn’t warn you.

And..

I love this room, said Moctezuma, you can’t imagine how I miss being a priest. Where there were splotches of blood, he saw sprays of flowers. The withered fingers of the hands of great warriors sacrificed during the year’s festivals swayed pleasingly like the branches of a small tree to the beat of some music he couldn’t place, though in a possible future we would have recognized it. It was T. Rex’s “Monolith.” The priest was also up to his ears in whatever he had taken to carry out his temple duties, so he bent his magic powers of hearing to the music and caught the sexy crooning of Marc Bolan. He smiled. That’s good stuff, he said. Moctezuma swung his hips to the beat. It’s nothing I’ve ever heard before, he replied, but I like it. He pulled his elbows in tight and shimmied, moving his head gravely from side to side, transfixed by pleasure. The priest, swaying his own ass to the beat—he was nearly eighty, but on mushrooms he was a jaguar-said, I was thinking about you, believe it or not; look at this.

My GoodReads score 5 / 5