traverses to its far corners over the ensuing years. Whether riding a vintage paddle-wheel steamer down the Sao Francisco River, taking a group of visiting U.S. farmers on tour, attending Carnaval, or traveling deep into a mountainside where garimpeiros search for diamonds, Geld discusses history, politics and culture."-ForeWord "Ellen Bromfield Geld couldn't have had a better teacher in all the world than her father. Her writing and her life in Brazil vividly reflect the strength of Louis Bromfield's convictions, his love of the land and the enduring importance of his legacy." --Lauren Bacall"I imagine everyone has a center of gravity," says Ellen Geld. "Something which binds one to the earth and gives sense and direction to what one does." Ellen's center of gravity is a writing table before a window that looks through the trees and down the slope to the croplands, revealing the changing scenes in a place that has become a way of life. The place is Fazenda Pau D'Alho, Brazil, where she and her husband Carson have lived and farmed since 1961. The changing scenes describe planting groves of coffee and pecans, and pasturing cattle in seas of grass. From her writing table, Ellen Geld here gives us View from the Fazenda, intricately weaving the threads of daily life on the farm into the broader pattern she has come to recognize in her quest for the knowledge of a country. Beginning with the serendipitous trip from her native Ohio to the outward reaches of Brazil, Geld provides us with a firsthand account of a remarkable adventure and an extraordinary life. Everywhere, using plain talk and warm humor, she seeks the character of a people who--arriving as immigrants or slaves, their blood and history mingled with that of native Indians--have created the true character of Brazil: a huge, diverse country, living in several eras at the same time, yet ever changing in its people's amazing ability to "find a way. |