The Vortex by Jose Estacio Rivera

 

When Arturo Cova scandalizes Bogata by seducing the daughter of a wealthy family, he must flee.  He and Alicia head to the lands near the jungles of Columbia.  There Arturo discovers that Alicia is pregnant and his love for her soon starts to wane.  He starts looking around for new conquests and to discover what he will do next with his life.  The area they are in is rural and poor.  The two main occupations are owning a ranch and raising cattle or the rubber plantations.

Arturo leaves Alicia behind as he goes off with friends to try to be a cowboy.  He is chastened to learn that the real cowboys regard him as a liability, just a city slicker who wants to play at riding horses.  He never has any trouble finding friends as he goes but he also makes enemies of some of the wealthiest and most corrupt landowners.  

The novel is told in first person narrative as Arturo puts down his adventures and his reactions to the land.  He meets an older man who serves as his guide who has worked the rubber plantations for years and has the scars and debts to prove it.  Arturo documents the terrible plight of the rubber workers and how when they agree to work they are unknowingly signing up for lifetime servitude.  The owners underpay for product and vastly overcharge for the necessities of life and the workers get further and further into debt with them.  Most are scarred from beatings and disease is rampant.

Rivera was a Colombian lawyer.  He spent time in the jungles surveying the Columbian border and learned about the terrible lives of the natives and the rubber workers.  This novel, published in 1924, exposes both and was a sensation.  His depictions of the horror of the daily lives on the rubber plantations and the terrible treatment of the Indians who were routinely killed and robbed by the men who came to the jungles to exploit them.  This book is recommended for those who are interested in other cultures.