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Florentino Aspillaga
Montezuma II was the Aztec ruler in power when Hernán Cortés and his army arrived in the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan in 1519. Montezuma and Cortés did not speak the same language and had to rely on translators to communicate. An error in translation led Cortés to wrongfully believe that Montezuma believed Cortés to be a god and had gifted him the city. Cortés proceeded by capturing and killing Montezuma, leading to a bloody war that killed 20 million Aztecs. Gladwell presents this historical scene in the Introduction to show how misunderstanding strangers can result in deadly consequences.
Montezuma II Quotes in Talking to Strangers
The Talking to Strangers quotes below are all either spoken by Montezuma II or refer to Montezuma II. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
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Introduction Quotes
Today we are now thrown into contact all the time with people whose assumptions, perspectives, and backgrounds are different from our own. The modern world is not two brothers feuding for control of the Ottoman Empire. It is Cortés and Montezuma struggling to understanding each other through multiple layers of translators. Talking to Strangers is about why we are so bad at that act of translation.
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Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Talking to Strangers LitChart as a printable PDF.
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Montezuma II Character Timeline in Talking to Strangers
The timeline below shows where the character Montezuma II appears in Talking to Strangers. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Introduction: “Step out of the car!”
...conflict departed from this trend. The conflict between Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés and Aztec ruler Montezuma II in 1519 was between two peoples who knew nothing of each other’s cultures. When...
(full context)
...of poor translations between Spanish and the Aztec language of Nahuatl led Cortés to misinterpret Montezuma’s coded language, believing that the Aztec ruler had deemed Cortés a god and gifted him...
(full context)
