Witnessing and Resisting the Truth: A Memoir

Phil McEvoy: Brilliantly written, absolutely compelling story of poetic witness. Sheds life on the worst aspects of human nature and the power of refusing to turn a blind eye to brutality and terror. One of the best books I’ve ever read.

United Kingdom on Jul 16, 2022

ChrisAn: I chose to read this book because I knew very little other than footage of mothers wearing white scarves holding photos of their nearly grown children which appeared frequently on the nightly news years ago. And of course the assignation of Father Romero. I stumbled upon “What you have heard….” It does not read as a history book but more of a conversation. I found the book very helpful and particularly so in view of the current flood of asylum seekers at our border. In searching for info about Father Romero’s death in 1980, I stumbled upon an article about the assassination of Father Ricardo Cortez on August 7, 2020. So yes, what you have heard is true. There are still witnesses and there is still resistance.

United States on Feb 19, 2022

Client d'Amazon: Parfait

France on Aug 29, 2021

Lynne M Ternosky: excellent condition-like new. thank
you.

Canada on Dec 23, 2020

Client d'Amazon: This is a great and extraordinary book. It is a first-hand account of an American woman’s experience of El Salvador in the 1970s. The book left feelings that lasted for days. It achieves many things. It inspires, with the examples of ordinary people who conjured extraordinary courage to resist hellish injustice and repression. Its language and observations make the book drip with atmosphere. There isn’t a redundant word. It is a deep indictment of appalling US foreign policy in Central America, but is not at all a polemic. It just honestly and simply bears witness. It is also beautiful and refined. It is heartbreaking and uplifting, and even humorous in parts. And it is an education, about a country that few Americans know about, despite being so near. El Salvador’s history and people and natural beauty become vivid in page after page. It should be on the curriculum in every American high school. Do read it. You will never forget it.

United Kingdom on Sep 05, 2020

DaveF: This book is a powerful and painful testimony of a witness to the fomentation of the brutal civil war in El Salvador from 1979 to 1992. It is not an easy read, but it's a very important book that should be more widely read than it is. "What You Have Heard Is True" by Carolyn Forche is very relevant to the immigration mess in the United States today. The United States is culpable to the terrible violence that has wracked Central America for many decades. The U.S. has helped instigate civil wars, trained national armies, and financed terrific violence; usually perpetrated on the masses of poor in these countries. The violence continues unabated. And then our government (and particularly President Trump) are incredulous about the flow of people away from this violence and toward the U.S. The culprit, in large measure, is us!
I urge folks to read this well-written book. Be forewarned-the violence witnessed is horrible.

United States on Jul 24, 2020

Emilio Corsetti III: Carolyn Forche's book starts with a visit from a total stranger with a distant family connection. The stranger, Leonel Gomez Vides, invites Carolyn to visit his home country of El Salvador. The reason for the unusual request unfolds throughout the book. It is a journey that encompasses danger, poverty, brutality, oppression, and ultimately war. Along the way, there is a great deal of history.

Leonel's ultimate goal was to have Carolyn witness firsthand the many atrocities occurring in El Salvador with the hope that she might write about her experiences and educate Americans. This book, in many ways, achieves that goal.

Leonel turns out to be a wise sage. He teaches Carolyn about his country: the past, present and future. He shows her the best the region has to offer as well as the worst. If Leonel had been in a position to run for a free and democratic election, he would have been the type of individual who could have turned it all around.

One of my favorite sayings goes something like this: feed a man a fish and he eats for a day; teach a man to fish and he eats for a lifetime. Dictators and autocrats have a different mindset. Not only do they not teach a man...

United States on Jul 20, 2020

Tucson Felipe: Carolyn Forche is a force of literary and positive nature, powerful witness/observer and a beautiful human being. Was lucky enough to hear her read a couple times in Tucson, this volume reminds me of why I considered her so stunning.

Germany on Oct 01, 2019

Mark Hackler: 𝑊ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑌𝑜𝑢 𝐻𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝐻𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑑 𝐼𝑠 𝑇𝑟𝑢𝑒: 𝐴 𝑀𝑒𝑚𝑜𝑖𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑊𝑖𝑡𝑛𝑒𝑠𝑠 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑅𝑒𝑠𝑖𝑠𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑐𝑒 (Penguin Press, 2019) is a beautifully-written, tension-filled story by the poet and activist Carolyn Forché. She traveled throughout El Salvador between January 1979 and March 1980, during the harrowing, endless rounds of protest and murder that led to that nation's shockingly cruel civil war. Her memoir is about death by indiscretion, by trusting the wrong person, or being in the wrong place at the wrong time. She writes about what she saw, questioned, heard, and experienced, including several narrow escapes of her own from American-trained death squads. Her last meeting in the country was with Archbishop Oscar Romero, who was assassinated less than a week after he insisted that she return to the U.S. - for her own safety, yes, but also so that she could tell the American people about El Salvador.

In the 1980s, she was unable to convince Americans to oppose U.S. support for the Salvadoran government's brutal war on its own people, during which several hundred...

United States on Apr 08, 2019