Five Black Ships: A Novel of Magellan.

• Author: Mujica, Barbara

Once in a while a novel comes along that really succeeds in transporting the reader to another time and place, in actually making history come alive. Five Black Ships is such a book; reading it gives us a new grasp of what it meant to venture out into uncharted waters on a ship captained by a visionary who may also have been a madman.

Narrated by Juanillo Ponce, Magellan's jester, the novel tells the story of the first successful attempt to circumnavigate the earth from an insider's perspective. Unlike other members of the crew, Juanillo was not enticed to sail with Magellan by the promise of adventure or even of great riches. A solid pragmatist, he enlisted simply to keep from starving. Now, back in Spain after the voyage, he finds himself once again destitute because the new king, Philip II, has denied him the pension to which he is entitled. The narrative consists of Juanillo's petition to Charles I, Philip's father, for reinstatement of his pension. Since his name has disappeared mysteriously from the ships' rosters, Juanillo writes a detailed account of his experiences in order to prove his participation.

Even before the journey begins, evil omens create a sense of foreboding. The flagship was built of wood from the forest of Corpes, where the daughters of El Cid were raped and battered by their husbands. Furthermore, the navigational charts are the work of Ruy Faleiro, reputed to be a madman, and the secretive Magellan refuses to share them with anyone.

The sailors become jittery as soon at the fleet sets sail, for the captain general gives orders to head down the coast of Africa, instead of west across the Pacific, as the men expected. Windless skies halt the ships' movements, and the endless waiting produces boredom, then frustration, then petty squabbles. Eventually, the crew becomes desperate and some sailors show signs of derangement. When at last the fleet reaches South America, the area is so desolate that Juanillo wonders why they should even bother claiming it for the king of Spain. And still, in defiance of reason, Magellan presses on, possessed by a vision. When Andres de San Martin, the ship's pilot, guesses that the captain general intends to reach the Orient by sailing through a supposed passage on the continent, Magellan has his tongue torn out in order to silence him, for he knows the men will rebel if they get wind of his foolhardy plan. Finally, a rift between the Spaniards and the Portuguese explodes into a...