With this fascinating and theoretically sound study, Rosario Hubert has produced a key text not only in Asia-Latin American studies, but also in Latin American studies and Asian studies. In Disoriented Disciplines: China, Latin America, and the Shape of World Literature, she explores, from the theoretical perspectives of world literature and cosmopolitanism, not so much how Latin American authors have mimetically represented China in their works but, rather, how their own misreadings (hence, the “disoriented” in the title of the book) of Chinese culture allowed them to reconsider world literature and join global cross-cultural debates.

During most of the 1980s I lived in Managua, Nicaragua, as a photojournalist for Newsweek magazine. I had covered the 1979 Sandinista Revolution that sent shockwaves through Washington because Nicaragua “lost” a staunch ally against Communism. Central America had become the final battleground of the Cold War, and Washington was not about to lose another Vietnam.

Omar Torrijos, military dictator of Panama, may be one of the most understudied leaders in modern Latin American history. After seizing power in 1968, he reshaped the country’s destiny, most notably by negotiating the transfer of the Panama Canal from U.S. to Panamanian control in 1977. Up until his sudden death in 1981, he also played an outsized role in inter-American affairs.