Chronicle of the Guayaki Indians by Pierre Clastres

Chronicle of the Guayaki Indians Reviews

• 
  achen

  3.5
  
  1. 這本書記錄了一個曾經存在，如今已然消亡的原始部落——他們的小孩誕生的儀式、取名的方式、成年後男女的社會功能、死亡後的食人習俗等等。只是因為沒有學術背景，不曉人類學/民族學深入探討的層面，所以覺得自己像搭了一趟觀光巴士（掩臉），走馬式地參觀了遙遠的他者過去生活的模式。
  
  2. 穿插全書的瓜亞基人用語比較影響閱讀，但此書還是值得一看，尤其第七第八兩章真是好看極了。
• 
  Rhonda Hankins

  An outsider's academic description of living among this group of people in the mid-20th century. Because the Guayaki tribe no longer exists, this book offers unique insights into a way of life that might otherwise be completely forgotten.
  
  Though it's not a light read, it's also not a heavy academic read either. The author, an anthropologist, does a great job at making this book an interesting page-turner.
  
  For reasons I do not know, I happen to read the translator's introduction to this book (normally I bypass such formalities). This one, however, is extremely interesting and I highly recommend you read it.
• 
  Paul Helliwell

  paul auster’s translation of pierre clastres chronicle of the guayaki indians. the forests are full of dangerous animals that can kill, the nights full of malicious ghosts of former tribe members, the neighbouring tribes are all shunned and believed to be cannibals. then there is the white man and his dogs and guns. the ghosts are lonely in their wanderings in the land of the dead, they must given someone to keep them company or they will come and take someone, it is difficult to keep everyone fed, there is abortion and infanticide to keep the numbers low at the level the environment can support, disease comes and when it does the sick are simply left behind to die.
  
  ‘although I have been back to paraguay several times, I have never seen the guayaki indians again. i have not had the heart to...’ clastres, a student of claude levi-strauss, died in a car accident in 77 0r 78. of the guayaki indians their numbers are in any event declining - soon, if not already, clastres realizes, they will be gone.
  
  auster’s translation was not published when it was made. the only manuscript was lost (only to be recovered from a second hand bookstore bargain bin years later). now we have it. I myself found my copy in a charity shop - not the manuscript but a fully bound paperback book published by faber and faber, they were presumably emboldened by the subsequent success of auster as a novelist.
  
  ‘no matter that the world described in it has long since vanished, that the tiny group of people the author lived with in 1963 and 1964 has disappeared from the face of the earth. no matter that the author has vanished as well. the book he wrote is still with us... a small triumph against the crushing odds of fate...’
• 
  Andrea Noren

  This was quite a strange book. After reading the first chapter, I looked up commentary by other anthropologists and found a mixed bag of reviews - it was romanticized, it was dated (well, it was written in the 1960s, though not published in English until much later), it was a valid work on the Guayaki and many more. I could see by reading it that he made many interpretations of their behavior, and he states often that he's doing just that. I also could see that his own biases might have influenced his interpretations of many of the tribe's actions.
  
  My main criticism of the book is that it seems more like a series of articles strung together. He repeats information, sometimes making a different interpretation of the Guayaki's actions, and even completely contradicts previous interpretations in the matter of burial and cannibalism. It's almost as though he found out that yes, the Guayaki had a long tradition of consuming their peers only after he'd written the first parts of the book.
  
  It was quite an interesting book to read, although jarring in places due to the contradictions. I'm also quite happy to note that although this particular band of the Guayaki may have died out after settling under the Paraguayans' protection, there are many others who are still living in the forests.
• 
  OtterM

  太有趣了，居然能有机会走进一个消亡的部落，去见证他们的没落与灭亡。（插句话，印第安人一年有21小时用来睡觉、娱乐、讲神话故事，只有三小时用来裹腹😭一天上这么多小时班，真的觉得人生是多么无趣啊…）
• 
  Jeanne Ouellet

  Had to read this for uni, it’s okay but it’s basically ethnology so you better like that
• 
  Fil Larocque

  Un classique de l’ethnographie.
  Décoloniser notre regard sur le cannibalisme.
• 
  Chelsea

  以原始生活状态的瓜亚基印第安人的部落生活，重新思考人类的天性到底是什么？以现代文明看似“野蛮”的一些部落习俗是否应该被现代文明所教化，一个民族的历史和文化能在浩瀚的时间场合中得以保留下来的可能都是经过后人以后世的社会标准所筛选的。
• 
  Magda

  Plein d'entrain, Pierre Clastres entre dans une société promise, par la force des choses, à une disparition lente et douloureuse. Déjà acculturés, ses" indiens" lui font cependant découvrir leur culture, partagent leur savoirs et leur vision du monde. Un trésor qui se perd face à l'avancée des "blancs" dans les forêts, réduisant les territoires de chasses ou les transformant en pâturages. Une société entre deux mondes, dont le fonctionnement unique mérite d'être relatée, et qui se trouve sur le point de basculer, voilà le portrait des Guayaki que nous propose l'auteur.
• 
  Andrew Bourne

  Short review here:
  http://bombmagazine.org/article/51671...
• 
  Katie Degentesh

  An excellent anthropolgical account that reads like sci-fi. Highly recommended.
• 
  (0v0)

  Read this. Katie says.