Description: Driven by a clear and compelling argument, this engaging book traces apocalyptic thinking in two civilizations-Western and Maya. Looking both backward and forward, Matthew Restall and Amara Solari build on their previous study, 2012 and the End of the World, to explore the per...
Brief description: Matthew Restall is Edwin Erle Sparks Professor of History, Anthropology, and Women's Studies at Penn State University, USA. He has written a number of history books, with titles like Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest and When Montezuma Met Cortés, but he secretly always wanted to write about music. Now the secret is out. He lives in Pennsylvania with his wife (not a huge Elton John fan), his many daughters (four), and his many records (more than four).
Review Quotes:
"Just as each generation believes it has discovered the truth about the past, each generation rewrites prophecy. Having exposed the colonial origins of the 2012 Maya Apocalypse at its vespers, Restall and Solari return to the scene of the crime with a decade of perspective to show how millenarianism or the belief in calculable cosmic destruction and renewal has been both a perennial Western project and a frequent Western projection onto other civilizations. The Maya, thanks to key factors described with clarity and humor by Restall and Solari, are simply among the most recent victims of such backward projection. And yet apocalyptic thinking has also escaped the grasp of Western culture, as any student of cargo cults knows. This is a penetrating and playful examination of an alarming phenomenon that ends with a hard look in the mirror. You may not like what you see, but you'll love what you read." --Kris E. Lane, Tulane University
"Restall and Solari's brilliant book solves a mystery: Whence came the world's widespread conviction that the Maya had foreseen the coming of the apocalypse in 2012? First the authors look for clues in the Mayan world they know so well. They then turn and look across the sea--and there, among Western traditions, they find the 'millenarian motherlode.' It is rare to find a book that is both erudite and crystal clear, but these two have written one." --Camilla Townsend, Rutgers University