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Bolivar: The Liberator of Latin America
A monumental biography that "captures the passion and frenzy in this extraordinary life" ( Kirkus Reviews ) and is at once "masterful" and "ideal for general readers" ( Booklist , starred review)
Simón Bolívar freed no fewer than what were to become six countries—a vast domain some 800,000 square miles in extent—from Spanish colonial rule in savage wars against the then-mightiest military machine on earth. The ferocity of his leadership and fighting earned him the grudging nickname “the devil” from his enemies. His astonishing resilience in the face of military defeat and seemingly hopeless odds, as well his equestrian feat of riding tens of thousands of miles across what remains one of the most inhospitable territories on the planet, earned him the name Culo de Hierro —Iron Ass—among his soldiers. It was one of the most spectacular military campaigns in history, fought against the backdrop of the Andean mountains, through immense flooded savannas, jungles, and shimmering deserts. Indeed, the war itself was medieval—fought under warlords across huge spaces by horsemen with lances, and infantry with knives and machetes (as well as muskets). It was the last warriors’ war.
Although the creator of the northern half of Latin America, Bolívar inspired the whole continent and still does today. This is Robert Harvey’s astonishing, gripping, and beautifully researched biography of one of South America’s most cherished heroes and one of the world’s most accomplished military leaders by any standard.
Simón Bolívar freed no fewer than what were to become six countries—a vast domain some 800,000 square miles in extent—from Spanish colonial rule in savage wars against the then-mightiest military machine on earth. The ferocity of his leadership and fighting earned him the grudging nickname “the devil” from his enemies. His astonishing resilience in the face of military defeat and seemingly hopeless odds, as well his equestrian feat of riding tens of thousands of miles across what remains one of the most inhospitable territories on the planet, earned him the name Culo de Hierro —Iron Ass—among his soldiers. It was one of the most spectacular military campaigns in history, fought against the backdrop of the Andean mountains, through immense flooded savannas, jungles, and shimmering deserts. Indeed, the war itself was medieval—fought under warlords across huge spaces by horsemen with lances, and infantry with knives and machetes (as well as muskets). It was the last warriors’ war.
Although the creator of the northern half of Latin America, Bolívar inspired the whole continent and still does today. This is Robert Harvey’s astonishing, gripping, and beautifully researched biography of one of South America’s most cherished heroes and one of the world’s most accomplished military leaders by any standard.
432 pages, Paperback
First published June 1, 2011
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
September 5, 2018
Very understandable and readable version, but disappointed that was not footnoted or sources of quotes readily identified.
February 27, 2025
4.5/5
Simón Bolívar was a larger-than-life figure, and he had to be to achieve the military and political heights that he did. Forced to flee his homeland multiple times in the face of defeat, he remained undeterred in his desire to see Venezuela—and South America at large—free from Spanish rule. “He was on par with Tamerlane, Genghis Khan, Alexander the Great, and Augustus Caesar… personally cover[ing] around 16,000 miles on horseback,” traversing both swampy savannas and the snow-capped Andes multiple times. He was an unstoppable force, consistently taking bold risks in his campaigns—sometimes to great success, sometimes to failure, but always with the same audacity.
Beyond his military achievements, what is perhaps more remarkable is that a wealthy aristocrat like Bolívar arrived at such high ideals of equality when envisioning his new nation-state. He did not begin his journey with these convictions, but over time, his fully realized worldview was an admirable one. He didn’t just speak of freeing enslaved and Indigenous people—he enacted those policies swiftly as he expanded the jurisdiction of Gran Colombia. Though imperfect—his constitutional designs concentrated executive power, which could easily lend themselves to autocratic rule—his convictions aligned with core modern ideals of liberty and equality. Unfortunately, many of his reforms unraveled after his death, and while his vision for a united South America never materialized, his legacy endured. It is no surprise that Bolívar became a symbolic figure invoked by military governments across Latin America, often to justify their own versions of high-minded ideals.
This book has left me eager to explore the history of Gran Colombia after Bolívar’s death and how he indirectly shaped the continent’s politics for the next century and a half, as the book suggests.
A great read, offering valuable insight into the key figures—both patriot and Spanish—who played crucial roles in the war.
Simón Bolívar was a larger-than-life figure, and he had to be to achieve the military and political heights that he did. Forced to flee his homeland multiple times in the face of defeat, he remained undeterred in his desire to see Venezuela—and South America at large—free from Spanish rule. “He was on par with Tamerlane, Genghis Khan, Alexander the Great, and Augustus Caesar… personally cover[ing] around 16,000 miles on horseback,” traversing both swampy savannas and the snow-capped Andes multiple times. He was an unstoppable force, consistently taking bold risks in his campaigns—sometimes to great success, sometimes to failure, but always with the same audacity.
Beyond his military achievements, what is perhaps more remarkable is that a wealthy aristocrat like Bolívar arrived at such high ideals of equality when envisioning his new nation-state. He did not begin his journey with these convictions, but over time, his fully realized worldview was an admirable one. He didn’t just speak of freeing enslaved and Indigenous people—he enacted those policies swiftly as he expanded the jurisdiction of Gran Colombia. Though imperfect—his constitutional designs concentrated executive power, which could easily lend themselves to autocratic rule—his convictions aligned with core modern ideals of liberty and equality. Unfortunately, many of his reforms unraveled after his death, and while his vision for a united South America never materialized, his legacy endured. It is no surprise that Bolívar became a symbolic figure invoked by military governments across Latin America, often to justify their own versions of high-minded ideals.
This book has left me eager to explore the history of Gran Colombia after Bolívar’s death and how he indirectly shaped the continent’s politics for the next century and a half, as the book suggests.
A great read, offering valuable insight into the key figures—both patriot and Spanish—who played crucial roles in the war.
February 13, 2020
Solid, if not spectacular biography of Simon Bolivar. Hard to condense his life into a single volume, though the author does an adequate job telling he narrative. I do wish that the author spent more time analyzing how events in his early life and exile would drive decisions Bolivar would later make in the wars for liberation.
August 20, 2023
Interesting book and an interesting life. It's full of battles after battles which is something I'm usually not fond of reading. I think Harvey wrote a balanced portrait of Bolivar--I came away with mixed feelings about him. It's an interesting book to read along with Marie Arana's Silver, Sword, and Stone: Three Crucibles in the Latin American StorySilver, Sword, and Stone.
June 26, 2011
One country's demi-god can be another's historical relic.
Simon Bolivar's profile in the United States is not a prominent one. Years ago there was a chapter somewhere in the elementary or middle school textbooks, but beyond that this prominent figure has not been the subject of an HBO miniseries, a biopic starring Antonio Banderas, or any such pop culture effluvia.
Robert Harvey has set out to change that in "Bolivar: The Liberator of Latin America."
He writes of his subject, "Yet as soldier, statesman and man of common humanity he stands head and shoulders above any other figure that Latin America has ever produced and amongst the greatest men in global history."
Given South America's status as perennial political delinquent and woeful economic laggard, the first half of his proposition is neither hard to argue with, nor much of a claim.
It is in support of the second that Harvey, a one-time scribe for the "Daily Telegraph" and "The Economist," sets out to make a case.
The task is a challenging one, not because of Bolivar's accomplishments, which were myriad and impressive, rather due to the staggering size and complexity of the continent in question, and the subject's disappointing lapses in judgment or, worse, humanity.
Harvey's recounting is an A to Z affair, tarrying long on the young Bolivar's development as a dissolute young man privileged enough to steep in the thought of Rousseau and the Europe where his writings were all the contemporary rage.
It's a portrait of another time and a disappeared class of person groomed with patience for whatever great feats might be in the offing.
Here is the budding Liberator loping through the old country, from romance to romance, landmark to landmark, musing upon his destiny, brimming with a proprietary sense of the glory that is his due.
Early on, Harvey takes an unorthodox detour into the biography of Francisco de Miranda, a revolutionary forerunner to Bolivar, and the victim of a fatal betrayal at the younger man's hands.
Yes, the two men's destinies were intertwined. And no discussion of the continent's revolutionary period would be complete without covering Miranda's career trajectory, but this section runs so long one forgets that Bolivar is the subject at hand.
Nonetheless, Miranda's life, his jaunt through 19th century Europe in particular, was so interesting and extraordinary, it is easy to see how Harvey could not help himself.
As they say in the sporting world, "No harm, no foul."
The narrative, which conveys the scope and workings of Spain's empire, the complex social and racial components of the continent's far-ranging regions, and the endless rivalries of the warlords driving the epoch, are rendered breezily.
Mr. Harvey does not hide his admiration for Simon Bolivar, nor does he make an effort at concealing his many flaws.
A former member of British Parliament, Mr. Harvey knows well the cracked armor of any beloved public figure. He seems to understand that, for the great and ambitious man, most success is seen through a rearview mirror, while the life itself is a torturous swim from shipwreck to shipwreck.
Bolivar did not rise up, whole, to save the struggling masses of Ibero-America.
He had a strong sense that the Spanish should be booted from their colonial holdings, but his first attempt found him on the side of Venezuela's privileged "criollo" classes and at odds with a rather ferocious hodgepodge of Indians, slaves, poor whites, and any admixture of the three.
It seems that the coalition he assembled to oust the Spaniards through military violence was one of convenience that required a constant re-cobbling.
Bolivar delivered Miranda into Spanish hands and imprisonment at Cadiz, Spain, where he died. He ordered the slaughter of 800 political prisoners under his command, slept with an unseemly number of women, and subjected his armies to terrible suffering and staggering losses with mad, never-say-die, strategies.
Harvey does not whitewash or reason these excesses away, rather attempts to place them within the context of the times in which they occurred. Whether he succeeds or not will depend upon the politics and sensibility of each reader.
The first third of the book, concerned as it is with Miranda's and Bolivar's development in the hothouse of European political thought, makes for great storytelling. The second part, covering the military effort, might have fallen into the familiar memes of war reporting (feints, out-flankings, charges, and counterattacks) were it not for the staggering topography Bolivar alternately battled and turned to his advantage, and which Harvey renders with color and passion.
The final part details Bolivar's attempt at the consolidation of those places from which the Spaniards had been chased into something governable -- the Liberator as statesman and politician -- and is marked by the melancholy his lack of success wrought.
The failures signify personal shortcomings only to the extent Bolivar could not be the best in every arena he proactively strode into.
Harvey's portrait is that of a true Renaissance man who excelled as a general, but was also a fair hand at writing political tracts, wooing the ladies, dancing, and envisioning a framework for the coexistence of disparate peoples across a sprawling landmass.
It is the portrait of an interesting man living a rather breathtaking story.
Simon Bolivar's profile in the United States is not a prominent one. Years ago there was a chapter somewhere in the elementary or middle school textbooks, but beyond that this prominent figure has not been the subject of an HBO miniseries, a biopic starring Antonio Banderas, or any such pop culture effluvia.
Robert Harvey has set out to change that in "Bolivar: The Liberator of Latin America."
He writes of his subject, "Yet as soldier, statesman and man of common humanity he stands head and shoulders above any other figure that Latin America has ever produced and amongst the greatest men in global history."
Given South America's status as perennial political delinquent and woeful economic laggard, the first half of his proposition is neither hard to argue with, nor much of a claim.
It is in support of the second that Harvey, a one-time scribe for the "Daily Telegraph" and "The Economist," sets out to make a case.
The task is a challenging one, not because of Bolivar's accomplishments, which were myriad and impressive, rather due to the staggering size and complexity of the continent in question, and the subject's disappointing lapses in judgment or, worse, humanity.
Harvey's recounting is an A to Z affair, tarrying long on the young Bolivar's development as a dissolute young man privileged enough to steep in the thought of Rousseau and the Europe where his writings were all the contemporary rage.
It's a portrait of another time and a disappeared class of person groomed with patience for whatever great feats might be in the offing.
Here is the budding Liberator loping through the old country, from romance to romance, landmark to landmark, musing upon his destiny, brimming with a proprietary sense of the glory that is his due.
Early on, Harvey takes an unorthodox detour into the biography of Francisco de Miranda, a revolutionary forerunner to Bolivar, and the victim of a fatal betrayal at the younger man's hands.
Yes, the two men's destinies were intertwined. And no discussion of the continent's revolutionary period would be complete without covering Miranda's career trajectory, but this section runs so long one forgets that Bolivar is the subject at hand.
Nonetheless, Miranda's life, his jaunt through 19th century Europe in particular, was so interesting and extraordinary, it is easy to see how Harvey could not help himself.
As they say in the sporting world, "No harm, no foul."
The narrative, which conveys the scope and workings of Spain's empire, the complex social and racial components of the continent's far-ranging regions, and the endless rivalries of the warlords driving the epoch, are rendered breezily.
Mr. Harvey does not hide his admiration for Simon Bolivar, nor does he make an effort at concealing his many flaws.
A former member of British Parliament, Mr. Harvey knows well the cracked armor of any beloved public figure. He seems to understand that, for the great and ambitious man, most success is seen through a rearview mirror, while the life itself is a torturous swim from shipwreck to shipwreck.
Bolivar did not rise up, whole, to save the struggling masses of Ibero-America.
He had a strong sense that the Spanish should be booted from their colonial holdings, but his first attempt found him on the side of Venezuela's privileged "criollo" classes and at odds with a rather ferocious hodgepodge of Indians, slaves, poor whites, and any admixture of the three.
It seems that the coalition he assembled to oust the Spaniards through military violence was one of convenience that required a constant re-cobbling.
Bolivar delivered Miranda into Spanish hands and imprisonment at Cadiz, Spain, where he died. He ordered the slaughter of 800 political prisoners under his command, slept with an unseemly number of women, and subjected his armies to terrible suffering and staggering losses with mad, never-say-die, strategies.
Harvey does not whitewash or reason these excesses away, rather attempts to place them within the context of the times in which they occurred. Whether he succeeds or not will depend upon the politics and sensibility of each reader.
The first third of the book, concerned as it is with Miranda's and Bolivar's development in the hothouse of European political thought, makes for great storytelling. The second part, covering the military effort, might have fallen into the familiar memes of war reporting (feints, out-flankings, charges, and counterattacks) were it not for the staggering topography Bolivar alternately battled and turned to his advantage, and which Harvey renders with color and passion.
The final part details Bolivar's attempt at the consolidation of those places from which the Spaniards had been chased into something governable -- the Liberator as statesman and politician -- and is marked by the melancholy his lack of success wrought.
The failures signify personal shortcomings only to the extent Bolivar could not be the best in every arena he proactively strode into.
Harvey's portrait is that of a true Renaissance man who excelled as a general, but was also a fair hand at writing political tracts, wooing the ladies, dancing, and envisioning a framework for the coexistence of disparate peoples across a sprawling landmass.
It is the portrait of an interesting man living a rather breathtaking story.
October 25, 2023
I did not finish this book.
I first learned of Simón Bolivar from the Civilization videogame series and checked him out on Wikipedia. For being such a major figure of history I'm surprised I don't remember ever having been taught about him. With all that being said, I also would've expected a better biography of him.
Many of the chapters weren't even about him, they were about completely other people that we didn't need their entire story. Would not recommend.
I first learned of Simón Bolivar from the Civilization videogame series and checked him out on Wikipedia. For being such a major figure of history I'm surprised I don't remember ever having been taught about him. With all that being said, I also would've expected a better biography of him.
Many of the chapters weren't even about him, they were about completely other people that we didn't need their entire story. Would not recommend.
April 10, 2025
A lot of names and places and action told factually and not as a novel. I learned a lot about that piece of history, but was often bogged down by all the information. Great research, but I think I was looking for a lighter, story form. I did love all the direct excerpts from letters.
September 26, 2020
Good. Focused more on his military campaigns, but otherwise, not a lot of new material here.
May 12, 2021
A good book, though it would be interesting to see what a Latin American author would make of him.
June 21, 2018
Wonderful book. Traces the development of the revolutionary process in the Americas. I like the way the author places the liberation process of South America in historical and global context. I love the way the battles were described by the author, easy to place one in the middle of the action through the campaigns. The book gives the reader a perspective of Bolivar as the hero he was but also as the flawed human being he was. Instead of the deity that he has made to be.
June 9, 2014
Few die having their name synonymous with a word. "Liberator" Bolivar was one. This biography’s excellent writing focuses on the aristocrat-turned-revolutionary’s spot in history. Simon Bolivar was born into a top Venezuelan family and steeped in European thought, especially the theories of Rousseau. He was of mixed heritage, European but also, most likely, of African and indigenous blood, and this helped shape his views on equality. Bolivar’s grand tour of Europe widened his thinking on liberalism as well as started his ferocious libertine ways.
Bolivar detested the backward Spanish domination of its American colonies. Four times, he led rebellions in Venezuela. The first three ended horribly, with bloodshed that destroyed much of Venezuela’s middle and upper classes and ruined its economy. The fourth time, a wiser Bolivar succeeded beyond the dreams of any but himself, as few men have ever been so self-assured or so single-handedly focused on a goal.
The military genius of Bolivar ranks with Napoleon and Hannibal. But the Alps are foothills compared to the Andes, the world's second highest mountain range. Bolivar's audacity defeated a Spanish Army of superior numbers, resources and military technology. He led his ragtag patriot army over more than ten thousand miles of terrain thought to be impassable, famously securing Venezuela by sneaking across unmapped Andean territory to seize Bogota, capital of the adjacent Spanish colony, from behind.
Bolivar dreamed to rid Spanish America of the Spanish and he personally led armies that freed modern-day Venezuela, Colombia, Panama, Ecuador, Peru, and Upper Peru, later renamed Bolivia in his honor. Like Napoleon, he left new constitutions in his wake, abolishing slavery and, less successfully, instituting equality before the law and reforming land ownership.
The great man had his failings, both ethical and strategic. Bolivar's dream of a sort of United States of Latin America came to naught, even in his lifetime, and was highly improbable when uniting such disparate colonies. It would have taken a far more subtle and patient politician to placate the propertied classes, the warlords, and the poor masses in each of the many lands. Peru, Colombia and Venezuela are famous for their breath-taking variety in geography, racial mix, terrain and climatology, and the cultural differences that resulted from geographic isolation. Bolivar died with his dream fraying, betrayed at most every turn by fickle allies.
Author Robert Harvey admirably explores Bolivar the man, his dalliances with countless women, his complicated psyche, and his tragic ending. That Bolivar was unable to fully replace authoritarian Spain with stable, representative democracy got the newly independent republics off to starts that quickly landed in dictatorships. The legacy shows in the region’s two centuries of endless civil wars, the inner strife that continues to this day in a land of caudillos, limitless corruption, personality cults like Hugo Chavez, frequent ruler overthrows such as those suffered by Bolivia, and the barbarism of rebel movements like Peru’s Shining Path.
This biography also explores the other important allies of Bolivar, many of whose names now adorn Andean polities, like Sucre and Santa Cruz, and especially, Francisco Miranda, the dreamer who hoped to be the first liberator of Venezuela and was betrayed by Bolivar, in one of the lesser actions of the great man's life.
Bolivar detested the backward Spanish domination of its American colonies. Four times, he led rebellions in Venezuela. The first three ended horribly, with bloodshed that destroyed much of Venezuela’s middle and upper classes and ruined its economy. The fourth time, a wiser Bolivar succeeded beyond the dreams of any but himself, as few men have ever been so self-assured or so single-handedly focused on a goal.
The military genius of Bolivar ranks with Napoleon and Hannibal. But the Alps are foothills compared to the Andes, the world's second highest mountain range. Bolivar's audacity defeated a Spanish Army of superior numbers, resources and military technology. He led his ragtag patriot army over more than ten thousand miles of terrain thought to be impassable, famously securing Venezuela by sneaking across unmapped Andean territory to seize Bogota, capital of the adjacent Spanish colony, from behind.
Bolivar dreamed to rid Spanish America of the Spanish and he personally led armies that freed modern-day Venezuela, Colombia, Panama, Ecuador, Peru, and Upper Peru, later renamed Bolivia in his honor. Like Napoleon, he left new constitutions in his wake, abolishing slavery and, less successfully, instituting equality before the law and reforming land ownership.
The great man had his failings, both ethical and strategic. Bolivar's dream of a sort of United States of Latin America came to naught, even in his lifetime, and was highly improbable when uniting such disparate colonies. It would have taken a far more subtle and patient politician to placate the propertied classes, the warlords, and the poor masses in each of the many lands. Peru, Colombia and Venezuela are famous for their breath-taking variety in geography, racial mix, terrain and climatology, and the cultural differences that resulted from geographic isolation. Bolivar died with his dream fraying, betrayed at most every turn by fickle allies.
Author Robert Harvey admirably explores Bolivar the man, his dalliances with countless women, his complicated psyche, and his tragic ending. That Bolivar was unable to fully replace authoritarian Spain with stable, representative democracy got the newly independent republics off to starts that quickly landed in dictatorships. The legacy shows in the region’s two centuries of endless civil wars, the inner strife that continues to this day in a land of caudillos, limitless corruption, personality cults like Hugo Chavez, frequent ruler overthrows such as those suffered by Bolivia, and the barbarism of rebel movements like Peru’s Shining Path.
This biography also explores the other important allies of Bolivar, many of whose names now adorn Andean polities, like Sucre and Santa Cruz, and especially, Francisco Miranda, the dreamer who hoped to be the first liberator of Venezuela and was betrayed by Bolivar, in one of the lesser actions of the great man's life.
July 25, 2014
A very enjoyable read about a man not too many people know about. It's hard to find books on Latin American history; glad I discovered this one. I highly recommend.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews