A Man Called AITA

By Joan Errea

A Man Called Aita is Joan Errea's moving, heartfelt, and honest tribute to her father, Arnaud Paris. Aita is the Basque word for "father." The sequel to her earlier book My Mama Marie, Errea's volume continues and complements her mother's history. Errea writes of her brothers Arnaud, Mike, Johnny, and Pete, her adored Uncle Otto, ranch hands, and the countless dogs, goats, sheep, horses, and cattle that make up life on the range in the Far West. Taking the form of an extended "bertsolari" - a form of improvisational Basque poetry that Arnaud was well known for - the memoir is written in accessible and soothing rhymed verse. Yet the resulting account is neither simple, nor entirely carefree: deaths, injuries, losses great and small, disease, and other challenges mark the lives of these migrants in their American adventures. A moving tribute to Errea's lost father, the book is also a testimony to a disappearing way of life on ranches in the Western United States and the place of Basques in that landscape. This love song to family, heritage, and a disappearing oral tradition is a gem of a book.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1935709828
• ISBN13: 9781935709824
• Release Date: January 2017
• Publisher: Center for Basque Studies Press
• Length: 123 Pages
• Weight: 0.44 lbs.