Russell-Wood, A. J. R.  The Portuguese Empire, 1415-1808: A
World on the Move.  Boston and London.  Johns Hopkins
University Press, 1998.

     World on the Move reminds the reader that Portugal was

the seminal influence in the creation of the modern,

interconnected and cosmopolitan society. Author A. J. R.

Russell-Wood (Russell hereafter) supports this claim with

chauvinistic zeal certain to satisfy his patrons at the

National Commission for the Commemoration of Portuguese

Discovery.  Russell is chiefly interested in the globally-

scoped Portuguese empire, with its complicated inter-

relations and mobility, and seeks to erase the artificial

demarcations of time, geography and discipline, because

these separations detract from full comprehension of early

Portuguese grandeur.  The global picture, the longue duree

is his chosen scope. (xx).

     Russell laments the willingness of historians of

Portugal and of empire to segment their work, defaulting to

the isolated and isolating monograph.  These many monographs

provide material for Russell's world-historicizing eye; he

synthesizes the works into larger systems, and calls on

other authors to meet, collaborate and do more along these

lines (245).  As was the case with Icelandic history in

Kirsten A. Seaver's Frozen Echo, Portugal's relatively small

(if far-flung) size and narrow chronology of importance

allow Russell to be familiar with presumably every important

monograph on the subject.  Although his range is catholic,

he shows a marked favoritism for the work of Charles R.

Boxer, showing a string of twenty-five works cited by that

author alone.

     The structure of the work hinges on the concept of

mobility (social, commercial, military, and literal movement

of commodities and people).  By building the work on this

conceit Russell sets up the reader is to draw parallels with

the current hyper-mobile world.  This analog reinforces the

argument that imperial Portugal was crucial in the creating

of this [post-]modern world.  To help resist the urge to

pigeonhole by chronology, Russell presents a series of

thematic sections, in three parts.  The first part , a

single chapter, "Portugal and the 'Age of Discoveries,'"

illustrates the natural challenges facing Portugal

(relatively small in size, population, and resources).  This

sets up his later discussion of Portuguese pragmatism in

maintaining control (in the widest sense) over its empire.

It also introduces the manner of the decline of the Empire

when aggressed by locals or competing empires: "The strength

of the Portuguese became their Achilles tendon (23)."

Unfortunately, the most interesting claim in this section

(and perhaps the entire work), that Portuguese honor has

been usurped by a Hispanicization of proper Portuguese

names, remains undeveloped (4).

     The next part contains chapters on transport (physical

mobility), migration (social, governmental, religious,

commercial, and microbial mobility), and commodities

(logistics of product mobility).  This part is the strongest

and these chapters could likely stand alone in a separate

volume, though the conscious rejection of chronology results

in a lurching, disjointed style which seems bent on refusing

any discrimination which might leave out anything

Portuguese.  The reader who prefers a survey, a litany, will

be most at home here.

     The last part of this work is the most promising and

least fulfilling.  The section on zoological, botanical, and

cultural exchanges seems skimpy after the wide traverses in

the previous section.  The section on "Dissemination of

Flora and Fauna" seems out of place and even confused.

Russell starts this chapter with the claim that "the

Portuguese were to play a major role as primary and

secondary carries in the global dissemination of cultivated

plants (148) and then a few pages later oddly asserts that

he is not claiming "Portuguese primacy as disseminators of a

plant from one region to another (157)."    In the last

chapter Russell again concentrates on movement and mobility,

this time missing the opportunity to develop and discussion

of  Portuguese inconography (216) and non-travel literature

(210).

     World on the Move had its title demoted to subtitle for

this second printing.  Perhaps this is an indication that

the mobility issue was not the most useful fulcrum for this

"compensatory history (xiii)".


http://www.mousetrap.net/~mouse/uta/transatlantic/