Soldiers in a Narrow Land: The Pinochet Regime in Chile, Updated Edition / Edition 1

by Mary Helen Spooner

Overview

On September 11, 1973, a military coup in Chile overthrew the socialist government of Salvador Allende, beginning an era of political repression that lasted over sixteen years. Mary Helen Spooner takes us behind the Pinochet regime's wall of censorship, silence, and propaganda and provides an inside look at a brutal dictatorship. She traces the personal histories of key political figures, explains why many Chileans supported the regime, and reveals the fate of many of its victims. The 1998 arrest of Augusto Pinochet and resulting events serve as a reminder of his harrowing legacy. In a new preface (Paper edition) Spooner looks at how Chile has changed in the 1990s and places recent events in a larger historical context.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520221697
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	09/01/1999
Edition description:	First Edition, With a new preface
Pages:	322
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Mary Helen Spooner is a journalist who has worked in Latin America since 1977, including nine years as a foreign correspondent in Chile. She has reported for ABC News, The Economist, The Financial Times of London, and Newsweek.

Table of Contents

Preface to the Paperback Edition 
Acknowledgments 
Prologue: Chilean Voices 
Part One: The Dictator's Rise
1. Coup Plotting 
2. The Aftermath 
3· Military Government 
4· Dirty Warriors 
5· The New Institutionality 
Part Two: Dictatorship's Demise
6. Cracks in the Order 
7· Days of Rage 
8. Heroes and Villains 
g. Pinochetistas 
10. Twilight of the Dictator 
Notes 
Select Bibliography 
Index

Editorial Reviews

Freelance journalist Spooner spent most of the 1980s in Chile, where she was able to interview a wide cross section of Chileans under the military dictatorship of Gen. Augusto Pinochet. Her account stands as quality journalism, depicting the country's political life from the September 1973 coup to the restoration of civilian government under President Patricio Aylwin in March 1990. One of the first acts of that regime was the public reburial of martyred President Salvador Allende. Spooner gives more credence to the suicide version of his death in the coup than do most sources. In addition, she holds that Pinochet was initially a reluctant participant in the coup. While her account is less analytical than Pamela Constable and Arturo Valenzuela's A Nation of Enemies (LJ 8/91), it is factually sound and balanced and is rich in human details of those involved in these public events. For large public and academic libraries with significant Latin American holdings.-James Rhodes, Luther Coll., Decorah, Ia.

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