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“On 13th August 1476, the ship commanded by Christopher Columbus is shipwrecked off the Portuguese coast. The future admiral has just turned twenty-five. Miraculously, he manages to reach the coast, and finds refuge in Lisbon with his younger brother, Bartholomew, who works as a cartographer.
Ever since the beginning of the Fifteenth Century, the world has been opening up, and Portugal is the driving force behind this. The Renaissance is starting with far-flung expeditions. Taking their impetus from Henry the Navigator, caravels leave every month to explore the coasts of Africa. Lisbon, the capital of knowledge, is a melting pot for every profession associated with discovery: mathematicians specialising in the skies, cosmographers, geographers, shipwrights, makers of navigational tools… cartographers.
For eight whole years, the two brothers work together, planning the journey Christopher has been dreaming of since his adolescence: the Indes Venture, heading for Cipango (Japan) and the empire of the Great Khan (China). But, instead of the usual route, the silk route to the east, they will tackle the oceans due West.
In 1484, their project is rejected by the Committee of Scholars who advise King John II. Which is why Christopher tried his luck with the Spanish monarchs, Isabelle and Ferdinand.
A master cartographer, a rhinoceros, a widow maker, a schoolmistress for birds, a slow-witted woman, a prostitute known principally for the quality of her ears, Marco Polo, a few Dominicans, Indian-eating dogs… these are just some of the secondary characters in this book.
I wanted to get involved in this little-known period in the history of human curiosity. An time when a new freedom was born and, simultaneously, the Inquisition was developing and the Jews were being driven out. The years when the integrity of the planet was gradually understood, heralding the first globalisation which would not be long coming.
To achieve this, I allowed myself to give a voice to the younger brother, Bartholomew. He is the one narrating: he is a party to and the principal witness of the Venture from its very inception. He is also the one asking important questions: how and why did the commendable passion for Discovery turn into genocide of the Indians? What is the point of discovering if you kill what you find?”

- Erik Orsenna


Erik Orsenna, member of the Académie Française, won the Prix Goncourt for Exposition coloniale (Seuil, 1988). He is the author of Longtemps (Fayard, 1998), Madame Bâ (Stock, 2002) and more recently Voyage au pays du coton (Fayard, 2007), La Chanson de Charles Quint (Stock, 2008), L’avenir de l’eau (Fayard, 2008) and Et si on dansait?, the fourth and last volume devoted to grammar.