I found Malintzin's Choices by Camilla Townsend very enjoyable and readable by even the most casual of history readers. While I will admit that I do not know much more about the Conquest of Mexico other then it happened and it was awful for the Aztecs living there at the time... Cortez doesn't seem like he would have been someone I would have liked...yes, the idea that he was a man of his times does get used by people, but Jesus he was terrible!
Anyway, Malintzin is one of those people who have been silenced throughout history. While it must be obvious that the Spaniards had to have had some sort of Native help, history has overlooked these contributions. Townsends work does not make Malintzin to be a heroine or a pragmatist, but a human living life in a tremendous time. Fortunately, a historian like Townsend as pieced together her life, as best as one can, and tell her story.
While the book is entitled Malintzin's Choices, I read it more as a history of communication and language, using Malintzin as the main character. Townsend brings up time and again the lack of communication sometimes and how critical a hand full of people who know languages can be in the course of history.
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