Balboa (Masterplots II: Juvenile and Young Adult Biography Series)
At a glance:
- Author: Ronald Syme
- First Published: 1956
- Time of Work: 1492–1517
- Setting: Spain, Hispaniola, the Pearl Coast, and Darien (later Colombia and Panama)
- Principal Characters: Vasco Núñez de Balboa, Juan de la Cosa, Alonzo de Ojeda, Martin Enciso, Francisco Pizarro, Careta, Tumaco, Pedrarias Dávila, Andres Garabito
- Genres: Nonfiction, Biography
- Subjects: Sailing or sailors, Sixteenth century, Central America or Central Americans, Explorers, Biography, Spain or Spanish people, Pacific Ocean, Panama or Panamanians
- Locales: Spain, Colombia, Hispaniola, Panama
Form and Content
Balboa: Finder of the Pacific is technically a biography, as it relates most of the important events in the life of a famous figure, but Sir Ronald Syme has created a narrative that resembles an adventure story more than a personal documentary. Rather than beginning at Vasco Núñez de Balboa’s birth or tracing his family background, the story starts with a scene between the seventeen-year-old Balboa and his father at the point in his life when Balboa’s career as an explorer began. The ensuing narrative follows his life by marking out the stages of...
[The entire page is 1426 words long]
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