From geology and biology to cinema and the theatre, this ambitious
thematic encyclopedia, unique in scope and style, provides a much needed
one-volume account of all aspects of Latin America and the Caribbean.
Written by some fifty recognised experts in clear and accessible
language for the general reader and copiously illustrated with full
colour photographs, it discusses general themes as well as the
individual countries in their own right. Ranging from contemporary
economic problems, such as the debts of Brazil, Argentina and Mexico,
and events of international political importance, such as the
revolutions in Cuba and Nicaragua, through surveys of the flora and
fauna, and the emergence of first human societies to the traditions of
the samba and tango, writers such as Neruda, Borges and Garcia Marquez,
and the potent production of the Mexican muralists, the Encyclopedia
depicts lands and peoples which have long represented a distant enigma
for the outside world but can no longer remain ignored by it.